Running the Regent's Canal at night

Regent's Canal at night. Copyright Stefan Schafer.

It is never a chore to put on my running shoes and fly away for 10 kilometres or so. I can feel the post-accident creak in my right knee whispering that, sadly, a marathon is probably never going to be a good idea but 45 minutes of strong running can turn the worst day to a manageable 24 hours that you can process and move on from. And it can also be the icing on the cake of a really good day, leaving me babbling to my nonplussed flatmates as the endorphins course through my system.

The seasons have most definitely changed. It is dark when I leave work and by the time I get home the sunless hours have settled in firmly, a city shrouded in a starless cape. There is less lingering, more hurrying. No point to dawdle in shirt sleeves, taking the air, prolonging the day. Instead, button up tight and rush home to switch on sidelights and cook hot meals. Stamp your feet as you hang up your coat and feel the comfort of central heating. Or, to warm pubs, bars and cinemas. Inside is good; it’s light and warm, safe. Stay inside; outside, the wind whips and rain threatens to become snow. Faces turn down to slippery dangers, strangers don’t meet and eyes don’t rove. Where have all the pretty girls gone? They must be solar-powered.

But outside is where I want to be. Where I can feel the chill on my skin while my system pumps and my lungs burn. Propelling this bag of muscle and bone, cartilage, sinew, fat and blood forward. A human body is a natural mechanical marvel, capable of great things when encouraged and trained. Each body is a miracle. How often do we really appreciate the incredible creation of which we are pilot? It is so easy to take it for granted. Like family, always there, right? The processes that are occurring simply for me to sit at my desk and type these words could fill books when explained scientifically but we don’t give it a moment’s thought. The potential inside all of us is huge. We just have to unlock it. When I run I feel like I am taking hold of the handle on the door to that potential. I’m gripping it with both hands and I am beginning to pull open that big heavy door. A crack appears and something seeps out. It fills me with strength and energy and drives me on. It motivates me to follow my dreams and fosters in me magnanimity towards my fellow humans. My thoughts become clearer with the body under motion. I have always marvelled at the philosophers who pondered profound quandaries while sat in a room, and much prefer the idea of Wordworth’s roaming of the Lake District as an inspirational technique. The world is out there and it should be experienced because we, and perhaps the planet as we know it, will not be around forever.

To make an escape without leaving the city I have the canal. It is not yet so cold that anything more than shorts and t-shirt are necessary. That people can run in hoodies and rain jackets amazes me. I would expect to sweat an obscene amount and be reduced to a shrivelled sack of skin, found lifeless under a pile of Gore-Tex and nylon. I cross Dalston Lane, picking my way through the endless clog of vehicles, that stuttering procession making its painful way towards the junction. This queue so frustrates drivers that they regularly run the light when it has long passed turning red. A white ‘ghost’ bike is locked up nearby, a memorial to a cyclist killed by an impatient motorist. Down Queensbridge Road where the leaves shed from the trees are mashed into the soggy pavement and the headlights of cars are smeared across the evening gloom. Straight south towards the canal I run. I feel a sense of purpose and focus. I direct my energy into my stride and into my breath and feel the dreary details of a digital day trampled under my feet.

I cut a long diagonal path across the road when the way is clear and swing down the ramp that leads onto Regent’s Canal. Immediately there is a sense of change. The silver ribbon of the canal reflects the buildings all about as it slips silently by, drawn irresistibly by gravity towards the next lock. There are no cars, no traffic and few people. There are no advertisements or hoardings, or shouting shop windows. 

The towpath takes me on past collections of narrow boats, long and pointed, the friendly round portholes illuminated by generators, which emanate a deep gurgling throb from within. Wood smoke, or coal smoke, and in one case the pungent whiff of weed smoke, curls up into the air from these floating dwellings. I am transported by the smell to a wild moor with the boats like cosy cottages nestled in the valley. Their wooden walls enclose private worlds. All at once inviting and mysterious they speak of an alternative way to live in the city. For some it is a lifestyle choice, to live on the water and have the freedom to move around, enjoying the company of different moorings as the mood takes them, or not; choosing an isolated spot where they will not be bothered. For others perhaps there is no choice, the rent on a narrow boat being cheaper than a flat and offering an affordable alternative to the  ‘inspirational living’ available in the uninspiring half a million pound new-build apartments that loom over most stretches of the water.

