IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Grove Road, RICHMOND, TW10 6SP

Taken from just outside the Cambrian Gate, a pedestrian gate into Richmond Park.

There are a number of these handsome buildings along the west side of Queen's Road. Not all retain as much of the original exterior detailing as this pair.

The Thames is on the right, the yellow crane is at the Star and Garter building Image

I don't often submit photos of vehicles to Geograph, on the grounds that they're mobile. But this old Chevy 32 Apache hasn't moved for so long that it seems pretty much a landmark. The San José/California 'license plate' carries the date 1959. I get the impression that the vehicle is being restored, but it's a slow process.

Footpath heading to the Cambrian Gate in Richmond Park

The road has been dug up by one of the utility companies. Temporary parking restrictions are in force.

When Richmond Park was first enclosed, by King Charles I, the Crown also commandeered a strip of land 16 feet 6 inches wide outside the Park wall. The primary purpose of this strip - the so-called freebord - seems to have been to allow passage along the wall for maintenance purposes. Over the course of centuries much of the freebord has been encroached upon, so that there are now few places where it is still constitutes a public passageway. One such place is here, off Chisholm Road, Richmond, where the freebord gives access to the Park via a pedestrian gate. The house on the right, built into the Park wall, is known as Bishop's Lodge - because once upon a time a gamekeeper called Bishop lived here.

This is a little dead-end street running south-eastwards from Friars Stile Road, stopping just short of Queen's Road. The houses on the south side are early 'semis', and appear to be all of one build. A string-course at eaves level is enough to hint that the gables are to be read as classical pediments. Most have a little roundel up in the 'pediment', and all have stone quoins. But the 'Georgian' details seem pretty vestigial and I'd guess that the row was built after 1830.

Only a small proportion of this grid-square - at its south-east corner - lies within Richmond Park. The area in question is a triangle of land immediately to the north and east of the Cambrian Road pedestrian gate. Along the margin of the Park is a belt of mature trees, well spaced. Species include sweet chestnut, beech, exotic oaks, and hornbeam. In this shot the tree nearest the camera is a hornbeam, Carpinus betulus. Light raking across the bark highlights the broad smooth ridges which give the species its common name. This is a big, rather stocky specimen. Richmond Park is a National Nature Reserve.