The London LOOP. Part V:Hamsey Green to Banstead Downs (The Valley of the Shadow of Death).

"Careless in our summer clothes splashing around in the muck and the mire" - Hang Me Out To Dry, Cold War Kids.

It seems the London LOOP has within it another more sinister loop. Some sort of gravitational pull that, no matter how hard you try, pulls you back to the concrete of East Croydon. Imagine a Twilight Zone episode directed by Ken Loach, perhaps scripted by Samuel Beckett. Waiting for Godot is the play in which, famously, nothing happens twice. In Waiting for the 403 bus, nothing happens three times. Suck on that, Beckett, you optimistic fucker.

The day, as so often, began with hope. Hope in the face of adversity paired with a downright denial of weather forecasts? It's a recipe for a perfect storm but that didn't deter me as I strode purposefully to Peckham Rye station, fuelled by salt'n'vinegar crisps and a Good Friday copy of The Guardian. The train arrived on time and I reached East Croydon just as the drizzle began.

Shep and our guest for the day, regular TADS walker Kathy, arrived in waterproofs and once I'd been put to rights (I talk too much, dress incorrectly, and don't work hard enough apparently - guilty as charged, your honour) we wandered into the bustling dystopian metropolis of Croydonia to repair for brunch. Greasy spoons were thin on the ground and even the local branch of Wimpy seemed to have disappeared. So 'Spoons it was!

The George is one of central Croydon's two large temples devoted to drinking oneself to death and on a bank holiday Friday it was, predictably, doing a roaring trade. Nevertheless we secured ourselves a table and some soft drinks and I had veggie sausage'n'mash (complete with some completely unnecessary peas) and Shep and Kathy had a portion of chips each.

The rain had picked up some while we'd been ensconced in death's waiting room and by the time we'd boarded, and disembarked, the 403 bus to Hamsey Green it was hoying it down. First the snow and now the rain. But it was neither of these elements that was to finally cut short our adventures and send us back to East Croydon. It was something equally prosaic and the clues are everywhere.

The walk proper didn't even start until nearly 2pm. Tithepit Shaw Lane was more poetically named than it deserved but it soon opened up into Dipsley Field. The pitter patter of rain, the damp squelch of muddied boots, and the ever grey skies would soon be our constant companions. The book (with the map in it) was at first moist and soon as damp as a stash of discarded porno mags. Thumbing it would become increasingly problematic. Navigation would soon be reduced to guesswork and hunches.

A solitary mallard took solace in one of the field's largest, most circular, puddles. On production of my camera he took flight. Not even nice weather for ducks it seems.

We manoeuvred ourselves gingerly down an incline, crossed the Old Riddlesdown Road (an old coaching route between Lewes and Brighton), and, promptly, got lost. A familiar story on the LOOP and one that seems more prominent, and more annoying too, when the weather refuses to affect clemency.

Retracing our steps and cutting through a pastoral idyll we reached a building site, train lines, and, eventually, Whyteleafe. Our book noted that we may see sheep (both Jacobs and Southdowns) at this juncture but none were on show. Only idiots go out in this weather it seems.

Whyteleafe did, however, see the steepest ascent of the LOOP so far. Even Shep, oft remarked upon are his mountain goat like abilities for swift hill climbing, struggled a bit. We were all out of breath when we reached Kenley Common and said breath was further taken away upon turning back to view the chalk escarpment from whence we'd wandered. Sometimes, even in the most quotidian suburbs, nature can truly astonish. It's one of the reasons we walk. It's one of the reasons we live.

Kenley Common itself was populated by a peppering of Corporation of London signs. There are nearly as many of these on the LOOP as LOOP fingerposts. Kissing gates, oak trees, a squirrel, and mud, glorious mud made up the common. We got lost - again.

We came out on a private road festooned with enormous houses and pontificated on the jobs of those who lived there? Stockbrokers? Builders? I managed to convince myself one of them belonged to Wilfried Zaha.



We corrected ourselves reasonably promptly and entered Betts Mead where, even more promptly, we got lost again. My temper was frayed, Kathy's socks were wet, and Shep (the good humour man, he sees everything like this) remained phlegmatic. Possibly his inner pub locator was in action because we soon chanced upon The Wattenden Arms, a pub that both looked inviting and meant we were back on course.

We assumed it to be full of rich local citizens (though not Wilfried Zaha, a non-drinking Muslim athlete) but it wasn't that. Despite the extended stares of a few locals (including one dick in a Manowar t-shirt who managed to be in the way of both the bar and the toilet) it proved a friendly spot so Shep and I both took a Doom Bar as Kathy sipped a soda.

At this point Kathy removed her socks only to find them wetter than Francis Pym in the eighties. Her boots had leaked and though she could face the rain she didn't fancy getting trench foot and so a cab was arranged and she left us. It was soon to become clear she'd made a good call.

