Friday, Mar. 11, 2011 12:01 a.m.

I decided to spend the afternoon before the group show (second group)'s opening doing a longer walk along the River Lea. By 'longer' I mean a walk that takes about 4 or 5 hours since 3 hours is my average and 6 hours may be a bit too much. The whole Lea Valley Walk is 50 miles long (I have no idea how long is one mile though, and I didn't bother to find a unit converter), and I assume it can be finished in 3 separate walks, each about 4-5 hours. Today I decided that the first walk should have a sweet ending, so I planned to start from Stratford near the Olympic site and finish at Island Gardens where a great view of Greenwich can be seen supposedly.

As there had been a lot of road works, I didn't manage to follow the river all the way through. Most of the time I was actually walking next to busy main roads and the my head was almost blown off by the crazily strong wind. Without the final section on the Isle of Dogs the journey could be quite depressing as many parts of east London were left in ruins. The greyish white sky had made places look even more unfriendly. The views began to look sweeter as familiar sights like Balfron Tower, Greenwich Power Station, Canary Wharf etc. began to pop up. It took me slightly more than 3 hours to reach the planned finishing point. As I wanted to walk more, I went backwards to visit Mudchute Park and its farm, so that the whole journey lasted for 4 hours.

Stratford > Three Mills by Lea > Bow > Blackwall Tunnel and Balfron Tower > East India > Blackwall > West India > along east side of Isle of Dogs > Island Gardens > Mudchute > Crossharbour

starting point near Stratford

Can someone tell me what it is please?

This is probably the TV studio. The stinking water in front is River Lea.

One of the many dilapidated warehouses by the river.

A regeneration project called ContainerFutures

Balfron Tower

DLR train above Bow Creek

A curious sculptural relic

Good place for yi yup.

Greenwich Power Station

Greenwich

Mudchute Park and Canary Wharf at the back

草泥馬. Llamas in the farm.