The twilit, silhouetted, darkened branches of a mighty oak poked out in to the December air, denuded yet proud. Each branch was a tendril, reaching out and tickling my soul. Conducting a psychological investigation into my very being and finding me, unsurprisingly, lacking. It stood as a testament to the London LOOP, to the year we were living in, and to life itself. It stood as something both very English, very London, and also very other.
In that it was the perfect symbol for an otherwise unremarkable, yet strangely rewarding, nine mile amble across the most northern points the LOOP encroaches upon. I took three tubes to get there and, in the long corridors of Green Park, I heard a busker play Wonderful Life by Black. It rung true, it set the mood for the day, and for a life where romance and melancholy are always bedfellows.
But not immediately. First concerns were of a more quotidian nature. It was pissing down when I rocked up in Cockfosters. Pam was on the same tube and Shep was waiting in the surprisingly impressive Art Deco station.
We hotfooted it to the Brooklyn Grill and I took an English breakfast tea, a veggie sausage, a fried egg, and a few baked beans. I nicked a few of Pam's mushrooms. Some of the best mushrooms I'd ever eaten, they melted on the mouth. It was posher than we're used to yet perfectly amenable. Shep, however, had an issue with the non-roundness of their plates. His chips were too hipsterish too. We're all getting on a bit.
But, there is life in us old dogs yet. Pam put her waterproof trousers on in the entrance of Cockfosters station - which is not a sentence I ever thought I'd type - and we headed off through some nondescript fields past trees as wet as the pelt of a randy seal, felled logs, and the mulchiest leaves you could ever wish to traipse over.
We passed a Go Ape (in the outer London boroughs, it is said you are never more than three miles from a Go Ape), we passed a cafe that may have looked better in spring or summer, and we reached Trent Country Park. Another place, like all we saw, that could be said looks better in its summertime clothes..
But, I wanna walk around with you, and so I did. There was a geezer in front of us who kept gawping at us and he got a bit annoying so we paused, let him move on, and soon reached a very picturesque lake. No waterfowl were on duty so a seagull acted as a replacement coot, much to our disdain.
To the north, our aspect was finer. For there stood an obelisk, proud and erect. Yet signifying nothing. Built in 1702 and placed in a 'keyhole', it parted the surrounding bushes and made for a fine specimen but if anything could ever be described as a folly it was this particular obelisk. To think, Sharp and Saunders had been irked by the pomposity of a bridge just one section back.
We came out on Hadley Road, the sun was striving to show its face, and the litterbugs, as ever, had been dumping their white goods into the surrounding ditches. We crossed into Ash Wood and then Duncan's Wood. Cabbages were planted as far as the eye could see. Shep approached a local dog walker for a chat about her chihuahua cross and then realised his knowledge of canines was somewhat nil.
Not to mind, we continued along Salmon's Brook. It was getting pretty now, and the rain had ceased. This was a long and straight, yet evocative, stretch. Eventually we reached a busy road and there stood the Royal Chace Hotel, the sort of place bored married couples go to spice up their love lifes, the sort of place you just know will have a wedding reception, the sort of place with clean bogs.
So, absolutely not our sort of place. We thought they may refuse us muddy bastards a drink but we could not have been more wrong. We grabbed our beers and gins, dried off our wet togs, admired their festive decorations, and put the world to right. An unexpectedly pleasant pit stop.
On egress of the Chase, we swung left towards the Red House down a potholed and puddled track. We crossed 'neath a railway line and we sang some Half Man Half Biscuit songs to keep our spirits up. Soon we reached Turkey Brook, an appropriate sight for the festive season and one we'd follow, more or less, until we reached Enfield. Enfield, Shep proffered, may turn out to be one of the most amazing places we'd ever visit. Let's see about that.
Turkey Brook was certainly pleasant. Hilly Fields too. And what of Freezy Water? A place name to rival Lonesome as one of London's finest. We managed not to see the old channels of the New River (it's not new, and it's not a river) and, also, avoided the site of an Elizabethan fishpond but when we chanced upon The Rose & Crown pub, we did not miss that. You know how we roll by now.
What a lovely boozer. Creaking floorboards, a maze of booths, more Santa hats than a Lapland cloakroom, and a telephone just like my mum and dad used to have. The mezzanine looked like the sort of place where New Orleans floosies would flash you a garter and some frilly knickerbockers and offer to make a man of you. I loved it.
But, of course, we had to leave. It was pitch dark by then too. The last stretch of a shorter than normal LOOP walk involved torches, map reading, and no little confusion. But it was jolly, and unseasonably warm.
We emptied out into Turkey Brook and took a jar in The Sun and Woolpack pub. Pam's presence increasing the number of females in that establishment by 50%. I helped a small child retrieve his darts from the board, they blasted out Oasis, and I heard a man say 'cunt' five times in ten seconds. Enfield, it seemed, had not left the nineties yet.
We tried another pub - no real ale. So we tried another - no real ale. There were no more so Shep ordered a few bottles of light ale and Pam and I got on the lager and made our fun with the jukebox. Soon we were listening to The Fall, The Smiths, New Order, NWA, The Only Ones, The Pogues, Toots & the Maytals, and Echo and the Bunnymen. We came to quite like it despite the fact it looked like The Hare & Hounds in Basingstoke on a quiet night in 1988.
We moved on to the Albany Tandoori (no Bangla) for a tasty, if not exceptional, curry and a couple of Cobras. It got more boozy than planned. Shep and I even opted for the dreaded, yet fun, train booze. Enfield may not be Armageddon, more a station of the cross and an important stop on this LOOP walk, but it was not, either, as Shep had hoped, an amazing place. It was a bit shit, truth be told, but we'll move on. Next time we're off to Chigwell, as I was telling Pauline Quirke earlier.
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