With the aid of two fellow hardy walkers we picked up the LOOP again and crossed the muddiest, squelchiest, wettest field so far.  I even felt sorry for the horses and I'm no fan of those particular beasts.

With the ludicrously small, dirty, mossy, dome of the Croydon Astronomical Society our beacon we passed briefly through Old Coulsdon and crossed a busy road before passing by the very welcoming looking Fox pub. Its sign welcomed walkers and dogs. We should've gone in. We really should've gone in. It looks a place that would suit a future TADS walk and the surrounding countryside would be equally impressive.

After a metalled track and a schlep through the woods we opened up into Happy Valley. How green was our valley? Not very, truth be told. But on a sunny day this spot would be angelic. Picnic benches suggested locals were in the know.

It was at this point that Shep went for a proverbial Burton. Slipping in the mud, he regained composure uninjured but his jeans, his coat, his hands, his phone, his vape, everything was caked in unforgiving brown stains. He looked like the cover of a mud fetish publication but, most pertinently of all, I thought to myself "no fucking pub's gonna serve this muddy cunt". Priorities.

Shep's own thought processes had, unsurprisingly, been along very similar lines. Unless he could wash his clothes, or ideally buy new ones, the walk was over. A potential blessing in disguise as the rain was now reaching biblical levels. Our best hope was to find a clothes shop in nearby Coulsdon but the only one, according to the internet, was an army surplus store due to close at 5.30. It was 5.10. Good Friday, too, may affect opening hours.

Happy Valley had proved anything but. We rushed on and it was, in many ways, a pity. Because both Happy Valley and the next stretch, over Farthing Downs, proved to be amongst the most spectacular we'd witnessed on the LOOP so far. If the views weren't as impressive as they should be in the grey drizzle then six information boards, perched near a quirky circular bench, testified to the area's beauty and historical significance. The scenery was more akin to Dartmoor, Wales, or the New Forest than the London Borough of Croydon. Truly stunning. Even when accompanied by a surprisingly sanguine if obviously, and understandably, disappointed mudman.



The path led down to Coulsdon. A sorry looking town that has seen better days and certainly not the thriving conurbation our map had suggested (everything's relative). The Army Surplus store was shut and there were no other clothes shops. I grabbed us an ale each from a local offy (Shep was ashamed to even go in) and, avoiding a local eccentric, we took the train to Croydon. Shep unable to sit.

At Croydon we struck joy. Shep got himself kited out satisfactorily in Blue Inc, we supped a couple of ales in The Spread Eagle, and we took the train to Forest Hill where we met our friend Simon for a tasty curry in The India Gate. I squared this with my conscience by the rationale that this stretch of the LOOP was the nearest to my home. Shep headed back to Basingstoke and Simon and I headed off into the night to simultaneously correct all the world's ills and destroy our livers.

On this stage of the LOOP we came, we saw, but we did not conquer. However, things that have died a death on Good Friday have been known to reappear anew before and this should be no different. Next time we'll start early, finish this stage, and carry on stage VI on to Kingston where we'll see, for the first time since the start of our orbital amble, the Thames once more. The way things are going we'll probably be set upon by a plague of locusts and smitten from above by a plague of frogs. Happy Easter. Mine's a bag of Mini Eggs.

TADS #18:Godalming to Guildford (or Walk This Wey).

"I took a big chance at the high school dance with a missy who was ready to play. She told me to talk this way, walk this Wey".

I felt like singing because it was 2.30pm on Saturday afternoon and I was in the Parrot Inn in Shalford playing Dobble with Tommy and surrounded by twelve of my favourite people in the world with a pint of Shere Drop from the Surrey Hills brewery on the go. The only thing I would've changed is to have even more friends there. It's a rare moment in life when you feel so contented and it was one I intended to savour as fully as my ale. Ale is physic for me.

The winter had not been kind. We'd been visited by the beast from the East, politically extreme views from both ends had left the centre struggling to hold, my romantic life had seen me, like Icarus, fly too close to the sun and burn my wings, and many of the things that had brought me comfort, the BBC, the Guardian, Facebook, had been attacked as amoral and corrupt. The way things were going I wouldn't have been surprised if they'd discovered that alcohol is bad for you.

What had seen me through the dark and cold nights was the thought that come March me and my friends would resume TADS. TADS was forged in the white hot furnace of emotionally troubling times and though the champagne that cracked against the side of the good ship TADS at its launch had regained its fizz and sparkle it was worth reminding myself that maintenance work at the emotional boatyard, and vineyard, of life is always an ongoing process. Life, like the walk itself, was about the journey more than the destination and, as such, could not always be pretty.

