Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Walk across the M25 to a different century and King James's palace
The other day we wanted to go for a walk somewhere a bit more countryfied that our neck of the woods, but didn't want to travel too far. I love the area around the Forty Hall. So, I took a look at the OS map and made the bold choice of a walk from Whitewebbs Lane across the M25. I was pleasantly surprised.
We started the walk by parking the car in the lay-by/car park outside the entrance to the Whitewebbs gold course and Toby pub (Yes, ex-communicate me, we drove there). From there it's a short walk back in the direction of the A10 to reach the footpath to Cheshunt, next to the driveway for a stables. At the moment the entrance is getting a little overgrown and could easily be missed if you're not a little watchful.
After skirting alongside various paddocks, you emerge into open fields. A couple of minutes further on, off to the south stood a huge old barn. It's in a sorry state and very atmospheric with it, it is too. It looks like it's in the grounds of a house. I do hope the owners are going to save it - or if not, that they keep it strong enough so it doesn't collapse.
You pass through the next hedgerow and then it really begins to feel like you're deep in the countryside.
It's odd though because there's a real dissonance between what your eyes see and what your ears are telling you. Five minutes further on and you're standing at the bottom of the slope that takes you up to a substantial pedestrian bridge spanning six lanes of traffic of the M25. (I can't imagine that the expense of this relatively little used bridge would be countenanced today). For much of the walk, the noise of the M25 is part of the soundscape. Welcome it on its own terms, or don't walk this walk.
As you float above wave after wave of traffic, looking back towards the pastoral scene we'd just quit, we noticed a fabulous view of the City and Docklands. Who'd'a' thunk the land here is so high.
Once safely across to the other side, easing your way past overhanging branches of cherry and respectfully nudging the brambles aside, it doesn't take long before the whooshing rush of traffic hurrying goodness knows where, begins to fade (though, truth to tell, it's another 20 minutes before it goes completely). And, once again, you feel like you're back in another century, looking across fields of wheat ready to clothe themselves in their harvest-time best.
It's difficult to believe what you've just left behind you.
A little further on and you reach a track called Theobalds Lane almost opposite Theobold's Manor.
This early-mid eighteenth century red brick house, formerly known as Old Park Farmhouse is on the Theobold's estate. It's the smaller of its two large houses. The other one is known as Theobold House. But it has a more noble past than that name suggests.
The current building is another from the eighteenth century. Its Tudor predecessor was more extensive and was referred to as Theobold’s Palace. It was built by Sir William Cecil, the Lord High Treasurer of England, in 1571. Nearly forty years later, so taken was King James with the house, that in 1607, he persuaded Cecil's son to exchange the property for Hatfield House, the family’s seat ever since.
The house is now part of a hotel/country club set-up called Birch. As much as I love tea (and a bit of cake) that didn't sound like my cup of it. So we turned left, crossed the track and continued north on the footpath, crossing more pastures and crop-fields.
Just as the sound of the M25 faded to almost nothing, we reached one of several narrow country lanes all blanketed in summer hedgerows.
It's all feels very countryside....until you turn the next corner and you get a sense of how swathes of this neck of the woods are being appropriated for housing for the well-heeled. And the message is that you're very certainly not welcome. All gates are very firmly closed and mostly tall enough to keep you out - and you get the sense that that's definitely where they want you.
There were one or two mid-Victorian houses that had a much more open feel and hadn't shut the world out. I liked those. I didn't like the feel of these others.
We walked along Barrow Lane and Halstead Hill and then turned into Silver Lane. About a kilometre further on, the footpath returns to the lanes and you turn into Woodgreen farm, (there were a few houses using Woodgreen in the name. So I assume this little area must be a namesake of our near neighbour).
After passing through yet another stables, (the owners of which, Judging by the signs of welcome, seem to wish the footpath didn't pass through their patch), you shortly reach a long straight trackway which my OS map told me was called Oldpark ride. I assume that at some point in the last 500 years, it was the Theobalds equivalent of Hyde Park's rotten row.
We'd meant to deviate from the loop walk and go on a bit, to see the old Temple Bar that once stood across Fleet Street as the City's main ceremonial entrance. It was brought to Theobolds by brewer Henry Meux in 1880, when the City Corporation wanted to widen to road.
Before we committed to the detour, something nagging in the back of my mind led me to check on the bar's whereabouts. Luckily, for us, I did so just in time to find that the bar had been moved back to the City in 2004 and is now the entrance to the Paternoster Square development by St Paul's Cathedral.
