Battersea Park (Part 1)

This being notice of the visit to Battersea Park and its environs trailed at reference 1.

Proceedings proper started with coffee and cake at Prezzemolo & Vitale at Clapham Junction, where we amused to get our cake on very artisanale wooden plates but our coffee in paper cups. Gear OK though.

From there to the bus stop across the road, outside the old parcels office, just by, if memory serves a goods exit to the station from platform 17 which I used to use in order to make a quick visit to the house then called the Windsor Castle, now the Junction, as per reference 3. Exit firmly shut up now, but one can peep through the gates, as snapped above.

The bus dropped us off somewhere along Battersea Church Road, very near the river,  somewhere with easy access to the river walk. One forgets how big a river it is - and was, even allowing for the modern embankments.

With access to the beach at the far end.

One had to brave the wildlife to get down the slipway.

Complete with a live heron on a dead barge, zoomed in the inset lower right. I wondered who owned the barge and what, if anything, was stopping the council or the river authority (whoever that might be) towing it off to the breakers. Or would the heritage people get cross about that?

The beach was generally pretty clean, but there were patches of rubbish. And there were these stairs, which it is as well that we did not attempt. Not sure that you would know from the top that there was no bottom.

Back up the slipway and into St. Mary's church behind, which we were surprised to find open,  Anglican churches being a bit hit and miss in that department, especially during the week,

Another handsome church (see reference 5 for another), in good decorative condition. They must have some generous members. Furthermore, it appears to be more in the way of a regular church than that one: perhaps gentrified Battersea is home to a nest of true believers? I shall get round later to checking whether Richard Church, another true believer, ever worshipped here. Although how exactly I shall go about that, I don't yet know as his three books of autobiography do not comes with indexes.

The piano already noticed at reference 1 is just about visible middle left. We also have what is left of a triple-decker pulpit more or less in the middle of the snap, just to the right of the organ.

A curious bay window let into the wall behind the pillars of the main entrance. According to reference 6, Jesus has been worshipped on this site for well over 1,000 years. Presumably at the start of the period, little more than an island in the middle of the wetlands bordering the river.

Very much in keeping with the death business noticed at reference 7, we find that the church runs a death café, perhaps once a month, perhaps intended to help people who are about to be visited by death. Which I learn from the parent organisation at reference 8, not US in origin as I had at first thought, is indeed the case. I wonder if I will be up for this sort of thing when my time comes, not being a great fan of group therapy in life? Nothing wrong with it and I am sure it helps lots of people, but so far I have not felt the need for it.

Out to continue our walk along the river. I am not sure that I had ever noticed how good looking Battersea Bridge was before. Perhaps it has been cleaned up since we were last there.

And a not so dead barge in what I now know to be Ransome's dock.

Presumably once flanked by busy wharves and warehouses serving the river traffic, traffic connecting the interior with the sea-borne traffic of the Pool of London. Rather bigger than I had realised from the river end.

Which looks as if it was once equipped with lock gates, presumably to keep the barges steady and afloat between tides.

Albert Bridge ahead of us also looking pretty well.

I have a memory of deciding that the roundels decorating the sides of the bridge were open in the middle and the appearance was enhanced by seeing the flickering of the traffic behind through the openings. But zooming in on this snap does not suggest openings, and nor do any of the snaps turned up by Bing. And not Battersea Bridge upstream or Chelsea Bridge downstream. Must consult BH, as my recollection is that it was she who first noticed.

And so to lunch at the Prince Albert of Albert Bridge Road and reference 9, a house we or I must have passed many times, but never entered. They could do me a very decent bit of chicken, supplemented by bread at one end and sorbet (orange) at the other. Plus a pint and a half of Young's ordinary, but very decent, bitter. As much beer as I have taken in one go since I gave up beer over a decade ago now.

A bit mean with the green vegetables, but that it what one has to expect at places of this sort: perhaps there is not enough call for decent portions. From where I associate today to the collective difficulty we Brits seem to have with fruit and vegetables, a matter which cropped up yesterday at the end of reference 10. Seemingly a matter of some concern to our health authorities. Also to a far-off occasion when I presented a hotel reception with a large round cabbage so that I could have a decent portion that evening. I am pleased to say that this worked, but finding this hotel is left as an exercise for the reader.

BH did something salad flavoured.

By no means full, but they were not doing badly for mid week but I imagine that the place is rammed Sunday lunchtime. Reserved places only. Plus space outside for those that like to take tobacco with their meals.

An impressive brown wood bar inside.

And the curiously finished end of terrace outside. Prompting one to wonder in what order things had been done. And why the massive buttress - presumably not entirely decorative.

And so to the park, the object of the mission.

PS: a souvenir of the beach, pictured on top of the Masonic rule book. One of the few bones that I came across. The humerus end of a broken scapula, but, from the images turned up by Bing, it does not look right for a human, so probably a domestic animal. 

It should be said that plenty of human remains do get washed out of the river banks, so that was a possibility.

And on top of the perforated stone, a weathered flint, gathered up on the previous excursion to a Battersea beach. A snap which failed to make much of either of them.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/06/piano.html.

Reference 2: https://www.prezzemoloevitale.co.uk/.

Reference 3: https://www.greeneking.co.uk/pubs/greater-london/junction.

Reference 4: https://www.stmarysbattersea.org.uk/.

Reference 5: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/05/the-aldwych.html.

Reference 6: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Mary%27s_Church,_Battersea.

Reference 7: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/06/progress.html.

Reference 8: https://deathcafe.com/.

Reference 9: https://www.theprincealbertbattersea.co.uk/.

Reference 10: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/06/sunday-trivia.html.