The romance of being a gypsy on the canal is tempered by the effort required on a daily basis. You must offload sewage, take on water and fuel, chop wood and carry shopping inconvenient distances. But you are the master of your own destiny. Under what other circumstances can you drive away if you don’t like your neighbours? If you live in a motor home, yes, but that is just a bit rubbish. The different motivations for choosing canal living are reflected in the huge range of crafts moored along its banks. There are grand, double-width palaces with shiny portholes and fresh coats of paint. These monsters thumb their nose at the idea that living in a canal boat should provide less space than a conventional dwelling. Inside you have to cycle from room to room and maintain a strict curfew on the go-kart track so the kids don’t keep you awake. At the other end of the spectrum are the dilapidated wrecks; listing to one side, mouldy and inhabited? Tarpaulins are stretched over leaking doorways and paint flakes off all over their creaking frames. Some are not canal boats at all but motor boats, presumably once the playthings of the wealthy, but now fallen on hard times and taken to drink. Dirty and decaying, it must be a very cramped existence inside. They speak of desperate necessity rather than a chosen alternative.

As living in the crowded city moves ever skywards into identical boxes the floating homes on the water offer a chance to maintain some individuality. Your home can reflect your personality, not only on the inside, but on the outside as well. You can paint your boat, and adorn it with murals and plaques. One craft moored down by Victoria Park has been made to look like a Tudor cottage, an elaborate and completely bonkers project. Even the clutter on the roof speaks volumes about who you are; buggies and bikes, golf clubs, barbeques and tin baths. Living on a canal boat involves work but in summer, if we have one, there is huge fun to be had lounging on the roof with a mojito and shooting the breeze with your canal-side neighbours.

These charismatic buoyant abodes entertain me as I whip eastwards and then south towards the Thames, following the ribbon of the canal glinting under the low glow of light pollution in the night sky. The darkness cloaks me. I find it comforting to be surrounded by the shroud of evening but there is also a sense of danger, of some lurking unknown lying in wait to shatter the stillness. Just beyond the fence a boogie monster is waiting to leap out of Victoria Park and drag me to its cave to crunch my bones.

A more likely peril is taking an accidental dip in the dark waters. Dressed in all black running gear, I am a menace to myself and the occasional cyclist I pass. Some ride their bikes down the canal with no lights or bell to warn of their approach. If passing one of these invisible high speed death-traps in a narrow tunnel, disaster is only inches away. Without investing in the correct nerdy apparel and a head torch I think it’s only a matter of time before I have an unwanted encounter that ends up with me tangled in a shopping trolley on the bed of the canal or flying through the window of a boat and into someone’s dinner like some kind of flailing Lycra-clad wrecking ball, all limbs and sweat into a carefully prepared carbonara.

Avoiding a spaghetti face plant I charge onwards, past Millenium Park, and under Mile End Road. The tunnel beneath Ben Jonson Road is the halfway point in my run where I turn and head for home. Thinking of the disgraced Canadian sprinter, I looked up Ben Jonson and discovered he was an English poet and contemporary of Shakespeare. In London, inspiration lies all around, threads of our rich history woven into the tapestry of a modern metropolis. I wonder what folk in the 16^th Century made of running as pleasure. Did such a concept even exist? Probably not. I imagine they were far too preoccupied with peasant riding and wench hurling.

I run back the way I came, my hands now good and clammy under my gloves. Bare legs are fine but numb hands make accessing one’s home and removing trainers a tricky task, so sweaty digits it is. I pay silent homage to the looming gasholder that guards the stretch of water near Broadway Market, its imposing steel framework silhouetted against the night sky. And soon I am back on Queensbridge road and only a short way from home. I stop to walk the last few hundred meters in an attempt to free some of the lactic acid from my muscles and prevent stiffness the next day. I feel a sense of peace settling over me. The exertion affords a temporary respite from the plague of my busy brain and relentless need to be doing ‘stuff’. Running is meditation on the move. Each time I set out for a run, I make a deal with my mind; I offer it a willing body to drive on for a period of intense activity and in return I am rewarded with reduced mental static, increased clarity and an enhanced mood. I feel it is a fair trade.