Top of the World: Photos of Nunhead Allotments, and the View from the Hill-Top Reservoir

Top of the World: Nunhead Allotments, and the View from the Hill-Top Reservoir, a set on Flickr.

The photos in this set — the 67th in my ongoing project to photograph the whole of London by bike — were taken on September 8, 2012, a lovely Sunny Saturday, and are the second of five sets from September, drawn from the huge archive I’ve been building up of my photographic journeys over the last five months (see the first set here). They also provide a contrast to the photos from November that I published previously, of autumn in south east London (see here, here, here, here and here), although I will soon return to more contemporary photos, as winter is now in full swing and Christmas is just around the corner.

On the day in question, I had set off on a bike ride, and had found myself drawn to the heights of Nunhead, one of the areas next to my home in Brockley, in south east London, where I had lived briefly in 1999, before the birth of my son. Completely unexpectedly, I stumbled on the allotments below Nunhead Reservoir, at the highest point in Nunhead, formerly known as Nunhead Hill, just as people were being let in, and, impulsively, I asked if I could come in and take some photos. For more information, see the Stuart Road Allotment Society’s website, and, for a history of allotments, see the National Allotment Society website, and the article, “A Brief History of Allotments in England.”

I was not only allowed in, as a lovely little social gathering was taking place, and given a drink, but I also became captivated by Nunhead Reservoir, built in 1855, which is the covered reservoir above the allotments, and found out that it can be accessed via Brockley Footpath, the footpath beside the allotments. This runs up to the hill-top beside the allotments and next to Nunhead Cemetery, another of south east London’s little-known treasures, which is one of seven suburban cemeteries built between 1839 and 1841, and it provides those who can locate it — those specifically drawn to the high places — with the most extraordinary views over London, as well as being a magnet for graffiti artists.

This was a fascinating journey — one of many that have occurred since I began my photographic project in May. I was surprised to make such great discoveries near my home, although it was not the first time I have been surprised by parts of London that are almost on my doorstep, to add to the pleasure of discovering completely unknown parts of London further afield.

The next photo set captures aspects of life on the South Bank during the Thames Festival, on the day after this set, and is followed by two sets in the West End, which I undertook after I had been interviewed on the BBC World Service, the day before the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, when the prison at Bagram airbase in Afghanistan was in the news.

I hope to see you for those journeys, but in the meantime I hope you enjoy seeing some of the wonders of south east London.

Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to my RSS feed — and I can also be found on Facebook, Twitter, Digg, Flickr (my photos) and YouTube. Also see my definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, updated in April 2012, “The Complete Guantánamo Files,” a 70-part, million-word series drawing on files released by WikiLeaks in April 2011, and details about the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (co-directed by Polly Nash and Andy Worthington, and available on DVD here — or here for the US). Also see my definitive Guantánamo habeas list and the chronological list of all my articles, and please also consider joining the new “Close Guantánamo campaign,” and, if you appreciate my work, feel free to make a donation.