Monday 16 January 2012

London Loop - Upminster Bridge to Harold Wood


We walked the next section of the loop today, albeit a much shorter one than before in order to break up a too long section; in total it was roughly four and a half miles.
We started back at Upminster Bridge, in sight of the windmill that is in Upminster itself, and after a short walk through a nice housing estate we came across it again while crossing a railway bridge.  It is about two hundred years old and was still being used up until the 1930’s.



From here we passed through three frosty fields, although the sun was surprisingly warm.  It was good that the fields were frosty since they would otherwise have been quite muddy.  In one of them sat two old leather sofas, on which sat some teenagers.  It’s a situation I only ever imagined happening in American films, but maybe that’s where they got the idea from.

 
At the far edge of another field was a pony having either a late breakfast or an early lunch.  He took very little notice of us since his food was obviously far more interesting.

 
A nice stroll across the Ingrebourne again and through some lovely damp smelling woods before we hit upon what we both hope will be the nastiest part of the whole loop; roughly one mile of walking alongside a busy road, only half of it with actual pavement, the rest with grassed verge.  Not nice.
However, we were rewarded by getting to Pages Wood, a lovely area with paths going all over the place, trees and this very cute ‘Duck’ bench.  It would be lovely to have somewhere like it very close by in which you could spend an hour just strolling. 

 
The woods fed into Harold Wood Park, which was very large and would be a great place to play and spend time.  I have to admit that the cricket ground and pavilion looked lovely and I could imagine it being a great place to play.  From here it was just another short walk to Harold Wood station and the end of this walk.

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