Ireland day 1573. Sunday 18 January 2026- In London

Today’s summary	Another day in London. Started early with a tube and foot journey to Paddington to see Val onto the train to Heathrow. She’s going to Switzerland for a few days skiing. Then had breakfast with family and in the afternoon walked up to Kentish Town to meet friends for coffee and a catch up. Fish and chips for dinner then rounded off the evening with a bit of TV.
Today’s weather	Overcast but dry. Almost no wind. Appx 10c.

Today’s overview location (The blue arrow shows the location of my route)		Close-up location (The red line shows where I walked) (Click button below to download GPX of today’s walk as recorded, or see interactive map at bottom with elevations corrected): Kentish Town

Commentary

I’m paying a flying visit to London at the moment, and doing my best to make the most of the short time I’ll be here.

In line with this maximisation effort, we were up at 5am, ready to catch a 5:30 Central Line tube to Ladbrook Grove. Val’s going to Switzerland for a few days skiing and needed to get to Heathrow for an early flight. Unfortunately the Piccadilly, Bakerloo and Elizabeth lines were all closed for engineering work so the only alternative was to get to Ladbrook Grove, walk from there to Paddington, and then catch the Heathrow Express.

Anyway she was duly delivered at Paddington by about 6am. By the time I was ready to return to base, Ladbrook Grove station was closed (“staff shortages”) so I had no alternative but to catch the bus. Anyway the no 23 delivered me back to where I needed be without fuss and I was there before 7am.

By this stage sleep deprivation was catching up with me so I went back to bed and dozed for a couple of hours.

Once I had properly surfaced, I had breakfast with family and Val texted to say she was already safely in Zurich.

After porridge and tea were properly digested, I walked about 5km north to Kentish Town to have coffee with friends. It was good catch up, as we hadn’t seen each other since they visited us in Ireland in 2024. So there was lots to discuss.

By the time we’d finished chatting, it was dark, so I had an atmospheric but enjoyable walk back through Camden and Bloomsbury. On the way back, I treated myself to a fish and chip supper, which successfully banished the hunger pangs.

The rest of the evening was pretty quiet as I was in my own. I filled it with some music and a few minutes of TV before retiring to bed. I’m doing some travelling, myself, tomorrow, so I need to get my beauty sleep!

Today’s photos (click to enlarge)


Paddington Station at before 6am today. unheard of!	The Hawksmoor hotel at St Pancras. What a transformation from 20 years ago, when this was definitely a no-go area

A distant glimpse of the British Library from Midland Road	Crick would have been proud. The Francis Crick Institute on Midland Road, Kings Cross. Nowadays, it’s one of the world’s leading molecular biology research centres. Fantastic.

You can probably guess where this is!	Mornington Crescent – probably best known as the subject of the BBC’s eponymous radio game

The British Museum this evening