Discovering London's Canals


Book Description

Discover the beauty and delights of London's waterways, on foot or by boat, with Derek Pratt and Richard Mayon-White's fascinating and thorough guide. To really explore London's canals is to see the city in a way you've never seen it before. A different world, away from the hustle-bustle of overladen streets and towering skyscrapers, the waterways offer a unique paradise, full of wildlife, brightly coloured narrowboats, lush greenery and an environment steeped in history. Discovering London's Canals will open your eyes to this world and show you all it has to offer, walking with you along the vast stretches of each canal, pointing out the many sights to see and enjoy, pubs to quench your thirst in and history to marvel at. Enjoy whole days out with family and friends, or just an hour or two, choosing a stretch of canal and discovering so many sights and attractions either on or within a short walk from the water's edge. With information boxes, travel directions, clear maps and beautiful photography, along with insightful travel writing from the kings of the waterways, Derek Pratt and Richard Mayon-White, Discovering London's Canals is the perfect guide for anyone who loves walking, wildlife and the waterways of the great city of London. The book covers more than 60 miles of waterways in London, easy to get to and walkable for just an hour, an afternoon or a whole day, and each route is great for walking, running or cycling, with many traversable at any time of year. Go out there and see for yourself – there is a wonderful network of waterways just waiting to be explored in parts of London you hardly knew existed.




London's Lost Rivers


Book Description

Packed with surprising and fascinating information, London's Lost Rivers uncovers a very different side to London - showing how waterways shaped our principal city and exploring the legacy they leave today. With individual maps to show the course of each river and over 100 colour photographs, it's essential browsing for any Londoner and the perfect gift for anyone who loves exploring the past... 'An amazing book' -- BBC Radio London 'Talling's highly visual, fact-packed, waffle-free account is the freshest take we've yet seen. A must-buy for anyone who enjoys the "hidden" side of London -- Londonist 'A fascinating and stylish guide to exploring the capital's forgotten brooks, waterways, canals and ditches ... it's a terrific book' - Walk 'Pocket-sized, beautifully designed, illustrated and informative - in short a joy to read, handle and use' -- ***** Reader review 'Delightful, informative and beautifully produced' -- ***** Reader review 'A small gem. A really great book. I can't put it down' -- ***** Reader review 'Fascinating from start to finish' -- ***** Reader review ************************************************************************************************ From the sources of the Fleet in Hampstead's ponds to the mouth of the Effra in Vauxhall, via the meander of the Westbourne through 'Knight's Bridge' and the Tyburn's curve along Marylebone Lane, London's Lost Rivers unearths the hidden waterways that flow beneath the streets of the capital. Paul Talling investigates how these rivers shaped the city - forming borough boundaries and transport networks, fashionable spas and stagnant slums - and how they all eventually gave way to railways, roads and sewers. Armed with his camera, he traces their routes and reveals their often overlooked remains: riverside pubs on the Old Kent Road, healing wells in King's Cross, 'stink pipes' in Hammersmith and gurgling gutters on streets across the city. Packed with maps and over 100 colour photographs, London's Lost Rivers uncovers the watery history of the city's most famous sights, bringing to life the very different London that lies beneath our feet.




The Regent's Canal Second Edition


Book Description

The Regent's Canal, the Limehouse Cut, the Hertford Union and the Lee Navigation collectively cut a swathe through north and east London. This 14-mile path, cycle and waterway is a journey full of intriguing contrasts: - From the amateur sports fields of Regent's Park to London's new Olympic Park. - From the studio where Hitchcock directed some of his early films to MTV in Camden Lock. - From fine period housing to industrial wasteland, social housing and new canalside builds. - From the pleasure boats chugging to Camden to the sleek Eurostars roaring off to Paris. The use of canals has changed dramatically over the past fifty years from one of industrial transportation to waterfront living and leisure activities. The canals in this book have undergone major phases of rebirth with new developments at King's Cross, Limehouse and the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Newham. Illustrator and writer David Fathers offers a snapshot of how the canals were formed and how they appear today, in a series of arresting and information-packed pages following a course from Little Venice to the River Thames at Limehouse, and on to the Olympic Park.




