One of the things I love most about London is it’s rivers, canals and waterways. I don’t just mean the mighty Thames, although as I said here ten years or so ago, the Thames gives the metropolis a geographical core in a way I never realised before moving here. Rather, I’m talking about the dozens of canals and small rivers which intertwine the city, especially it’s northern half. Quaint little tributaries to the Thames which many people who don’t live here barely realise exist: rivers like the Lea, winding through the Olympic park down into the Thames; or the regents canal, dug long before the metropolis existed, yet serenely cruising its north from east to west, behind houses and buildings,, barely visible from the main roads.

I love how they both have wide, flat, well maintained towpaths so I can drive my powerchair beside them for mile upon mile as they take me on a tour of the city, the troubles of the past few days being instantly banished from my mind. Fascinating cultures and communities have sprung up beside them in places like Camden, where stall holders sell goods in the same way that they have for centuries. People drink in happy little riverside or canalside pubs, built in medieval brickwork and no doubt once backing onto fields yet now increasingly surrounded by shining silver skyscrapers.

Someone who didn’t live here probably wouldn’t realise this watery London existed: canals aren’t something that the city is noted for. Yet once you start to explore London, once you get to know it’s secret little corners, you find it to be a place of quiet, charming little waterways meandering through the metropolis, all the wonderful variety of human life in a modern, twenty-first century metropolis on either bank. As I wrote here, it’s an incredible way to explore London, drawing you in metre after metre as you trundle along towpaths created centuries ago.