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Tubewalker: The Tube, on Foot

Metropolitan Line: Wembley Park to North Harrow

Wembley Park station
Wembley Park station: just add people

The weather gods must be smiling on me, because today opened with pure blue skies all the way to the horizon. Their timing is good, because although yesterday's walk took me from the urban landscape of zone 2 into the noticeably greener zone 4, today is when I finally broke out into proper countryside. The Welsh Harp Open Space might be a pleasant interlude, but it's still defiantly urban; the view across the reservoir to Neasden is quite built up and the nearby Edgware Road takes no prisoners, but today the countryside seems to stretch on and on and the sky is considerably bigger. I'm not into the woods yet – that will take at least another two zones – but I can sense that the balance of power is shifting, and when the sun is out, it's easy to be thankful.

Wembley Park to Preston Road

Houses on Barn Hill
The classic suburbia of Barn Hill

I'm going to be a bit tired of Wembley Stadium by the end of the week. I spent yesterday steering towards the giant hoop and today's walk starts with a view down long, straight Olympic Way as it leads all the way to the stadium, and tomorrow I'm going to be back here on a day off from tubewalking to see the Foo Fighters raise the roof. But it's such an impressive and imposing building that it's still fascinating even after days of gazing, the hoop giving it an otherworldly atmosphere, like an urban Jodrell Bank. It might have been late arriving, but it's a fitting home for the nation's favourite sport, and Wembley Park station is equally impressive. Obviously designed to enable huge crowds of screaming fans to get in and out as quickly as possible, a cascade of steps falls down from the entrance to a subway under the main road, taking the coloured scarves and party atmosphere off to the stadium below. I bet it's quite a sight on match day.

A path on Barn Hill
Walking down Barn Hill

Preston Road to Northwick Park

Preston Park
Preston Park

Preston Road station is just west of Stanmore Junction, where the Jubilee line turns north towards Stanmore, leaving the Metropolitan line to continue out into Buckinghamshire on its own. Preston Road itself is not the loveliest part of the world, but it's hard to find main roads in London that are. Luckily the suburbs of Preston follow the normal pattern of increasing in beauty as the main road recedes, and it isn't far to Preston Park, a genuinely lovely little suburban park (or it is when the sky is Saharan like it was today).

Northwick Park to Harrow-on-the-Hill

St Mary's Church, Harrow
St Mary's Church, Harrow

I ducked off the Ring for a short while to visit Northwick Park station, right next to the Harrow campus of the University of Westminster, and from there I struck west along a shaded path, sandwiched between the university and St Mark's and Northwick Hospitals. It's quite a busy place, this path, because it's clearly the designated smoking area for the hospital. There are black bin bags pinned up every few yards, presumably for the butts that still manage to litter the path, and when I wandered through it was proving a popular spot; then again, on a day like this, who wouldn't fancy a fag break out in the sun, even if you have to spend it skulking in the dingy undergrowth?

Harrow-on-the-Hill to North Harrow

Harrow-on-the-Hill station
Harrow-on-the-Hill station

The design of Harrow-on-the-Hill station hints at the architectural excellence of Charles Holden's seminal Tube stations (such as Sudbury Town, Arnos Grove, Southgate and Oakwood on the Piccadilly line extension), but it turns out to be a much more functional affair, having only the glass slats on the front to remind you of Holden's more impressive designs. The station acts as a pedestrian crossing over the line and dumps you into the main shopping area of Greenhill, where buses rumble past as if to rub your nose in the fact that Harrow-on-the-Hill station is a world away from its namesake. The architect Hugh Casson regarded Harrow as the 'capital city' of Metro-land; I'm not sure the appeal is quite as obvious these days, though perhaps that says more about the old Metropolitan Railway's publicity department than anything else.

Harrow Cemetery
Harrow Cemetery