The Number 326 Route

28 June 2010 

 Having made use of the facilities in The Spires Shopping Centre, Linda and I (Mary was having her turn in North Wales)  hopped onto the small 326 heading for Brent Cross. It was 13.15, but we had scoffed our sandwiches while we waited, so were in good order. We had time to check out the Brent Councillors on the bus stop while we waited.

The bus was fairly full all the way from Barnet High Street, mostly shoppers, but we also thought some post-exam students. We looped into the Dollis Valley estate, with its boarded up little shops, and then out again, and we saw signs to the Barnet Table Tennis Centre  as well as many signs warning of parking restrictions on Match days, which we took to be about football rather than Table Tennis. 

 We passed New Barnet Station, where the 84 (and the Project) will get to in a few weeks, after its trip to St Albans (!) and noted the Railway Bell Pub, as well as the Lord Kitchener. Wetherspoons say that the Railway Bell was built in 1850, as the Railway arrived in Barnet.  But as usual I can find no information about who named a pub after the hero who relieved Khartoum and fronted the poster campaign for a volunteer rather than conscript army in 1914. 

Our route was almost entirely through residential roads, passing Totteridge and Whetstone Tube station as well as signs to the Dollis Valley Green Walk.  We were mostly in ‘hail and ride’ territory, which is always a bit exciting for us, as we don't have them where we live.  It's especially interesting when parked cars make pulling into the kerb a little challenging. We also met the River Brent a couple of times. 


In Courthouse Gardens, we came to a blue plaque which appeared to be to commemorate the artist William Henry Bach, but it isn’t an EH one so I can’t find more details, and auction house websites require membership before releasing any information, though as far as I can see, the Bach style seems to be slightly blurry landscapes. 

  Soon we came to Hendon Lane: almost every front garden is hard standing, but I suppose being at the top of a hill means that flooding is not a worry. The old Hendon Town Hall, now of course Barnet, was looking very fine, with red and white bedding plants in the front. The War Memorial was also handsome in the sunshine




 When we saw the London Iryo Centre, we thought it might be a religious establishment, but is in fact medicine for Japanese people.  


We turned into Brent Cross at 14.10, really the first shops we had seen since leaving Barnet.