Eel pie island slipways1/3/2024 Mary the Virgin, with its medieval tower. Then, before Putney Bridge is a barge-loading slipway and after the bridge, St. Crossing Beverley Brook we come to Putney Hard, with many rowing clubs, pubs, a ships chandlery and the post marking the start of the Boat Race. On the Surrey bank we pass in front of Harrod’s Depository, now apartments and go alongside the Wetlands Centre, where the old reservoirs of Barn Elms have been transformed into a marvellous bird reserve. The decorative Hammersmith Bridge, designed by Sir Joseph Bazalgette, opened in 1887, is the lowest bridge on the tidal river and pleasure boats can often be seen stemming the tide waiting for sufficient air draught. Past Upper Mall with the famous Dove pub and Kelmscott House, where William Morris had his printing and design works into Lower Mall, with boat clubs, pontoons and a house-boat colony. Then Chiswick Ayot, with its post showing the available room under Hammersmith Bridge, the elegant houses of Chiswick Mall to Hammersmith. On the Middlesex bank are Duke’s Meadows, several boathouses, Chiswick Pier and St.Nicholas Church, with William Hogarth’s tomb in the churchyard. Past the eight-storey block of the old Mortlake Brewery and The Ship Inn, with across the river the finishing post of the Universities Boat Race. Then past Oliver’s Ait, with a view across the river to the cottages and pubs of Strand on the Green to Chiswick Bridge and Mortlake riverside. Leaving Richmond on the Surrey bank, we look across Syon Reach to a rare, preserved habitat, a tide meadow that is flooded twice a day and to our right are Kew Gardens, with the red brick of Kew Palace, to Kew Bridge and Pier. Then The London Apprentice pub, the modern Isleworth Church built on to a 14th century tower and the gates of Syon Park Home to the Northumberland family the Tudor Syon House has interiors re-modelled by Robert Adam and a stone lion on the roof. Then to Old Isleworth, the mouth of the Duke of Northumberland’s River, a preserved crane marking the former commercial importance of the area. Then past a collection of houseboats and barges where the River Crane flows in, behind Isleworth Ait, which has working boatyards and an important heronry. On the Middlesex bank from Richmond Bridge is Ducks Walk, with boats moored at the end of gardens, down to Richmond Lock, a “half-tide” lock where the weirs are usually opened for two hours either side of high water and, when closed maintains navigation depths up to Teddington. Then past Old Deer Park, now playing fields and a golf-course, with stone obelisks near the river markers along the meridian line through Kew Observatory, built by George III. Past Trumpeters House of 1701 and the Palladian Asgill House of 1758 to the former river frontage of the royal palace of Sheen, where Henry VII built his own RichmondPalace and where Elizabeth I died. Then we reach the Old Town Hall, with a library and museum to the White Cross pub, whose customers can be marooned at high tides. We then reach Richmond Bridge and the waterfront, with a boat-builders yard and day-boat hire base in front of a combination of old and old building styles from architect Quinlan Terry, opened by the Queen in 1988. Then past the National Trust’s Ham House, with its formal gardens and collection of 17th century furniture and décor to the steps of Hammerton’s Ferry, which runs a regular service to the other bank.īack on the Middlesex side we see the beautiful white Marble Hill House, built for Henrietta Howard, mistress of the future George II, set in a park with a view across the river to Richmond Hill, dominated by the Star & Garter home looking, from its heights, out over the open vista of Petersham Meadows – one of the classic Thames views. Then past the grounds of York House with its exotic fountain, Riverside lane, often flooded at high tides, the fine Dial House, to The White Swan and the Georgian terrace of Syon Row.įrom Teddington Locks, on the right, Surrey bank are the expanse of Ham Lands and the entrance to the dock serving the gravel pits, now the base of the Thames Young Mariners, for sailing and canoeing.
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