Day 1 – Regent’s Park – Marylebone – Baker Street

 Today’s Route

Inner Circle

Disillusioned with the failure of the Simply Red reunion Mick Hucknall embarks on a new career

The Garden of St John’s Lodge – A Little Gem

Queen Mary’s Gardens

A drone-free oasis

Can’t remember ever having been round this part of the park before – the gardens really are quite impressive and the wildfowl exceptionally numerous, especially the geese and you don’t want to get too close to those guys

The herons can be pretty unnerving with their sentry-like stillness. If “The Birds” ever became a reality I wouldn’t want to find myself anywhere near here.

                                                                       crap selfie of the day

                                                                        Oi ! Over here mate !

Outer Circle

Elizabeth Bowen – Writer 1899 – 1973

“Novelist and short-story writer who employed a finely wrought prose style in fictions frequently detailing uneasy and unfulfilling relationships among the upper-middle class”.  As famous for her 32-year affair with a Canadian diplomat seven years her junior as documented in Love’s Civil War: Elizabeth Bowen and Charles Ritchie: Letters and Diaries 1941–1973 (edited by Victoria Glendinning),

Park Road

The Rudolf Steiner House

The London Business School – what goes on behind the blue door ?

José Francisco de San Martin – 1778 – 1850

was an Argentine General, governor and patriot who led his nation during the wars of Independence from Spain.

Gloucester Place

The Gloucester Arms

Closed in August 2005, it is now a branch of the Francis Holland School though much of the exterior pub decor still remains.

Ivor Place

Proverbs 6:23

For the commandment is a lamp; and the law is light; and reproofs of instruction are the way of life:

– King James Bible “Authorized Version”, Cambridge Edition

Glentworth Street

Cyprian (Latin: Thascius Caecilius Cyprianus) (c. 200 – September 14, 258) was bishop of Carthage and an important Early Christian writer. He was born around the beginning of the 3rd century in North Africa, perhaps at Carthage, where he received a classical education. After converting to Christianity, he became a bishop soon after in 249. He was executed by beheading during the reign of the Roman Emperor Valerian.

Balcombe Street

Flat 22b – infamous site of the 1975 Balcombe Street siege in which four members of the provisional IRA (responsible amongst other things for the murder of Ross McWhirter) took a middle-aged couple hostage for six days before giving themselves up to the Met.

Pub of the day – excellent crab sandwich

Siddons Lane

Bentley was founded in 1919 by Walter Owen Bentley, or “W.O.” as he was known

Dorset Square

Dodie Smith – 1896 – 1990

Writer of “A Hundred and One Dalmations” and “I Capture The Castle” and joint author of the script for the 1944 film “The Uninvited”.

York Street

St Mary’s Church

Not keen on people sleeping in the doorway

Montagu Place

Who’d have expected the Swiss of all people to have their embassy in a 1970’s office block (though the side façade is significantly more prepossessing). The Swedish consulate across the road is even less impressive.

Crawford Street

On Crawford Street, once well-known for its antique dealers, is the long-established (200 years as of 2014) pharmacy of Meacher Higgins & Thomas

Baker Street

The queue outside the Sherlock Holmes Museum. Not sure what these people are expecting to see. Are they under the impression that it will be memorabilia of real person.

219 Baker Street (Ability Parkview) features the retained central tower and a section of the Baker Street facade of Abbey House, which served as the headquarters for the Abbey Road Building Society (then known as Abbey National and now Abbey) from 1932 until 2002. The prominent clock tower on the Baker Street frontage is topped by a 13 metre (43 feet) tall flagpole. The site of Ability Parkview covers the address of 221B Baker Street, the fictional home of Sherlock Holmes. However, the address only came into existence when Baker Street was extended to the north in 1930, long after Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s books were written. The retained 1920s east façade and open clock tower are art deco/art moderne in style and were designed by J. J. Joass.