Tracking the Tube: Metropolitan Line 04: Rayners Lane to Moor Park

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Weather: Sunny and almost warm!
Distance Walked: 9.3km
Distance By Tube: 7.39km
Stations Visited: 5
Fantastic Place: Pinner

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Quite a difference from my previous walk, the sun was out and it almost felt warm. This was the only dry day for weeks so I felt very lucky to be out and about. Spring had started to spring as I managed to spot the first few daffodils on my way to the station. Rather than going backwards and forwards on the tube I walked from Rayners Lane to North Harrow as they are actually not that far apart in real life. The busy road took me past Imperial Court a nice block of 1930's flats. The rather attractive Rayners Pub with equally attractive sign has closed to be replaced by even more flats, probably not as attractive as Imperial Court.

Cambridge Road had a number of large houses with original 1930's stained glass, of birds and pastoral scenes in the doors and hall windows. It's nice that they have been kept. The attractive buildings continue in Nower Hill, older probably Edwardian in age.

Pinner itself is a very attractive village within the mass of cookie-cutter suburbs. The high street has a number of interesting shops and a variety of architectural styles which if I wasn't walking I would certainly have explored.

Early Spring Sunshine on a Pinner Pillar Box

Pinner appears to have an active historical association, some of the older buildings and the church have information plaques.

Fine Mansion in Pinner

Talking of the church, this unusual tomb dominates the graveyard.

Strange Tomb in Pinner Church

The old Victory pub is now an Italian restaurant, the Victory itself (exhibited in Portsmouth) was the scene of many happy visits when I was a small boy. My dad always used to make the joke about the plaque on the deck which says, 'Nelson fell here', saying "Well he should have looked where he was going." Never failed to raise a laugh. Never.

Part of the Characterful Pinner High Street

Managed to get a bit lost in the side streets beyond Pinner before finding myself on Cookoo Hill where there was a fine thatched cottage, something I wasn't expecting to see.

Northwood Hills is fairly nondescript and so I pushed on through before arriving at Northwood. This has an interesting green-man sculpture opposite the station which was possibly the hardest one I've had to get a decent photo of. The junction is busy and so I had to wait for cars, lorries and buses going past as well as large numbers of pedestrians, also the sun was in an awkward position as well.

Northwood itself has an interesting range of shops on the high street and was quite busy. I spent the next half hour or so walking in completely the wrong direction as my directions told me to turn right on Sandy Lodge Lane. However, the road is not called that where it intersects with the High Street and I walked past the turning at least twice before finding Dene Street and walking up there to where it magically changed into Sandy Lodge Lane.

This lane continued up to the Sandy Lodge golf course which was the reason that Moor Park tube station was built. The private estate that has grown up there is very pedestrian unfriendly with limited directions to the station and almost no footpaths. Eventually I found the route I took for the London Loop and followed that to the station. This section was very muddy from a winter of heavy rain and going was quite treacherous.