London Place 2: Gunnersbury Park

Gunnersbury Park was the showiest of the local parks.

Blessed as we were to be within walking, cycling, or short driving distance of several marvellous green spaces, Gunnersbury had something Lammas, Walpole, Pitshanger, Boston Manor, Blondin etc lacked - a boating lake.

Not just a boating lake, but a putting green, a pitch and putt, tennis courts, a kiosk, a line of muddy mounds for biking and, if membory servies, other fancy stuff like follies, mansions and what have you.

But it was the boating lake that elevated it in my eyes.

There were pedalos - I think for one or two people - and rowing boats. I never graduated beyond the pedalo. 

In fact, I have a ridiculous memory from over a decade later, when I was running a playscheme, and took some children out in a rowing boat on a different boating lake, and when we were called back to shore, knowing that we needed to get back quickly, opted to take over from the kids, installed myself in the rowing seat, before suddenly realising I did not actually know, technically, how to scull, and the skill did not suddenly come to me. I pretended to pull a muscle in my arm and shamefacedly vacated the hot seat.

But back to Gunnersbury. I spent many happy afternoons there. It was a mid-range treat. Clearly a step up from my nearest, Lammas Park but a step below e.g. London Zoo.

I had a friend, when I was little, who lived on Popes Lane, and his garden had a gate to gain direct access to the park, which seemed an unfathomable luxury.

Weirdly, my strongest memory of the boating lake, though, is a rather sad one.

I was probably about 9, and had just returned to the shore from a happy 20 minutes pedalling aimlessly. I just remember a couple of children about my age squabbling, and their mother, who looked tired and on edge, desperately pleading with words that were something like "this was supposed to be a treat, please don't spoil it" and I think that was one of the earliest visceral experience of pathos I had, just knowing, seeing in that second that some lives had a sadness to them that was hard to escape. Aah well ...