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Jim Lewis has managed to reveal more history to add to the extraordinary heritage of the Lea Valley. Prolific Lea Valley historian Dr Lewis continues to investigate the sites then and now associated with great names and inventions. London’s Lea Valley: Home of Britain’s Growing Food and Drink Industry and a Little Bit More! embraces […]

Thursday 19 September is St Januarius Day in Italy where a crowd in Naples waits to see his blood liquify. But in England it’s more observed as St Theodore of Canterbury Day. Theodore was a Greek, born in Tarsus, who became Archbishop of Canterbury in the 7th century. He came to Hertford in 673 to […]

Sean Fletcher’s walk down the River Lea on BBC1’s River Walks features the newly opened Walthamstow Wetlands at Tottenham where he says it “feels like we are in the middle of nowhere” having just left Tottenham Hale Station. The film shows how the reservoirs have are not just concrete pools but have delightful wooded banks […]

Sean Fletcher is walking from Tottenham to the Thames on BBC1 next Monday. He will explore the industrial past and look to its future. River Lea will be shown as part of the River Walks series in the BBC1 London region at 7.30pm on Monday 10 December. Each region is having its own programme so […]

Phil Holland, who has worked at Rye House and knows it intimately, has written a book about the moated and allegedly haunted gatehouse. Rye House and its lovely pub with its 400 year old windows is a popular stop on the Lea Valley Walk. Only the early 15th-century gatehouse survives from the house. By the […]

A new but already popular place for lunch at Tottenham Hale is the cafe just inside the Walthamstow Wetlands entrance. This is opposite The Ferry Boat inn which has long been an option for lunch. The new cafe is located in a pumping station built in 1894 to pump water through the vast reservoirs which can […]

Stonehill Business Park, also known as the Lea Valley Industrial Estate,  is slowly disappearing to make way for Meridian Water development. The industrial estate is immediately south of Lea Valley Viaduct and at present this half a mile is the least attractive on the entire Walk. Clearance is ahead on the east bank whilst the […]

The official notice confirming a new station in the Lea Valley appears in The Times today. Meridian Water Station is due to open on Sunday 19 May next year. This will replace Angel Road which is not very handy for walkers. The new Meridian Water Station, between Ponders End Station and Northumberland Park Station, will […]

An exhibition called Raw Materials: Textiles takes a new look at the Lea Valley’s industrial heritage. The venue is the Nunnery Galley which is found down an alley in Bow. The building is the former St Catherine’s Convent dating from 1866. It was a Benedictine community although confusingly its cafe is called the Carmelite Cafe. […]