Womble walks around London: Day 2 Hatton Cross to Uxbridge

This retracing your steps thing is going to be interesting each day. At the end of a day you want to go home, so you might cover some of the same ground. The next day, you have to get back to yesterday's stop point. So I get to visit Uxbridge twice having never been there before. Things to note so far: the toilets are right at the back of the shopping centre and there's a fairly old church bang in the middle of the High Street opposite the station, looking quite out of place.

Anyway, back to Hatton Cross. Sorry to state the bleedin' obvious, but Heathrow is massive, isn't it. Incredible how many people want get from A to B where they are far enough from each other to fly. Does anyone know what proportion of the world's population is in the air at any one time? Of course, there is a huge knock on benefit for the local economy but how awful is it to live in a house where the planes are almost touching your roof every two minutes? And it's still £300k+ for a 3 bed house.

Ok if you're a plane spotter

The first bit of my walk saw me go off path as I was confronted with water and mud. I wasn't ready to submit my nice new Merrells to that just yet! Crane Valley Park continued meandering through scrubby paths with the odd butterfly and a mystery white bird that escaped before I could snap it. Cranford Countryside Park was altogether more pleasant with large expanses of space with the River Crane still along one side. I think it used to be part of the estate of the Earl of Berkeley, bought in 1618 from Sir Roger Aston.

Behind the ruins of the Berkeleys' mansion is a very lovely church, St Dunstan's, which has been there in some form since being mentioned in the Domesday Book. It's a small church with massive memorials and has been well kept and restored over the years.

Sir Roger Aston & family

Having escaped Heathrow you'd think it might get a bit quieter but no, you have the M4 to negotiate (by tunnel) and later the hum of the M25. Finally, I reached the Grand Union Canal which was to provide much of the route for the rest of the day. At times it was really depressing. So much litter and detritus but also signs of people living by the side of the canal and I don't mean in boats. In my line of work you can spot a sleeping place, a bit out of the way, with a few items strewn about, hopefully under some cover. There's been a lot in the news recently (if you're a Radio 4 person!) about canal boats and the rights that people have to live in one place or whether they have to be continuously cruising. However, the bits of the GUC that I walked today were so quiet, and it was a Bank Holiday when you think some pleasure cruising might be going on, that you wonder why a radical re-think of the liveaboard rules might not go some small way to helping people find alternative affordable accommodation. I can't even imagine how busy the canals might have been when they were used to transport timber, coal etc around the country.

I revisited my telecoms days with a diversion through Stockley Park. The site was developed from 1985 and BT took a couple of buildings as it's so handy for Heathrow. Indeed, I used it to host my European meetings (get me!). 250 acres were also 'transformed' into a golf course and country park. It was pleasant and had much less litter than many of the other parks I'd been through so far.

The day had started a bit grey but the sun came out for a while and there were some lovely shots of the canals, it wasn't all doom and gloom!

Cowley Peachy Junction looking back at the GUC

Cowley Peachy Junction looking at the Slough Arm of the GUC

Cowley Peach Junction looking up the GUC

Apparently, the 5 mile Slough Arm of the GUC was virtually the last canal built in this country. By contrast, Slough is now going to benefit from Crossrail and house prices are already shooting up in anticipation of services starting in 2019. This bit of the canal did have its moments though, including a short aqueduct to take the canal over a river! Not far from here were the Little Britain lakes which were pretty.

The Colne Valley Park was long and thin but with a delight thrown in at the end - a pair of swans and five cygnets! I saw the male first, then the female. When I saw the cygnets caution took a grip very quickly. I wasn't right up close but I was within angry running swan distance. Anyway, I managed to take some pictures without any incident.