Nautical metaphors tossed aside into the salty brine briefly, I woke with an anticipation not far south of pure joy on Saturday morning. The weather forecast wasn't as good as I'd hoped but it was better than I'd feared. Grey, overcast, slight chance of drizzle, but no full on downpour, no snow. Pub gardens would not be as inviting as I'd hoped but the Weyside banks would be muddy rather than impassable. It was the first TADS walk I'd mapped, planned, and annotated myself and I was apprehensive that it be a success.

 

Walking boots were donned and I took the train to Clapham Junction. If the emotional boats of life were finally getting a service the same could not be said for Britain's ailing and overpriced rail network. South Western Trains, or whoever it is that runs them (it's so fragmented now it's near impossible to ascertain who is responsible for anything), were taking a free jazz approach to their scheduling. Several different boards suggested several different trains and several different options, none of which tallied with the available, but wrong, information on their website.

 

An angry traveller vented at a hapless staff member. It was understandable, the service is shit and you're expected to fund the increasing shitness of it, but it wasn't her fault. I can say from personal experience that working for incompetent unpleasant bullies is even worse than being their customer.

 

After an unscheduled half-hour wait in Woking we finally arrived in Godalming. Ten of us. Myself, Pam, Teresa, Adam, Shep, Kathy, Rachael, Neil, Belinda, and Eamon. I'd not seen some of them since our last TADS walk, others I'd seen often. Each and everyone I was pleased to see.

 

We set off up The Mint, crossing a small tributary of the Wey, before cutting down an alley to the pink building, known as The Pepperpot, that sits at the end of Godalming's bustling High Street. The Pepperpot was erected in 1814 when the previous market house fell into disrepair and it's been used,  variously, as a shop, a museum, a toilet, and a prison cage! It's near the spot where, in 1881, the world's first ever public electricity supply appeared.

 

Along the High Street of the busy little market town we went and upon reaching a bifurcation we swung left into Bridge Street and eventually on to the Phillips Memorial Park. It's named, as is the local branch of Wetherspoons, for the chief wireless telegraphist of the Titanic, Jack Phillips. A man whose perseverance to duty in the face of impending disaster almost certainly cost him his life.

 

The parish church of St Peter and St Paul that backs on to the park is Godalming's oldest building. It was built in the twelfth century of sandstone and Bargate stone from the nearby Greensand Ridge and its silhouette, like that of the park's trees, looked confident and assured on this reflective March day.

 

The river Wey, which we'd now joined, is a Thames tributary that runs for 87 miles from the village of Farringdon near Alton to Tilford where it joins the Thames. It's been simultaneously managed and left to fend for itself. Canal boats idle along its navigable banks yet the muddy paths and reeds that flank the river suggest it would be very easy to slide into. At one point we saw a couple of people using magnets to fish its depths. They spoke of finding coins and Roman treasure but their magnets revealed only unfortunate gastropods.

 

Godalming's a well-to-do commuter town that's been judged to have a high standard of living. It's existed at least since Saxon times and probably earlier. In 899 Alfred the Great left Godalming (as well as Guildford) to his nephew Aethelwold in his will. Roughly halfway between Portsmouth and London it grew in size due to its location and, as with many nearby towns, inns were built to house those travelling from coast to capital.

 

Key industries were woollen cloth, stockings, leatherwork, and paper marking and famous sons of the town include James Oglethorpe (founder of the colony of Georgia), ex-Ipswich and England footballer Mick Mills, Julius Caesar (not that one, some cricketer apparently), and Brave New World author Aldous Huxley.

 

They were all born in Godalming. Unconventional and scandalous composer Peter Warlock is buried here and those who've made it their home include Terry Scott, Terry Thomas, Christopher Timothy, Billy Dainty, and Alvin Stardust. Euros Childs of Gorky's Zygotic Mynci recorded a song called 'Godalming' for his 2016 LP 'Refresh!' and the town has featured in Dracula, For Your Eyes Only, and often in The Return of Reginald Perrin.

 

The most astonishing story, though, is that of Mary Toft, a local maidservant who, in 1726, had hoaxed the town into believing she could give birth to rabbits. She became something of a cause celebre and the responses of the men of the time speak volumes about how unenlightened those times were. Toft finally confessed to inserting sixteen rabbits into her vagina.

 

Across the Wey stands Farncombe and the famous Charterhouse school in front of it. Charterhouse was founded on the site of an old Carthusian monastery in Smithfields, London in 1611 and lays claim to the invention of Association Football and to being the place where the band Genesis met. Old Carthusians include John Wesley, the Earl of Liverpool (PM from 1812-1827), Robert Baden-Powell, Field Marshall Montgomery, both David and Jonathan Dimbleby, Jeremy Hunt and Douglas Carswell. Right pair of cunts at the end there.

 

We curved tight to the banks of the Wey along a track known as the Lammas Lands (amazingly not the best path name of the day), through the park, across a bridge, where we picked up a path on the left side of the river that led us peacefully away from Godalming. After one kilometre the Wey was joined by Hell's Brook and a bit further is Peasmarsh where I read that Paul McCartney lives.

