Permbulations on the Perimeter of .... SE5:Butterflies And Elephants.

SE5 is, to all intents and purposes, Camberwell and Camberwell has enjoyed a long association with butterflies. Ever since a Camberwell beauty (Nymphalis antiopa) was first identified on Coldharbour Lane (the road that runs from Brixton to Camberwell) back in 1748. You see butterfly imagery everywhere you go in Camberwell. But on yesterday's postcode related perambulation around SE5, the TENTH I've done so far, I saw more elephants than butterflies.

I'm not even sure what links elephants to SE5. Surely they'd be far better suited to nearby Elephant & Castle which, fact fans,is mostly in the SE1 postal district. I'll do that walk another time. I nearly didn't do the SE5 one yesterday. My mate Ben was up in London from Wales to see Yo La Tengo at the Palladium and I'd met him, and his friend Saf, in The Shakespeare's Head on Carnaby Street for a few liveners on Friday.

I wasn't sure how energetic I'd be come Saturday morning and I wasn't 100% recovered from a recent, and rather nasty, bout of gout. But once I'd had some breakfast, carried out my morning chores and protocols, and seen the weather was at least halfway decent I decided to set out. Walking from SE23 alongside Peckham Rye and in to SE15 where I stopped at Ozzie's Coffee Shop for some scrambled egg on toast (very tasty but not much of it) and a cup of tea while reading the Saturday Guardian.

From Ozzie's, I continued up Rye Lane, took a right into Choumert Road (past some, now hardly uncommon, anti-gentrification graffiti), and then a brief spell on the hilariously named Bellenden Road. On Lyndhurst Way I saw my first elephant of the day. Standing vigil outside somebody's front door. I then turned into Warwick Gardens and passed through there. 

After nearly 4k of walking, and at the northern end of Talfourd Road, I finally entered SE5 proper. On Peckham Road I had a quick look at the South London Gallery, the Peckham Pelican (much to early for a pint), the long gone Kennedy's Sausages, and the Oliver Goldsmith Primary School. Named after the Anglo-Irish novelist and poet who'd written The Vicar of Wakefield and She Stoops to Conquer in the eighteenth century.

I headed up Southampton Way. Passing signs to the Damilola Taylor Centre (a reminder of a particularly sad event, a murder - or, legally, manslaughter - of a schoolboy from the year 2000), fast food outlets, a blue plaque for the 19c poet Robert Browning (who I seem to make a habit of accidentally calling Roland Browning - Erkan Mustafa's character in Grange Hill), signs for a David Bowie exhibition at the Southbank Centre, and the Happy Valley Chinese restaurant.

No, not that Happy Valley. Or this Happy Valley. Southampton Way slowly curled left and I took a right up Wells Way between The Flying Dutchman bar and the Little Ochie restaurant. Wells Way took me past The Well Community Church and right into the centre of Burgess Park. It wasn't an entrance I'd used before and I was, very briefly, a little discombobulated.

On the side of the Lynn AC Boxing Club, once the Samuel Jones paper factory, there's a huge Camberwell Beauty for visitors to admire. Which I did. Before heading up to the large mound, or small hill, near the centre of the park and taking in the views of the Shard and the skyscrapers on the Isle of Dogs. 

Back down the hill I was at the side of a large lake. Fishermen flanked its banks though many of them seemed more interested in drinking than fishing. The lake itself seemed to have more waterfowl making it home than fish. I spotted Egyptian geese, Canada geese, mallards, and a couple of specimens that I was sadly unable to identify. There were swans too and one of them was fairly aggressively making sure that its personal space was not being invaded by either a nearby coot or a solitary, and brave, moorhen.

Near the side of the lake, and by a wooded and surprisingly muddy area, there's a series of sculptures by Sally Hogarth. Silent Raid commemorates the people and places that were impacted by a World War I zeppelin bomb that landed on what was once Calmington Road and is now part of Burgess Park.

They show houses much like the ones destroyed by the bomb and each house represents a man, woman, or child killed in the raid. There are many many memorials in South East London, I see them out walking all the time, to those who lost their lives in both World War I and World War II. On many occasions, after bombing the docks in the East End, any leftover bombs were simply dropped on South East London as the Nazis flew back.

Elsewhere in the park people were walking their dogs, kicking balls around, playing in a playground with a very large slide or simply soaking up some sunshine. I thought about taking my jumper off so it immediately started raining. Not heavily though. I walked past where the Market Gardens once stood, the second elephant of the day (in the form of a water fountain), and the manicured Chumleigh Gardens before reaching an underpass that took me back under Wells Way.

The underpass is adorned with art made by local children that aims to remember the Grand Surrey Canal that once flowed through here and the barges that once plied their trade on it. When you come out the other side of the subway it's not long before you reach an old limestone kiln. Kept in place as a memorial to the workers of a time gone by and their contribution to London's once extraordinary growth and prosperity.

There's a little, brightly painted, cafe, the Tennis Cafe, in the park too. There was no indoor seating and I didn't fancy sitting in the rain so I continued on, past the cute Fowlds Cafe, and in to applegreen on Camberwell Road. A petrol station that doubles up as a Greggs and a Lavazza coffee shop and even has a BEER CAVE. Yes, a BEER CAVE. In a petrol station.

I didn't buy beer. Or coffee. But I did buy a bottle of water, a Crunchie, and some Parma Violets. My scrambled eggs on toast really hadn't filled me up. I carried on along the slightly careworn Bethwin Road and then on to John Ruskin Street. This took me to Kennington Park and a part of Kennington Park I'd not visited before. I'd first visited Kennington Park back in 1987 to see The Mighty Lemon Drops play a CND festival. An event I got very drunk at. I think Red Lorry Yellow Lorry might also have been on the bill.

