Text by Jeff Koehler
(C) Attache Magazine/Jeff Koehler
Here’s a simple fact that few Americans know: Virtually the
whole of England is accessible by an extensive 4,000-mile web of
waterways, half of which are canals. The country’s relatively
small size, its flatness, and the fact that few places are more
than 60 miles from the sea made the canal system an ideal means
of affordable and reliable freight transport more than a century-and-a-half
ago. Primarily built between 1790 and 1830, these were the arteries
of the Industrial Revolution, allowing factories in the Midlands
to move raw materials in and finished products out while capitalizing
on the low-cost energy of nearby coal fields.
As modern transportation
evolved, the canals were gradually replaced, first by railway, and
later by motorway. With their original purpose obsolete, a new wave
of canal use began. In the 1960s, England’s canals enjoyed
the start of a renaissance. Narrowboats—70 feet long and a
mere arm span wide—carried passengers who cruised and toured
for pleasure. Many hundreds of miles of canals have been restored
and opened to leisure use, and the towpaths that were originally
constructed to allow horses to pull laden boats are now bustling
with walkers, joggers, and cyclists.
London’s 8.5-mile-long Regent’s Canal is one of the
most widely used in the system. It offers a narrow (and often hidden)
strand of freshness in the city as it moves though a disparate collection
of neighborhoods that begin in North London and end at Limehouse
Basin in the East End, where it enters the River Thames.
The length of Regent’s Canal can be cruised in a boat or
enjoyed on foot by walking the towpath. The best place to begin
is in Paddington at Little Venice where Regent’s meets Grand
Union Canal, the trunk-route of the system that runs north to Birmingham.
Narrowboats bead the shores here. They are painted in bright colors
like circus wagons, decorated with roses and castles, their names—Mea
Culpa, Poppy, Beau Ideal—written in flourishing loops.
Under sprawling trees and alongside rows of elegant Georgian townhouses,
the canal passes out of Little Venice, under Maida Hill Tunnel—above,
Cafe Laville perches over the water offering superb views and frothy
cappuccinos—and into Regent’s Park.
The park was laid out between 1812 and 1827 by the great architect
and urban planner John Nash. Curving gently through grassy slopes,
towering trees, and resplendent quietness (what the English poet
Bernard Spencer called “the little teeth of a London silence”),
Regent’s Park offers the spirit of its previous life as a
hunting ground of Henry VIII, and, as well, hints of the garden
city it was originally designed to have: There is a sprinkling of
palatial mansions with classical pillars, vast parlor windows, and
manicured gardens cascading to the waterline.
Straddling the canal is the London Zoo, as old as the park itself,
and now home to a menagerie of 12,000 animals. On one bank, hippos
graze alongside spiral-horned Arabian Oryx; on the other, peacocks,
eagles, and wood ducks flutter inside the aviary.
From the floating Feng Shang Chinese Restaurant, a kitschy red
and gold landmark at the edge of the park, Camden Town is just a
short distance away. Waterfront warehouses and wharfs that once
supported narrowboat traffic are desirable properties along the
canal, especially around Camden, and are being rapidly redeveloped
into expensive loft flats and glassy offices.
Camden, with its world-famous markets, is the most popular locale
on the canal and one of London’s biggest tourist draws. On
Sundays, when the hundreds of stalls selling everything from used
clothing to aromatic joss sticks and handmade jewelry are at peak
activity, the whole area is crowded.
Just beyond the set of narrow double locks, a series of modular
metallic homes curve out over the water. Nicholas Grimshaw’s
1980s Sainsbury Development is the most original example of modern
canal architecture.
Ahead is St. Pancras Basin and the industrial yards of King’s
Cross—brick chimneys, a remaining gasometer where coal was
once converted to gas, and dozens of train tracks. An appropriate
stop is the London Canal Museum, set in an 1860s warehouse originally
built for ice-cream maker Carlo Gatti to store ice shipped from
Norway.
At this point, the towpath runs underground for 3,000 feet through
the Islington Tunnel, while pedestrians pass above ground through
Islington. Such a diversion is hardly unpleasant. One of London’s
most alluring neighborhoods, Islington is intelligent, hip, cultured.
The main drag, Upper Street, is a bounty of shops, restaurants,
and theatres (namely the Almeida and the King’s Head), and
a brimming Saturday antiques market.
The towpath is rejoined, above ground, near the Angel Tube Station.
The southern section of Regent’s Canal is quieter and less
traveled. The mix of history, leisure, and eco-friendliness that
characterizes Regent’s Canal, inducing a feeling of disconnection
and perhaps aloofness from each consecutive neighborhood it passes
through, continues as it moves through Hackney and Mile End.
The wide pool that forms just past the first lock of this section
is a favorite spot for urban anglers. “There’s plenty
of fish in here alright,” one fisherman assures me—roach,
gudgeon, stickleback, perch, pike, bream, carp (up to 25 pounds),
and eel. His 20-foot pole stretches over the water, a bowl of wriggling
red grubs and tall can of pilsner at his feet. “It’s
just getting them out.”
