Walking and the Winter Wonderland

Date: 5th January 2014
Route: Notting Hill to St Paul's Cathedral through the parks and along the Thames
Distance: About 6 miles

Keen to make the most of the only dry weather forecast for the whole weekend, we decided to avoid the water-logged countryside and take a semi-improvised tourist-friendly stroll through Central London as our first walk of 2014.

This route is very flat and takes you through three different parks, past lots of historical buildings and monuments and along the South Bank, finishing up with a stroll across the Millennium Bridge to finish at St Paul's Cathedral.

The walk starts at Notting Hill station, from where it is only a few minutes to Kensington Gardens. We cut through the Gardens diagonally until we reached the pond in front of Kensington Palace then turned left to go into Hyde Park, passing the Royal Albert Hall and Albert Memorial, the Serpentine Gallery and the Serpentine and heading towards Hyde Park Corner.

The final day of the Winter Wonderland gave us plenty of opportunities to buy Christmas decorations, candles and candy floss, have a go at winning huge cuddly toys or scare ourselves stupid on fairground rides - luckily, we managed to emerge unscathed at the Wellington Arch, where our progress was slightly delayed by the Household Cavalry filing past on horseback.

We then headed down to Buckingham Palace, across Pall Mall and into Green Park and up towards Westminster, passing the park's slightly incongruous pelicans (descendants of the ones gifted by the Russian ambassador in the 17th century?), before cutting through to Whitehall near the Cabinet War Rooms.

Once at Westminster, we dodged the crowds taking photos of the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey, passed the statue of Boudicca and crossed Westminster Bridge. On the far side of the bridge we turned left and followed the Thames Path past the London Eye, various street performers, the Festival Hall, the National Theatre and NFT and carried on walking until the former Bankside Power Station, Tate Modern, where we crossed the Millennium ("wibbly-wobbly") Bridge and past Sir Christopher Wren's St Paul's Cathedral to reach the Central Line station.

This is one of those walks that reminds you of how beautiful London can be in the winter sunshine and is largely traffic-free. A great way to spend a couple of hours without the need for walking boots, wellies or walking sticks, with lots of distractions and attractions along the way.