 

It was a pleasant stretch with nothing to admire but the river, the trees, and the company. After six and half kilometres we reached Shalford and turned off the river. We'd earned a drink.

 

Darren, Cheryl, and Tommy ('the car lot') joined us, Shep put Teresa's coat on, we wiped the mud off our boots and we enjoyed ale, coffee, and wine. The pub didn't look much from the outside but was friendly and accommodating within. Neil ate his sandwiches in the car park.

 

Phil Collins wrote his debut album of dreary divorce ballads, Face Value, in his home, Old Croft, in Shalford and it's said, too, that Pilgrim's Progress author John Bunyan lived in hiding there.

 

We didn't see much of the place. After the inevitable 'two pint mistake' we were soon back on the Wey, our more elderly members regularly emptying their now full bladders in the bushes, for a rather stunning expanse of baked earth, water so still it was barely flowing, and the odd ancient ruin of which we knew, and could find out, nothing.



 

Eventually we arrived in Guildford. Entering a city via its waterways is often a gradual process and this was no different. The path took us through a park and, near the Yvonne Arnaud theatre, we left the river and headed up Porridge Pot Alley.

 

We passed what must surely be Britain's thinnest house (is there even room for a bed?) and after a few busy roads and a deceptively steep climb we reached Guildford Cathedral. Cue Jerry Goldsmith's score to The Omen.

 

We had a look inside, even Shep came in, and it smelt of fresh paint. The cathedral, a mix of Art Deco and neo-gothic, was designed by Edward Maufe and built between 1936 and 1961, the year in which it was consecrated into the Anglican tradition. Maufe's next most noteworthy commission is the Air Forces, or Runnymede, Memorial near Egham. 

 

Stag motifs on the cathedral floor tell us we're atop Stag Hill where the kings of England used to hunt. It's also the location of the University of Surrey where in November 1986 I went to see The Mission. I'd just turned eighteen and it was one of the first times I'd ever drunk alcohol at a gig. The Mission were rubbish though.

 

I'd not known that Teresa, a few years after I'd joined the moshpit for Serpent's Kiss, had been a student at said university. She regaled us with anecdotes as we descended Stag Hill, crossed the railway tracks, and followed the path of Walnut Tree Close to Woodbridge Meadows and, once more, the banks of the Wey.

 

Less than half a mile from Guildford city centre sits a scene of almost rural idyll. Passing boatyards and barges we eventually reached a footbridge and crossed the Wey itself into Guildford proper.

 

Primark, River Island, Zara:- we weren't in Shalford anymore. An ascent of North Street took us to the top of Guildford's High Street and a pint of Lancaster Bomber in The Three Pigeons pub. Guildford girls took selfies, local drinkers finished off afternoon sessions, and we all enjoyed the pub's spiral staircase. Not one you'd want to walk down after too many Lancashire Bombers.

 

Historians attribute Guildford's existence to a gap in the North Downs where the Wey was forded by The Harrow Way, an ancient neolithic track. By AD 978 it was home to the Royal Mint (now based in Llantrisant, Glamorgan), and its castle, a motte and bailey affair obvs, was believed to have been built shortly after the 1066 invasion of William the Conqueror.

 

We didn't have time to look at the castle, nor the 14c Guildhall, but there was time for me to read a list of notable Guildford residents:- PG Wodehouse (born there), Kazuo Ishiguro (the Remains of the Day author was born in Nagasaki but lived there), Mike Rutherford of Genesis (born there), sprinter Alan Wells (born Edinburgh, and Michael Buerk (born Solihull).

 

None of The (Guildford) Stranglers were born in Guildford. Hugh Cornwell was born in Tufnell Park, Dave Greenfield in Brighton, and JJ Burnel in Notting Hill. Jet Black who was 36 (ancient!) when the band formed and is now 79 was born in Ilford but he ran an off-license, and even a fleet of ice cream vans, in the city. Go buddy, go!

 

We ate in Guildford Spice. A fine, if not spectacular, Indian restaurant that served a huge pile of poppadums but no Bangla. I had tarka daal, pulao rice (shared with Rachael), and a chapatti. It filled me up but not as much as the laughter and company of good friends. A few of us had another pint in the local 'Spoons (I know) before heading back. It was very lively but even the young girls dancing around in their bra tops couldn't compete with what had been a really beautiful day out in the Surrey countryside.

 

The good ship TADS has set sail once again and as we, the sailors that ride aboard it, wave our hankies from the deck we can't know if the seas ahead will be choppy or calm. We can only say we hope to see you next month when we lay anchor in Wendover for a Chiltern challenge that will take us to beautiful Berkhamsted for tea with Graham Greene.