SE23 Forum

A lot of people turned up for this event considering it wasn't advertised on the Sydenham Town Forum:
http://foresthillsociety.blogspot.com/

Steve did a great job despite the Vista problems on his computer during the presentation. My favourite moments were having the rare opportunity to visit Dacres Wood Nature Reserve as well as the fresh new facts that came from Steve's research:
*Possible canal bank running at the side of Sydenham Station.
*Garages, walls and trees along the Forest Hill alignment of the canal.
*Contour map and speculation on how the surveyors would have planned the route, ie. getting around Peak Hill.
*Identifying the buildings in a painting.
*Rare newspaper articles uncovered.
*Potential canal bank at Mellenium Green with possible brickwork.
*The romantic connection between the Dartmouth Arms pub and Eliza place.

Here are my pathetic photos I took (dunno why so many came out blurry; must be bad luck):








Would be great if Steve could be so generous as to upload his impressive slideshow complete with various maps, pictures and newspaper articles. Also, if anyone else has any multimedia from the event, please share.

My videos came out a lot better, so if everyone has no objections, I'll begin to upload those...

Did many go on the canal walk from Sydenham to the Hob yesterday?
I meant to go but assumed it was happening today (Sunday).

I'm quite disappointed as I had a couple of questions.
Are there any presentation notes available on the web?

I was there (you can see me on my Dad's shoulders in a couple of the pictures). I think someone said there were about 120 people in all.
It was great! The rain held off and there was the unexpected treat of a (professional?) singer singing some old waterman associated songs from the late 18th/early 19th century (apologies if I have got the history wrong).

I didn't stay for the lecture - my Dad's span of attention is not that good, but the walk was really good for making you look at all the familiar places with a little insight into what went before.

Thanks to Steve Grindlay, the singer and everyone else involved in making it happen.

Just to let you guys know that videos are on Facebook (Sydenham SE26 Lovers) and slideshow on the Forest Hill Society website.

If you have any questions about the Croydon Canal, I think this would be a good place to post them.

BTW, I remember having a major in-depth discussion about the Croydon Canal on the Sydenham Town Forum just under 2 years ago, and the biggest source of confusion and unending arguments was regarding the alignment from Honor Oak Park to Crofton Park--and whether the canal crossed the railway line! This problem still remains unsolved to this day...

can of worms