The view from the hill.

Thursday 17 January 2013, Primrose Hill

I am loving this winter weather ! These cold yet dry days are perfect for roaming London, especially as there seems to be fewer people about. I had heard that Primrose Hill had good views over London and I am pretty sure I have never been there before so today seemed like the perfect day for another walk.

I caught the tube to Marble Arch and then walked up Baker St as I wanted to at least pass the Sherlock Holmes Museum. I did think about visiting but a large group of (I am assuming) Chinese had just gone in and I knew it would quite crowded in the small space. I may go back as I have long been fascinated by the famous detective.

It is a short hop from the museum to Regents Park and I am not sure if I have actually been there either, I would like to think I have visited in the past, but have no recollection at all. The park had very few visitors which was perfect and I was really surprised at how frozen the lake was. I was not tempted to walk on it myself of course, but the gulls were definitely walking on water.

I then skirted the rest of the park and followed Regents Canal around to the bottom of Primrose Hill, the canal is tidier here than in Hackney and while there is a small amount of graf on some of the walls there is no street art to look at. Different suburbs with different priorities !

I wandered up Primrose hill for the famous view, and was not overly impressed really, it is more of a lump than a hill, even by Auckland standards – and Auckland’s hills are often mocked by those from other New Zealand cities for being merely large humps. It was nice up there and is probably beautiful (and crowded) on a really clear day.

The short and steeper section near the top seemed to be very popular with runners doing circuits, I watched them for a while, running ever slower laps up and down the triangular path. I really surprised myself by not being jealous. Normally when I see people run I immediately want to join them and capture that rush of endorphins I get when a hard run has been completed. For some reason I am just not into a running groove at the moment, even a week ago I was running happily – yet this week I have zero motivation. It is not a situation I am happy about either, but that is not making me want to run!

Picking up the canal again I followed it down into Camden Town.

I went for a brief back street walk looking for street art, and surprised myself by finding almost none, perhaps I should have done some research first, though I did like this old car.

Not finding much else to see or somewhere that had the food I wanted to eat, nor the indoor space I wanted to eat it in, I went home again.

Happy to have seen more of this lovely city !