Jumping Over Shadows


Book Description

The true story of a German-Jewish love that overcame the burdens of the past. Finalist for the 2017 Book of the Year Award by the Chicago Writers Association “A book that is hard to put down.” —Jerusalem Post “This book confirms Annette Gendler as an indispensable Jewish voice for our time." —Yossi Klein Halevi, author of Like Dreamers "The ghosts of the past haunt a woman’s search for herself in this thoughtful, poignant memoir about the transformative power of love and faith.” —Hillary Jordan, author of Mudbound, now a Netflix movie “An exquisitely written conversion story which expounds upon personal and collective identity.” —Washington Independent Review of Books “A compelling, gracefully written memoir about the impact of the past on the present.” —Michael Steinberg, author of Still Pitching History was repeating itself when Annette fell in love with Harry, a Jewish man, the son of Holocaust survivors, in Germany in 1985. Her Great-Aunt Resi had been married to a Jew in Czechoslovakia before World War II―a marriage that, while happy, put the entire family in mortal danger once the Nazis took over their hometown in 1938. Annette and Harry’s love, meanwhile, was the ultimate nightmare for Harry’s family. Not only was their son considering marrying a non-Jew, but a German. Weighed down by the burdens of their family histories, Annette and Harry kept their relationship secret for three years, until they could forge a path into the future and create a new life in Chicago. Annette found a spiritual home in Judaism―a choice that paved the way toward acceptance by Harry’s family, and redemption for some of the wounds of her own family’s past.




Adrift


Book Description

Journeying along London's waterways on a canal boat called Pike, Helen Babbs puts down roots for two weeks at a time before moving on. From Walthamstow Marsh in the east to Uxbridge in the west, she explores the landscape in all its guises: marshland, wasteland, city centre and suburb. From deep winter to late autumn, Babbs explores the people, politics, history and wildlife of the canals and rivers, to reveal an intimate and unusual portrait of London – and of life.




The Hackney Canal


Book Description

Freya Najade captures the unexpected beauty and abstraction along the waterways that course through East London. Focussing mainly on detail and colour but drawing on a tradition of landscape photography her images remind us of the hidden poetry in the city and the richness of the waters that sometimes run darkly through the heart of the capital.




Exploring the New River


Book Description

The New River is neither new nor a river but a 400-year-old man-made waterway between Ware and Stoke Newington. This book should be of interest to local historians and those who wish to walk the canal.




London's Hidden Rivers


Book Description

A fantastic guide to exploring the hidden rivers of London. London has many rivers, but they are often hidden under centuries of development. Rivers like the Walbrook, the Fleet or the Effra have left their mark on the city, and still form an important part of our subterranean world. - From the former watering hole, by the Earl's Sluice, where Canterbury pilgrims rested, David Bowie rehearsed and Henry Cooper trained, to the Gardens by the Westbourne where a young Mozart performed. - From Counter's Creek and its burial grounds of Kensal Green and Brompton to the River Effra and the West Norwood cemetery. - From the pipe carrying the River Tyburn over Baker Street Underground station to the grate in Farringdon through which the River Fleet can be heard (and seen). David Fathers shows the course of London's hidden rivers in a series of detailed guided walks, illustrating the traces they have left and showing the ways they have shaped the city. Each walk starts at the tube or rail station nearest to the source of the river, and then follows it down to the Thames through parkland, suburbia, historic neighbourhoods and the vestiges of our industrial past. London's Hidden Rivers contains over 120km of walks, both north and south of the Thames. Winding through the hills, valleys and marshes that underlie the city, every page is a revelation.




Exploring the Regents Canal


Book Description




This Other London: Adventures in the Overlooked City


Book Description

Join John Rogers as he ventures out into an uncharted London like a redbrick Indiana Jones in search of the lost meaning of our metropolitan existence. Nursing two reluctant knees and a can of Stella, he perambulates through the seasons seeking adventure in our city’s remote and forgotten reaches.