The Underpass from Stanground

Friday. Last day before a week off. I decided a longer lunchtime walk was in order. I headed to Stanground. I'd seen it from the train with its bungalows resting on the waters edge. And a church spire which I decided I would try and reach.

At the end of Fletton Avenue I followed the road under a flyover. One of a confluence of several roads passing through the behemoth of concrete led me into Stanground Village. I turned left onto what I think was the Highstreet, opposite a light-industrial yard containing a tattoo parlour. The area featured a couple of MOT garages and used car places. I spotted a pub, The Golden Lion. Boarded up, permanently closed, a drink out of the question. Opposite a chip shop which was almost tempting.

Although I was only just outside of Peterborough the village could have been miles away, in the middle of nowhere. It retained some of the atmosphere of other places in the city but felt cut off, temporally and spactially. For a few minutes I forgot where I was. I could have been in one of the more crumbly and run down villages of Cornwall as easily as the bit of England which is half East Midlands, half East Anglia.

After I passed the Baptist Church, house in a brown 1930s type building that could have passed as an old workshop, the houses began to look more salubrious. Smarter terraces and old cottages.

Soon I was at the church who's spire I had seen from the train. I followed the path past it. I took an old man walking ahead of me as a barometer of safety. I wasn't sure where it would lead.

I crossed a brook, running along some bungalows similar to the ones seen from the train. A path ran alongside, I noted for a possible future wander. The houses looked pleasant. Although one was sporting a St George's flag on a large pole in the garden. Possibly too soon for the world cup..

The path continued through an underpass, splendidly tiled. As I passed through, a cyclist was appeared from the blinding light at the other end. Instead of emerging into some sort of heavenly nirvana, when I came out the other side I recognised the path back across the dual carriageway that I had walked over on a previous excursion. My route back to work.

Development Opportunies

The first day that felt like Spring. Sunny, warmer but not too warm. Perfect day for a walk. I decided to head up Eastfield Road and keep going to see where it led.

Past the area containing the dilapidated looking pub 'The Sportsman', various shops and takeaways and the entrance to the graveyard, the houses start getting a bit bigger, first 1930s bay windowed semis, then bigger victoriana. One large house hosted a use car business and others old people's homes, a common use of larger houses in Peterborough. A petrol station with a Costcutter attached on on side and unusually a Chinese restaurant, including mock pagodas on the other. 

By this time I think I had entered the area known as ''Newark". The sign I'd seen yesterday had referred to this place, rather than the Newark near Nottingham. Now it made sense.

I passed a large house, currently in disuse but apparently acquired as a 'development opportunity'. I'd thought care homes were even bigger money-spinner a than residential developments. It seems even these establishments are not immune. The building had a slightly spooky air, somehow exacerbated by the abandoned cardboard box in the foreground. Maybe it had contained the belongings of a former resident, dropped in the struggle to leave by the eviction deadline. An absurd scene came into my mind. A struggle between the carers and elderly residents with bailiffs and representatives of the developers. Short-lived and one sided. 

I carried on. After passing the extensive low rise Regional College, I was drawn off Eastfield Road down a path alongside the college's playing fields. I could see a green space the other side and thought I could stop for lunch. It turned out to be a grass verge alongside a fairly recent housing development. The path eventually came to a sudden and unexpected dead end. I was diverted through the housing estate, and eventually onto a main road heading west (possibly).

The road was residential to begin with, possibly 1930s vintage. Further up a few shops and an MOT garage, including a large Fish and Chip shop. Noted for future reference. The road bent round into the direction of the City Centre (I hoped..I'd already extended my lunchtime and must have been a good 20 minutes from work).

I passed a pub, The Elm Tree. It seemed unsure as to whether it was open. A large function room had an advert for the Circus on the door. I couldn't tell if it was contemporary. 

Further along a flat roofed brown 30s(?) building, of the simple type used for community halls and scout headquarters. A building with potential as an excellent community facility. But currrently housing the Christadelphians, one of the many small, obsure and a bit sinister Christian sects that seem to find homes in these sorts of places. I hurried past, not wanting to risk being accosted by someone trying to talk to me about god, and headed back to work.

The Blank Signpost

After a bit of a hiatus of late on the lunchtime walking front, I got back out today for a brief and slightly wet wander.

I headed down the path where I previously encountered Trainspotter Man, and had turned back. No sign of him today and I continued beyond the back of the indoor bowls club, a brown utilitarian building reminiscent of something from Prisoner Cell Block H. Being separated by a fence very similar to the sort you get near railway tracks enhanced the feeling.

Just past here I past the only person I'd seen since leaving Star Road. A young woman glued to her smartphone, causing her to wander like someone half pissed. Small child in tow. She didn't look up when I passed.

I reached the underpass I had been trying to find before.

I went through, not sure what I would encounter on the other side.

I passed a young couple looking a bit shifty as I went under. They might have thought the same about me I suppose.

Beyond was a path/cycle way following the route of the Parkway. Just beyond that houses. A signpost showed the way to Fletton and Stanground in one direction, Newark in another, and nothing in the direction I was going in to head back in the direction of work. A blank. I thought of London being erased by 'No' in the film The Nine Lives of Tomas Katz. I carried on through a street of brown flats and houses towards the non-event of the afternoon ahead at work.