100 Up

Having visited 97 sites by the end of September I decided to bring up the century in the first week of October. 

Site 98: Crayford Marsh, October 5th

On previous visits here I took the train from London Bridge, this time I had a shorter journey: tube to West Ham, DLR to Woolwich Arsenal and train to Slade Green. Exiting the station and turning right, it's only a minute's walk along Moat Lane to the start of the footpath across the marsh. The start of the path runs by Howbury Moat and is then lined by trees for a while before it opens up.

The path joins up with another one that runs along the west side of the River Darent. You can turn left towards the Thames but I usually follow the path right for a while to explore the inner marshes before doubling back.

The junction with the River Darent path

The river channel is tidal and is best viewed at a lowish tide when it will have waders and ducks on it. The adjacent fields can be good for small birds as well. I'm yet to visit Crayford during the breeding season so there's quite a few birds I've not yet seen here. Going back past the junction I carried on towards the flood defence barrier.

Darent flood barrier

Confluence of the Darent and Thames

There's usually a lot of gulls roosting on the mud at the mouth of the Darent and often some waders. It's worth remembering that birds seen the other side of the Darent are on Dartford Marshes rather than Crayford. 

Harbour Seals resting on the shore; they're more often seen on the Dartford side

I walked westwards along the Thames to Erith Yacht Club. Inland there's nothing to see during the first half as it's full of scrap yards but nearer the yacht club it does open out onto marshes and is worth checking. I saw a distant Kingfisher along one of the creeks.

I decided it was too far to walk to Kingston Bridge...

There's a nice muddy bay near the yacht club

Inland marshes

Large reed-bed by the yacht club

Great Black-backed Gull

Grey Heron

Kingfisher

Redshank

Starlings on a cellphone tower

The path ends at the yacht club where I turned right onto Manor Road, down Slade Green Road, Hazel Road and back to the station. It's about 15 minutes back to Slade Green station. As it was still early I decided to take the train to another site.

Site 99: Greenwich Park, October 5th

I alighted at Maze Hill station where it's only a minute walk to the northwest corner of the park. I've visited this park mostly for non-birding walks so don't really know the best birding areas. I walked a clockwise loop down to the lake and back up to the same entrance gate. There are many other gates including ones near to Greenwich station. 

Climbing the hill allows great views of the city. It's quite wooded on this side of the park so there's more bird life here than on the open areas on the west side. I walked into the flower garden and had lunch overlooking the lake.

Sweet and Horse Chestnut trees

I passed quite a few people searching under the Sweet Chestnuts as there's a good crop of nuts this autumn and I helped myself to a pocketful.

Carrion Crow

Magpie

Grey Wagtail

Mallards

Moorhen hoping for a free lunch

The next day I paid my usual weekly visit to Rainham Marshes. The warm weather and westerly winds are preventing the visible migration season from getting into full flow. I did record a few Skylarks heading over today though. My best find of the day was when I was on the riverwall and scanned the reserve. I could see some Cattle Egrets with their bovine overlords and suddenly realised that there was more than the usual two with my final tally being seven.

Seven Cattle Egrets

I walked around the reserve loop but it was a fairly quiet day. The Barn Owl was just about visible in its box again. Once the tide had dropped I checked out Aveley Bay again but the only wader was a solitary Curlew. Several more Stonechats were visible than on previous visits.

Stonechat

Site 100: Valentines Park, October 7th

This is another site that's reachable on one bus for me, I took the 145 which stops right alongside the park. I've only been here once before, to look for an over-wintering Turtle Dove so hadn't really been around the whole park properly. I walked an anti-clockwise route, alongside the boating lake, up towards the pond in the northern section and then back down to the north side of the main lake. Being a nice Saturday morning it was quite busy in the park and later on there was even a fun run going through it. 

Being an old park, there's plenty of mature trees and there's quiet areas where you can see a good selection of parkland birds.

Fish pond where the Turtle Dove wintered

Hard to believe it was nice enough to be playing cricket in October

Shortly after I arrived I saw a Little Egret fly along the boating lake which I thought was a good local bird, then I discovered a roost of 14 of them on adjacent trees. I wonder how long this roost has been established?

Little Egret

Carrion Crow

Coot showing off its funky toes

Egyptian Geese

Greylag Geese

Moorhen

When I started my challenge to visit 100 sites in London at the beginning of the year, I didn't know how long it would take so it was good to complete it with almost three months left. I may still go to a few other sites during the remaining time as I've enjoyed going to lots of new places and revisiting some that I've not been to for a long time.