Birds, too, abound: grey herons, great crested grebes, black cormorants
with hooked yellow beaks, even the occasional small, bright blue-and-orange
kingfishers. Pairs of giant white mute swans glide along the water,
hissing at the leashed dogs along the towpath.
The canal passes Acton’s Lock and the best place to eat along
its length—a cafe and restaurant serving such delectable dishes
as borscht, blinis, and chanakhi (eggplant stuffed with lamb)—and
then curves slightly south along tall brown-brick estates toward
Victoria Park and into the East End. Established in 1842 by James
Pennethorne, a protégé of John Nash, Victoria Park
is London’s oldest municipal park. From here it’s a
short walk to Limehouse Basin.
Shortly after 1820, Limehouse Basin became the Thames’ canal
port, a harbor once hectic with goods from ships around the world
being unloaded onto the narrowboats. In the 1890s, Limehouse was
home to London’s Chinese community, and the area was notorious—and
romanticized—for its dens of vice. Oscar Wilde wrote, “There
were opium-dens, where one could buy oblivion, dens of horror where
the memory of old sins could be destroyed by the madness of sins
that were new.”
Of course, there are no signs of that now. These days, Limehouse
is defined by modern office towers and new flats offering splendid
views. The only place that even seems old is a waterfront pub called
The Grapes. Dating to the 16th century (and rebuilt in 1720), it
was frequented by Charles Dickens and immortalized in his novel
Our Mutual Friend as The Six Jolly Fellowship-Porters: “…it
had not a straight floor, and hardly a straight line; but it had
outlasted, and clearly would yet outlast, many a better-trimmed
building, many a sprucer public-house.” Indeed it has, and
with few changes.
After a day on the canal, with the sun sliding toward the Thames,
there is no cozier spot to sit than beside the fire while sipping
pints of hand-pulled draughts. And there is no better place to savor
the pleasing irony that the canal has become an escape from the
bristle of energy that sparks the success of the city it helped
to create. |
Where to start
US Airways offers daily service from Charlotte and Philadelphia
to London’s
Gatwick Airport. Visit usairways.com for flight schedules.
After arriving in London,
visitors can get info on Regent’s Canal from British Waterways
London Regional Office at the Toll House,
Delamere Terrace, Little Venice. The original toll house is now
an information center for British Waterways, which handles 2,000
miles of canals and rivers. (020) 7286-6101;
britishwaterwayslondon.co.uk.
WHAT TO DO
Take a narrowboat between
Little Venice and Camden Lock. A round trip takes approximately
90 minutes. Runs daily from Easter
to October, and on weekends
throughout the winter.
WHAT TO SEE
London Canal Museum
This museum details 200 years of canal history and offers an excellent
specialist bookshop. Open Tuesday
through Sunday and on holidays. 12–13 New Wharf Rd., King’s
Cross, (020) 7713-0836; canalmuseum.org.uk
Ragged School Museum
Situated along the towpath, this museum explores the life
and the education of the East End’s poorest in Victorian times.
The Ragged School Museum is open on Wednesdays and Thursdays and
the first Sunday of the month.
London Zoo,
Regent’s Park
Open daily except Christmas Day. (020) 7722-3333; londonzoo.co.uk
WHERE TO EAT AND DRINK
Cafe Laville
Above the canal with views of Little Venice, the cafe is a great
place for breakfast and coffee, or a light lunch of baguettes, panini,
or pasta. Little Venice Parade, 435 Edgeware Rd.,
(020) 7706-2620;
cafe-laville.co.uk
Little Georgia
(Cafe and Restaurant)
The menu—and the name—changes at
7 p.m. For breakfast, lunch, or dinner, everything is
recommended. 2 Broadway Market, London Fields,
(020) 7249-9070.
The Grapes
At this pub with real ales and traditional Sunday roast lunch, try
to get a stool inside by the fireplace or, if the weather is sunny,
on the terrace looking over the River Thames. There is a celebrated
fish restaurant upstairs. 76 Narrow St.
(020) 7987-4396
WHERE TO SHOP
Camden Lock Market
Open seven days a week, the best day to browse and shop is Sunday.
Camden High Street; camdenlockmarket.com
Camden Passage
The Saturday antiques market is the draw, although they remain on
sale throughout
the week. Upper Street, Islington, outside Angel Tube Station.
WHERE TO STAY
Hilton London Paddington
Set above Paddington Station, this gorgeous art-deco hotel recently
had a $100-million-dollar refurbishment.
146 Praed St.
(020) 7850-0500;
paddington.hilton.com
Holiday Inn
Camden Lock
This sleek, newly constructed hotel is in the heart of Camden Town
and adjacent to the canal. 28 Jamestown Rd. (020) 7485-4343; holidayinncamden.co.uk
The Colonnade
Near the canal in
Little Venice, this luxurious townhouse hotel was a
19th-century maternity hospital.
2 Warrington Crescent.
(020) 7286-1052;
theetoncollection.com
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