Imposing tower blocks surround the park but there was also a chance to spot my third and fourth elephants of the day. One of them marking the Blue Elephant theatre. In the park there were people playing football and volleyball, families listening to cumbia and having picnics, and others, like me, just having a curious wander.

Kennington Park, the first open space in Lambeth dedicated to public use and enjoyment, first opened in 1854 but before it was Kennington Park it was Kennington Common and that's where, in April 1848, over 25,000 supporters of the Chartist Movement assembled to press for demands for a National Charter of rights for the working classes.

These days there's a pleasant flower garden (the daffodils looked radiant as the sun had come back out), a bandstand, a statue of a toad, and even some real toads (though I was not fortunate enough to see any of them). There was a sign informing me that the day's bat hunt had been cancelled which immediately had me thinking of Half Man Half Biscuit's Renfield's Afoot. Later I'd read in the paper that Nicholas Cage can currently be seen playing Dracula in the comedy horror film Renfield (along with Awkwafina and Nicholas Hoult). Renfield, most certainly, was afoot.

Leaving the park on to Kennington Park Road, I passed a fountain of Aberdeen red granite that was installed in 1861 at the request, and expense, of local resident Felix Slade, founder of the Slade School of Art. Near Oval tube there's an unexplained pillar and a large stone sculpture on a traffic island and over Camberwell New Road, a road I'd soon be following, you can enjoy views of St Mark's Church.

I didn't stay long. My phone battery was slowly dying so it seemed a perfect excuse to pop in to the Kennington pub for a pint of Estrella, a read of the paper, and a bit of phone charging. They had the Grand National on the television but I didn't watch as I'm not into animal cruelty. Only one horse died this year but instead of arresting the jockey and owner the only people who were arrested were those that protested about animal cruelty. What a fucked up way to go.

I drank my pint very very slowly, allowing maximum phone charging, and by the time I was back on Camberwell New Road the sun was back out - even if dark clouds were hovering ominously behind the tower blocks. I passed the Golden Goose, ostensibly a restaurant but it seems more like a grim looking pub, and, after turning off down Lothian Street and Calais Street, found myself in Myatt's Fields Park.

Somehow, despite living nearby for the best part of three decades and regularly visiting Camberwell, I had never visited this park before. It's a nice one too. It's got lots of playgrounds, a Little Cat Cafe, and, of course, a Victorian bandstand. I had my first 99 of the year from an ice cream van and I paid with my card even though the machine was the other side of a glass window. I told the ice cream man that I was impressed with that and he proudly claimed to be the sole architect of this innovation.

Hmmm. Of course as soon as I'd finished my ice cream it started raining again. The park was still pleasant though. It's named for Joseph Myatt, a tenant market farmer who grew strawberries, rhubarb, and cabbages here in the 19th century and was opened to the public in 1889.

Coming out of the park, and a short way down Knatchbull Road near Art Deco adjacent Lambeth Archive and Minet Library, there's a building called Longfield Hall. It was once the home of Dark and Light, Britain's first black theatre company. I'd never heard of either Longfield Hall or Dark and Light so that either showcases my ignorance or means we still have some way to go on issues of race despite recent advances.

More tower blocks, a local children's artistic plea for Clean Air, an almost tropical front garden, and a launderette with the name Beejay (wonder if they offer other 'services') led me towards Loughborough Junction (once memorably pronounced by a visitor as Lugabaruga Junction). I wasn't particularly interested in downloading the 'augmented reality' walks (I had my own walking plan) but I did stop to read a poem about synaesthesia and some homespun wisdom on a bridge:- "if you want to go fast, got alone - if you want to go far, go together".

But I stopped for the longest in, you guessed it, a pub. I'd never been to, or even walked past, The Cambria before but it was a nice friendly boozer. As I walked in the big screen showed Erling Haaland scoring Man City's third goal (and his 32nd league goal of the season, 47th in total) againt Leicester in a match they'd go on to win 3-1. Leaving their title chances very much in their own hands and leaving Leicester in serious danger of relegation.

I finished my Heineken and headed on for the last, quite short, section of the walk. It wasn't long before I found myself in Ruskin Park. Named for the artist, writer, and social campaigner John Ruskin (a man I once believed was terrified of pubic hair though I have since heard Mary Beard say that's not true). Ruskin lived nearby between 1823 and 1871 and there's lots of stuff named for him in the area.

The park opened to the public in 1907 after a campaign by local residents. It's got most of the stuff you'd expect in a park (grass, trees (including one right knobbly old bastard), flowers, a moorhen, a bandstand, a playground, and, our old favourite, a Once O'clock club. The park was laid out by local legend Lt. Colonel J.J. Sexby as so many in the region are. There was a large group of white clad cricketers engaged in a game and as I passed by one of the must have been bowled out as a roar of applause pealed out. Howzat!

I followed a tree lined avenue and came out, near the hospitals of King's (a regular haunt for me of late it seems) and Maudsley on Denmark Hill near the William Booth Memorial Training College. Statues of both William and Catherine Booth stand in front of a fairly brutal red brick frontage and a large tower adorned with a very serious and large cross.

The building was designed by Giles Gilbert Scott who is also responsible for Bankside Power Station (now Tate Modern), Liverpool's Anglican Cathedral, and the University Library of Cambridge. It's quite a local landmark. I stopped for one last drink in The Phoenix pub which sits atop Denmark Hill station and when that was done I jumped on the 176 bus and went home to watch Race Across The World. I'd not discovered as many new things as I do on some of these walks but there was one new park, one new pub, and several new roads as well as some new knowledge about buildings and places that I already knew a little bit about. That'll do me for a surprisingly blustery, at times sunny, at times wet, Saturday in April. But why the elephants?