London Loop Section 7

Banstead Downs to Ewell

 

 

Previously in this London Loop series of blogs I arrived at a fingerpost in the woods on Banstead Downs at 1320 on Bank Holiday Monday26th August 2024 having completed section 6 from Coulsdon South. Now the adventure continues...

 

 

 

 Pausing long enough to take a photo I pressed on through the woods, emerging once again onto Banstead Downs golf course because yes, it really is that big. And empty. Well not quite empty. I sat for a while on a bench looking down the fairway as something bright pink approached. This turned out to be a lady of Oriental appearance, dressed in mostly day-glo garments and having a conversation on her phone in loudspeaker mode and held at arm’s length. I have no words.

 

The bench on which I rested was dedicated in memory of David & Nora Bryson. Don’t know who they were but they are now my first entry on OpenBenches.org Having done that I carried on out of the golf course and down Sandy Lane for the start of a a long, hot slog along residential streets lined with expensive and mostly large detached houses. This is probably my least favourite bit of the London Loop so far. An unrelenting drag along often uneven pavements with little shelter and only uninspiring front gardens to look at. At least at the point of entering Epsom & Ewell Borough there was a stink pipe to spot. 2 points to me 😊

 

 

 

 The road walking continued down to and along Cheam Road then Down Bramley Road which reminded me I’d need to get some apples to go with the blackberries I’d snaffled on section 6. Through an arch under the Sutton & Mole Valley branch line and finally the houses disappeared and I was in the wide open grassland called Warren Farm open space. By now I was flagging a bit and was glad to get across this to the shelter of the trees at the edge of Nonsuch Park. I found a bench under the trees and sat a while, drank some of my dwindling orange squash supply, and added Dolly and Ron Bees to OpenBenches.org as well.

 

Nonsuch Park was the site of Henry VIII’s Nonsuch Palace. On the Epsom & Ewell council website there’s a brief history, reproduced in part here:

 

King Henry VIII began the building Nonsuch Palace on 22 April 1538 on the Thirtieth anniversary of his accession. The King's advisors chose a site then occupied by the village of Cuddington,
with its church and manor house. These were cleared away and the owners compensated.

Within two months of work beginning, the name 'Nonsuch' first appears in the building accounts. The structure was substantially completed by January 1541, but the decorations of the outside walls (which were to be the fame of Nonsuch and the explanation of Henry's purpose in its creation) were still in progress five years later. By November 1545 the work had cost £24,536. When Henry died on 28 January 1547, the palace was still unfinished. What little remained to be done was completed by Henry Fitzalan, Twelfth Earl of Arundel, after his purchase of the palace from the crown in 1556.

Elizabeth I regained Nonsuch in 1592 and it remained in Royal hands (apart from the Commonwealth) until 1670 when Charles II gave it to his erstwhile mistress, Barbara Villiers, who became Baroness Nonsuch, Duchess of Cleveland. She demolished the palace in 1682-3 and broke up the parks to sell to cover her gambling debts. The site was excavated in 1959. Only small remnants of the Palace can be seen today.

 I was glad the Loop followed the path along the edge of the park, lined with chestnut trees so mostly shaded, before bearing off through the woods and passing the site of Nonsuch Palace Banquetting House, a site raised up behind a retaining wall looking like a Tudor artillery fort and intended to afford panoramic views to the surrounding countryside to the royal guests. The site is now much covered by trees, the building is long gone but the retaining wall remains as a ruin.

 

 

 

 I went down a couple of flights of steps and crossed the Ewell Bypass road then along an alleyway to enter Ewell via Church Street between the castellated Victorian school and the church of St. Mary the Virgin.

 

 

 

 On reaching the High Street I turned right and crossed to enter Bourne Hall Park by its impressive gateway, which had been closed the last time I was here but fortunately was now open negating the need for a detour.

 

 

 

 At this fingerpost by the pond I sat down and ticked off Section 7.

 

 

 

What to do next? Silly question.

 

 

 

I needed that. I resisted the temptation to have another, a decision helped by the £6.35 price tag and the continuously barking dog in the pub garden, went and bought some apples, and got the train from Ewell West to Guildford and from there home. The return railway journey was a whole lot less stressful than the outward had been.

 

Flickr Album London Loop Section 7 (16 photos)