One of the things I like best in London, if not the best, is going around by bike. I don’t mean the daily bike commute to and from work. I mean the occasional bicycle run across half of the city with no hurry to reach the destination. Update: August 7th, another trip from Fulham up to Hampstead Heath, with photos.

I feel like biking is the best way to absorb the city. First, even if a bit silly, it marks you out as a local. It’s a stupid thing to point out but, being a foreigner, is one extra bit that makes you feel more at home. Surely you’re not a tourist, who is unlikely to spend the time to experience the city in such a way. Secondly, it guides you through parts of the city that you wouldn’t otherwise cross. Forget the tube where the only thing you do is trying to avoid each other stare, forget the buses which follow the main roads only anyway, and taxis (whenever I get a taxi, is because I’m in a hurry and I don’t give a damn about the parts of the city I’m travelling across).

It’s fairly rare for me to have the time to bike across the city centre. Most of the time I’m limited to the home-work-home commute. During the morning and evening commute I don’t spend time looking around. I have other things in my mind: getting to work to start coding on that particular bit, getting home to see my daughter and wife at the end of the day.

But every now and then I have a chance to go to West End or East London (which equates to crossing half of the city for me, given I depart from the south west) and then, on the way back, usually at night, you have time to experience all those little details that would otherwise get lost. You wouldn’t appreciate it in the same way if you were on foot, it would take you just too much time to get home. But by bike… there’s no better way, especially on warm nights like this. It’s the right pace.

I’m travelling back from around Tottenham Court Road this time and when I get to Oxford Circus I always get lost in the maze of little roads that ultimately leads me to Hyde Park Corner. I like this area. It’s just a few roads but I never spent time studying it on Google Maps and every time I’m here I end up taking a different turn. I like looking inside the illuminated windows: hotels’ receptions and sitting rooms, posh restaurants, pubs, so many people standing outside having a beer, the occasional apartment, yes I enjoy getting glimpses of other people’s routine, sitting in front of a tv, cooking, chatting, while I run past on the bike.

Passing past Hyde Park Corner is always the tricky part. People tend to speed up while driving over there, they feel they have all Grosvenor Place ahead where they can accelerate toward Victoria (mind you, at night. During the day they’re stuck) and 5 lanes of cars are always a bit of an issue when you’re on the bike and you want to get on the other side toward Belgrave Gardens.

From Victoria onward it’s the same road I do every day after work. But at night, with no hurry, is different. I like slowing down to have a look at the antiques shops on Pimlico road, something I never do during the day and everytime there’s a new detail to notice in the surrounding buildings, that winding staircase with hanging flowers. I go through Chelsea instead of taking the embankment, I like the red facades of the buildings leading to Sloane Square. I like New King’s Road quite pace at night. When I cut straight down Royal Hospital Rd I can never resist from looking inside the windows of Restaurant Gordon Ramsay, crossing eyes with the valet standing outside.

Eventually I arrive in Fulham, have a look at who’s inside Megan’s, also doubling up as best breakfast place for Sunday mornings, scan the last set of pubs, wonder why the Imperial Arms is always half empty (and it looks nice, if not better than the others around, who knows…), finally turning towards Sands End, the usual buzz coming out of The Sands End pub with its orange lights and nobody else around elsewhere in the poorly lit side streets, home.

Next time you visit a city, grab a bike.

P.s.: article photo by Phil Dillon, which I hope won’t mind me using it here.

Update: August 7th, another trip from Fulham up to Hampstead Heath.

View Hampstead Heath in a larger map