Highgate Wood is my local park – a place to walk, dream, relax and play. Part wildlife reserve, part Victorian park it lies on the ridge just below Highgate village. A remnant of the ancient forest of Middlesex, today it’s an extension of our backyards – with a semblance of the village life in the urban metropolis. In the summer the playing fields, centred around the mock-tudor cafe, become an idealised vision of the English village, with its cricket pitch, football games and children’s parties. Despite its village pretensions, it remains a truly urban space with joggers, dog walkers, buggies and tourists jostling for space along its paths and buses to central London running along the roads at its edges.
Stolpersteine in Aachen
Aachen the German border town that straddles Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium is probably best known for its Cathedral – the oldest in Northern Europe and the burial site of Charlemagne. The ‘Imperial Cathedral’ is a magnificent structure, composed of several distinct buildings constructed at various stages in its long history. But my interest in a brief visit to Aachen during a wet and cloudy January was to explore another history that lies in it’s pavements. This history is marked by small brass plaques that stand as memorials to those who were evicted, deported and murdered by the Nazis.
Düsseldorfer Weihnachtsmarkt
For the past 12 years I have spent Christmas in Düsseldorf – and each year I head to the Weihnachtsmarkt, the traditional Christmas market. For a month a little rural village arises on the streets of Düsseldorf. Spread across the Altstadt are lines of stalls selling traditional wooden toys, socks, crystals, and candles – the perfect solution for those last minute presents. Yet the true heart of the market is the food and glühwein stalls, which create a meeting place in the public square.