It’s been a long hard slog this lockdown business. Never knowing how long we’d be in lockdown. When we’d be released. What we could do and what we couldn’t. How far we could travel. Where we could travel. How much exercise and when. But there have been benefits.

It was the exercise rules that forced us to walk more this last year. By allowing us to get out at the start for an hours exercise meant that we just had to get out of the house. The car stayed outside the house for months except for the very occasional trip to the supermarket. Mostly we shopped local so as well as our daily walks we walked to the shops. Every day. Sometimes twice a day. Sometimes for no reason other than to get out. But we walked.

Walking gave us the opportunity of finding the local parks along with everyone else. I say the opportunity of finding the local parks like we are new to the area. Funny that. We have lived here together for nearly 30 years. Me a bit longer so we aren’t new to the area at all. Yes. We know the area but when we were both working it was out of the front door to the office at 6.30 and often home 12 hours later. At weekends we would head west to Somerset. Now we had time on our hands. 24 hours a day in fact. 24 hours a day together which was in itself unusual especially as that 24 hours also meant 7 days a week. For the last 16 months. To be fair we haven’t got to nearly 30 years together by being together all day. Every day.

Yesterday we revisited Burgess Park. A park we walked to a lot in lockdown. It’s a short walk from the house and to be honest up to lockdown I skirted the park a lot. We’d often cut along it in the car. On our way to the flower market. Sometimes as a cut through on my way home from work. Always driving. Often at the Walworth Road end on the no 12 or the 171 bus travelling into or from central London. The good old days ( there’s my mother speaking again ~ sometimes I open my mouth and her wisdom comes out) when you could hop on and off the route master. I loved sitting downstairs just by the open door ~ there wasn’t a door in fact ~ on one of the bank of seats. Never upstairs where smoking was allowed. There was one exception. On summer weekends you could often find the no 12 ~ which you could get at the bottom of our road and heading all the way to Shepherds Bush ~ Was an open top bus. An open top route master which wasn’t a tourist bus. I loved it. And definitely sat upstairs.

But lockdown forced us to explore. Burgess Park was an eye opener. Large. Diverse. A lake. A cafe. A skateboard park. Avenues of trees. It held a large annual Latin festival. So it became one of our favourite circular walks.

I can’t remember being there at this time of year in 2020 but looking back at my photo timeline it was the first time in 6 months that we were able to get to Somerset. So we missed July. I know I would have remembered it as the planting is amazing.

We walked to the park from the house past the award winning Peckham library and past the new Mountview theatre school and theatre space into the end of the park.

Further into the park the line of trees follows the route of the old Surrey Canal ~ from the Friends of Burgess Park ‘Burgess Park is one of London’s biggest parks. But its significance is due not so much to its size as to its history, and the unusual way it was created. Inspired by the Abercrombie plan and post-war optimism, the park was set up after hundreds of dwellings, factories and churches were demolished, thirty streets were covered over, the Grand Surrey Canal was filled in, and bomb-damaged areas were incorporated and grassed over. This unusual method of park development took place gradually, within living memory. The ever-increasing patches of green which stretched along the canal route were named Burgess Park in 1973. Over the following years various additions were made to the park such as the community sports facilites and the tennis centre.’

https://www.friendsofburgesspark.org.uk

The park also has listed buildings. The early 19c lime kiln which I’d walked past quite a lot before finding out anything about it. The almshouses of Chumleigh gardens. The former church of St George designed by Bedford, now converted into flats, is also listed and Its war memorial of Christ, head bowed, holding a crown of thorns, by the Danish artist Arild Rosenkrantz is also listed

Continuing our walk I know I would have remembered this planting from last year. It’s pretty spectacular and colourful and something I’d love to replicate at the bottom of the garden in Somerset. One can dream. It’s natural and not forced. It has a kind of flowing rhythm.

It was completely different to when we were last in a few months ago and is exceptional for a council maintained park. Hats off to Southwark Council who do a great job of maintaining their parks. Mt memories of many parks is the municipal style of planting. There is nothing of the sort here.

We didn’t walk around the lake which I’m disappointed about as I now remember that the last time we were there was a nesting swan in situ. I’d like to have seen if the cygnets had hatched. Maybe that’s tomorrow’s walk. But we headed past the ‘Bridge to Nowhere’ built in the early 20th century and spanned the Surrey canal saving a long walk to a place to cross. More information from The Friends of Burgess Park

Our destination was Chumleigh gardens another area within the park itself. First to the cafe ~ and then into the gardens.

From the London Gardens Trust ~

‘In 1821 the Friendly Female Society, founded in 1802 ‘for the relief of poor infirm aged widows and single women of good character who have seen better days’ opened its almshouses for 20 occupants in Chumleigh Gardens, the north and south sides built in the early 19th century, the west side c.1840. They were occupied until World War II, when they were bombed.

After remaining derelict for many years, the almshouses were renovated and now house meeting rooms, offices for Park Rangers and the Art in the Park team of artists. There is an English Garden in front of the buildings and a World Garden with four different styles of garden – Oriental, Mediterranean, African and Caribbean and Islamic – at the back. There is a café round the corner on the north side of the buildings.’

The English garden at Chumleigh gardens changes with the seasons. When we were last here it was Spring and there were tulips and spring flowers in these beds. Which was really pretty. Also I’m sure at this time last year the gates were locked and we couldn’t walk around the garden.

Through the gate into the African and Caribbean Garden with its tree ferns and large plants. In the centre a now empty small pond with the remains of a little boat. All overgrown. Around the small area into the Islamic Garden, with a very large palm and a geometric pond in the centre. A lovely cool place to sit. Not in the pond but on some of the table and chairs or the bench.

Walk around the blue tiled pond and though the pergola and back out into the park. Don’t miss the glorious colour of the tree on your right as you leave.

The flowers change in the park as the seasons change and along the edge of the park in Spring is some surprising wild flower planting. This is from Spring this year.

We are so lucky to have so many well kept and maintained spaces in London and in lockdown they have provided an essential lifeline to people who needed to get out where many didn’t have any space of their own.

The friends of Burgess Park website gives a lot more information on the park. Details of walks. Some history. Fundraising. There is also a good book available from Amazon ~ which I have bought.

Tomorrow is another day. Tomorrow is another walk.