Part Three: Morden Hall Park to Plough Lane

 

The River Companion and Wandle Trail Guide says: ‘the new Wandle Trail stitches together a ribbon of parks and nature reserves’ and there certainly does seem to be much more green space than boring ‘road walking’. Hats off to the Wandle Group and the Wandle Industrial Museum who have made the River accessible, beautiful and interesting.  This is especially so in Morden Hall Park. There is riverbank planting to ‘improve habitat and biodiversity’, there’s me thinking the plants just grew naturally!  Last time I visited was late summer and some beds of Autumn flowers had replaced the rose garden beds.  There is a wetlands area to explore and the National Trust Snuff Mill where we can see the two watermills which used to power the snuff mill and some millstones.  Imagine having one of those round your neck! An exhibition explains how and why people used to take snuff, too weird, but seems it was big business in the 1800’s. A wealthy tobacco and snuff manufacturer, Gilliat Hatfeild (yes I know, strange first name and incorrectly-spelt surname) brought the mills and Morden Hall in 1870. As the Squire of Morden he acquired the surrounding land which he made into a deer park and we have Gilliat Junior (his son) to thank for leaving the House and Park to the National Trust. Incidentally, Gilliat Junior was unmarried and preferred to live in the modest Morden Cottage, just next to the Snuff Mill, rather than at the much grander Hall.

 

And now, weary of beauty and history and all things watery, it’s time to stop for lunch at the welcoming National Trust Cafe. (The NT are getting a lot of mentions, perhaps they should give me a free lunch….or at least a cup of tea!) Suitably refreshed, we are ready to follow the Trail over the pretty stone bridges, past the wetlands and onto the surprisingly unobtrusive tramline. It’s not dangerous to cross as the trams are VERY loud as they approach. Look up and we see the Trinitarian Bible Society Building, which really does look out of place. Next is Deen City Farm, well worth a visit if you have children; it’s free to visit but please make a donation. As we approach, can you spot the fake black and white cow? This next stretch of river has a manmade sluice coming off it called the Pickle Ditch, which sounds really cute but probably derives from ‘pike and eel’. This once served Merton Abbey.

 

Next we arrive at Merton Abbey Mills, ‘London’s alternative market.’ Worth a visit to the craft shops and cafe and the still working Wheelhouse, on the site of the Merton Abbey print works. In 1724 there was a calico printing works which was taken over by Liberty and Co. of Regents Street in 1904, only ceasing production in 1972. Incredible to think that the original mills on this site were in the precinct of a church the size of Westminster Abbey, hence, Abbey Mills. The site has been nominated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Crossing Merantum Way you can see bits of the original priory wall. The arch is not original, it’s been rebuilt, but it looks nice and fits in with the wall. Not so nice are the flats which occupy the site of William Morris’s Merton Abbey Print Works.

 

Now a walk through Priory Retail Park where several people are fishing, which gives a strangely rural look next to the huge Sainsbury/M & S building.  Crossing Merton High Street we come to the second Wandle Park. Several streams to follow here over pretty bridges, and in the children’s play park, a random large white wooden jug.  If we choose to follow the main river here, along Wandle Bank, Merton Flour Mill still exists, converted into flats.  The next bit is called Wandle Meadow Nature Park but when I was there it had a look of Death Valley (without the buffalo skulls), being parched and scrubby looking. It used to be a sewage works. Through an arch under the railway and we follow a wide path, avoiding cyclists, where there are several of these numbered markers, I should really find out what these mean! Now we are at Plough Lane, Wimbledon, sounds a long way from Croydon doesn’t it? Crossing the road at the pelican crossing, we begin the final stretch. There are approximately 3 miles to the Thames!