Graffiti at Horseguards Parade building

Horseguards Parade ground links Whitehall to St James's Park. I love marching across the open space  listening to the scrunch scrunch scrunch of the gravel beneath my feet. Approaching from Whitehall, two of the King's Life Guards sit mounted on horseback either side of the gate, usually surrounded by tourists taking photos. An information panel behind them gives a bit of background:

But there's so much more to see here than good looking young soldiers and beautiful beasts – continue into the passageway and look up to see a parish boundary marker painted on the stone ceiling:

This delineation marker at the junction of St Martin-in-the-Fields and St Margaret's, Westminster, is rarely noticed by the thousands of tourists, and indeed Londoners, who daily walk through here. But there's something else to check out next time you are using this cut through – scratched into the stone walls here there are marks said to be made by the guards, possibly as they wait to move forward to the parade ground:

There are full names, initials and dates of varying sizes and quality. The middle right pic above shows a couple of dates; 1886 and 1924. Bottom left shows P.C. Burt, R.H.C. (Royal Household Cavalry).

Some areas are slathered in multi-layered scratchings and others are very well incised, such as the marks left by Parking and Paynter:

High up at the top of one of the arches on the right-hand side (as you enter from Whitehall) there is a name that looks like W. A. Burrows, beautifully executed in italic script (pics 2, 3 and 4 below): 

I'm wondering if he had to stand on his horse to achieve that mark. Also, how long did it take to create? Another question is, what implements did they use to make the marks? Hand held tools look to have been the favourite in the most part and some marks have been infilled with a black substance which I'm guessing is boot polish. 

Some marks at lower level are dotty, messier and less distinct. I think these might have been made by the guards bashing their boots/spurs into the walls. A good example is shown below, left:

As I stared at the walls, trying to decipher names and dates, it occurred to me that many of the marks might actually be quite recent and not created by the guards at all. Almost as that thought popped into my head, two eastern European fellas walked in from the parade side and made a bee-line for the dotty heart containing the letters W.A.P. over W.L. (below left above T.S.). One fella pointed it out to the other in a sort of 'see, look there!' fashion, and the second fella seemed to say 'oh yeah' and then they walked off at speed back the way they came. Perhaps he knows who made that mark and what it means, or he could have done it himself. It looks to me to be created by a metal punch of some kind. 

Also within that same top left pic: J.H.Q. is followed by 1925-26, although I am befuddled by TSCATS. In the other pics, Andrew O'Connor and A. Richardson haven't dated their work but there appears to be a hint of '54 under Kennedy's weak scratchings, and I think 1.31 after PL/LW in the last pic could be January 1931.

Do go and look for yourself. I wonder which of these marks is the oldest and the the newest.

Swain's Lane and Highgate

(This is the continuation of my post on 29 Jan)

So where was I?  Oh yes, I exited Waterlow Park and turned right up the hill towards Highgate Village.
Immediately I saw a sign telling me (well; drivers) to slow down. Who needs a sign?! I think slowing down is normal at that point as it's about a 1-in-7 gradient – just see these pics and note how the old cemetery boundary wall in the pic on the right isn't true compared to the contemporary white and grey building.

But it didn't seem steep to me. Having already hiked up Dartmouth Park Hill I thought it odd that I didn't seem to be suffering at all. Perhaps my comfy lace-up wedges helped being as they are approx a 1-in-7 in the opposite direction, so I was effectively climbing up a very shallow staircase.
A cyclist overtook me. I heard him before I saw him. His demeanour reminded me of the fella in the animated film Belleville Rendez-vous; clad in Lycra with massive thighs in a hunched up position. But the odd thing was the very loud huffy puffy almost gaspy breathing he was doing. I appreciate he may have been cycling for longer than I had been walking, but it didn't sound like he was doing his body any good at all. Perhaps he should buy some nice comfy shoes and go for a walk instead.
At the top of Swain's Lane on the corner of Bisham Gardens, opposite the locked gate to the cemetery, there is a massive telecommunications mast. It's a bit of a shock seeing it there in amongst the lovely old things. But I suppose needs must these days.

Glad to notice the public toilets in Pond Square are still open and being used and a family with young children were playing ball in the square.

From there I headed north, first checking that a few things in the village were  still intact, such as enamel signs, markers for parish boundaries and insurance companies, and fancy metalwork. Almost at the top of North Hill I turned right into Church Road and then right again onto Archway Road. 

Pleased to report that I finally found old copies of both Vile Bodies and A Handful Of Dust in the warren of books that is Ripping Yarns. I have been keeping my eye open for them since going on Jen's Bright Young Things literary walk last year. More of Jen's walks here. Coincidentally, Jen lives in the Dartmouth Park area.

And then a brisk walk home; down the hill through the hollow way through Archway and into Holloway itself. Nice.

Cally Festival, Sunday 16th September

Another bit of self promotion, but also a good excuse to put some pics on here of a neglected, and now misunderstood and much-maligned, area of north London.
Starting at Kings Cross, Caledonian Road runs due north for over a mile (I must check that!) all the way to Holloway. In the past the street was well-used by cattle-drovers taking their stock to market in the area that is now Caledonian Park. The park/market area was originally just a stop-over for the herds on their way to Smithfield Market. And in later years there was a thriving antiques and bric-a-brac market there. Only the clocktower, and the shells of former pubs are left these days to hint at the history.
The Cally is a real mix – on the east side there's the Thornhill and Barnsbury Estates with their carefully-designed terraces and managed squares and gardens, including a road once lived in by a recent PM, then on the western side council estates were erected thus creating a real mix of cultures; a "them and us" situation – almost a Regent Street 'divide' of the north. A recent BBC programme about the road only glanced upon the diverse history and, in my view, spent too much time talking about the current dodgy landlords and prostitutes at the KX end.
I travel up and down the Cally almost every week spotting old bits of history here and there and some of my observations are shown below.
But to the point... this Sunday the whole area is coming together for the Cally Festival – a pop-up street celebration of the area's diverse offerings, which will include art, craft, music, dance and more.
The stretch of the road between Offord and Bridgeman Roads will be closed to traffic for the day and, judging by last year, it should be good... I hope to see you there... come and find me at my Amelia Parker stall.