So we re-joined the path, re-crossed the hustle-bustle of the traffic-river and made it home in time for tea.
The walk was about five miles. There were enough discoveries in it to satisfy me, as well as some deep green to luxuriate in. I could have done without the houses with the stay-away-from-what's-all-mine-mine-mine gates, but they were easy enough to cock-a-snoop at as we walked on by. All in all, a nice afternoon's diversion.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Martin (Woodside) on
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Very nice. I've been walking the area with an old schoolfriend for some years Hugh, thanks also to Crews Hill being the last stop on the Oyster card. This has given me some ideas for alternative routes as I've never used that footbridge before but have seen it on the map. A walk from Cuffley Station (I buy a one-stop extension ticket at AP station) to Crews Hill nurseries past the postcard cottage at Burnt Farm Ride (and apparent eccentric owner) is a favourite, you get to walk under Soper's viaduct. The life of Lady Meux is a good read in itself, she used to use zebras to pull her coach rather than horses. Her 28G shotgun complete with original presentation box was recently auctioned at Holts and was sold for around £15k. No walk ends without a pint, usually in the Plough.
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Permalink Reply by Hugh on
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Zebra carriages! How wonderful. Now I have a great picture to paint in my mind of how Oldoark Ridings was used.
More on the fascinating Lady Meux here. Interesting to see that Whistler painted her three times. He was a regular visitor to Harringay House, both a friend and portrait painter of the Alexander family.
I’ll try your walk next time. Thanks for the tips.
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Permalink Reply by dubmill on
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It is true that in the past Crews Hill was the last station where you could use an Oyster card, but you can now use Oyster at Cuffley, Bayford and Hertford North.
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Permalink Reply by John Leeming on
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Yes, you can use Oyster as far as Hertford North, but not the Freedom Pass, the limit for which is Crews Hill according to the published map.
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My understanding is that the Freedom Pass is financed by London Councils. So this means it only covers travel within London, as defined by local government administrative boundaries.This means London goes no further than the M25.
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Permalink Reply by Gordon T on
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That's so with a few odd extras outside Greater London on TfL-funded services - Cheshunt but only via London Overground, Watford Junction ditto, Reading (!) but only via TfL Rail aka Crossrail. Also several in the south-east e.g. Dartford, Swanley and Orpington (no idea why). The map is here.
Booking tickets beyond the boundary either requires one to know the last valid station e.g. Crews Hill or to ask at a booking office for a ticket from "Boundary Zone Six", which option is not on ticket machines. I shall miss Harringay station's booking office.
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That's broadly correct (Greater London rather than M25), though there are some extensions, such as Amersham and Epping, and even Reading on TfL Rail.
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I know this route quite well, but can attest that the path from Whitewebbs Lane to the footbridge gets incredibly muddy in winter. Lovely at this time of year, though. I agree with you about the presence and proximity of the motorway. You cross the footbridge, with hundreds of people speeding who knows where, then on the other side the footpath skirts an area of woodland as it climbs towards Oldpark Ride, and you do feel you are in a different world. I love it around there.
Over the years I have come to realise what a wealth of places and walking routes there are like this which can be reached relatively easily and quickly from Harringay by public transport (trains from Harringay station, Seven Sisters or Tottenham Hale, the Piccadilly line to Cockfosters; and buses from Turnpike Lane that go as far as Waltham Cross and Enfield).
Finally, though, I must say I am horrified by Enfield Council’s new development plans. They don’t affect the area you describe as it is mostly within Hertfordshire, although Welwyn Hatfield Council is proposing development in the area east of Potters Bar, between the motorway and Coopers Lane Road. Meanwhile, Hertsmere has ideas for swallowing up various areas of open land north, south and west of Potters Bar.
But in Enfield borough, many large areas of open land are now under threat. I was shocked when I read the proposals, as it seems they want to ruin many of the places I have come to love in the last ten years or so. There’s a big campaign against the plans but will the council just ride roughshod over objections and say it’s all necessary and good? I notice that the development proposals are dressed up with repetitive jargon about sustainability and green values, and they mention multiple times how it’s all consistent with the idea of London being a ‘National Park City’, but I don’t think this is what the originators of that concept had in mind.
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I share your horror. These developments would bring a real loss to us all. I wrote about two significant developments in this area just recently.
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Some news in today that may affect this area.
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