Having visited Southwark’s newest parkrun last week this week we travelled to Dulwich parkrun, the oldest of the 4 parkruns in the London Borough of Southwark.
Dulwich was first documented as a hamlet in 967 AD by King Edgar. Over the centuries the hamlet evolved into Dulwich Estate which at its centre is the College of God's Gift. Dulwich is steeped in education which includes the impressive Dulwich College a location for filming Harry Potter and The Importance of Being Earnest. Dulwich Village is a conservation zone with well-maintained 18th and 19th-century buildings that feel entirely different from the north of the Borough. The Dulwich Picturehouse Gallery and Crown and Greyhound pub are beautiful buildings. In keeping with all of this, the 76.2 acre Dulwich Park is a listed Grade 11 on the register of Historic Parks and Gardens and home to this week’s parkrun.
With the sun up the Southwark Slammers assembled along with the 590 other participants. One chap was doing his 500th parkrun and baby Chloe at 12 weeks old was doing her first, assisted by her mum 🙂
Starting just down from the Queen Mary’s Gate, this is a 3-lap anti-clockwise course on the main carriageway. It goes around the boating lake and past the Three Perpetual Chords sculptures designed by Conrad Shawcross. The park is beautifully planted, the carriageway is wide and this course is one of the fastest I’ve done.
Dulwich park has excellent facilities including a delightful cafe. On this occasion I only stayed to use the baby changing facilities before heading over to East London to cheer my wife running the Pride 10k in Victoria park.
The Southwark Slam will conclude next week at Burgess parkrun. It will be a special occasion as it’s their birthday. It will also be my 300th parkrun. Do come along I can promise there will be bananas at the end 🙂
See you at Burgess parkrun and happy running
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