Today the forecast was for cloud and mist and a maximum temp of 6 degrees, so of course I thought I’d take myself out for a nice little tootle on the bicycle, and advertised on the London Cycling Campaign email list was what was biled as a leisurely 12 mile run to Rainham Marches, starting from Greenwich, which is about 8 miles from home …. which I could do at him own pace.

I really should have known better. (On several counts – one of them being that Southwark cyclists’ idea of “leisurely” is my idea of “just keeping contact with the back of the bunch by gritting my teeth and giving it all I’ve got”.)

No, it was fun really – in a slightly beating your head against the brick wall sort of way. I just looked up the distance home from the marshes and it is about 22 miles – and that was after getting to Greenwich, and then doing, to one person’s odometer, 22 miles there (the scenic route via the Woolwich ferry.) So I must have done near 50 miles today… (if you say 80km it sounds even more impressive.)

If the text here is a little tilted my apologies – sitting rather oddly since my seat bones weren’t in the condition for this. (Not to mention my legs….) In fact (another use of the blog) I just looked up my last serious ride and it was August 12, which covered some of the same route – as far as Woolwich.)

Still there were some interesting sights, including these World War II concrete barges (possibly used for D-day? so made due to the wartime shortage of steel) rotting quietly by the river:

And we went through (scenic route might be an honorary title) London’s great rubbish dump. On the north bank of the Thames opposite Erith are these slightly out-of-place looking hills – and what indeed they are out of place – these were once marshes, like the survivor we were heading for, but they became London’s landfull site. The smell is awful – sour, fetid, almost indescribable really), and there are chimneys where the methane brewing up under these grass-covered monstrosities is burnt off.

Hate to think how much the Christmas season will be adding, if not here then elsewhere. And you have to wonder why it was put right beside the Thames. No doubt theoretically these is some lining supposed to stop it polluting the river, but…

(As this walker notes, this is also the end of the London Loop walking route – a bit of a rubbish finish…)

But Rainham Marshes have survived and should continue to do so, having recently been bought by the RSPB.

There’s a new and fascinatingly enviro-friendly visitors’ centre that even boasts defensive drawbridges, and 2.5 miles of boardwalks that would no doubt be great on a day with a little better weather. (Winter is supposed to be the best time for bird species.)

Unfortunately they haven’t got to the info panels yet – and since this area apparently preserves the medieval field system I’d like to have known more. Guess I’ll have to go back.

But next time I might catch the train…