My next alphabetical destination proved a conundrum because no London suburb starts with J. The Ordnance Survey maintains a list of "populated places", 681 of which are in the capital, but that alas jumps straight from Islington to Kenley. Only four of the placenames even include the letter J, these being Clapham Junction, St James's, St John's and St John's Wood, none of which count as little-known locations. So I've had to plump for Joyden's Wood instead which is in Kent, or at least the vast majority of it is.
Joyden's Wood is a vast tract of ancient woodland partially devoured by suburbia. You'll find it between Old Bexley and Swanley, safely tucked between the A2 and the A20. The first building work hereabouts was the Fæsten Dic, a mile-long defensive earthwork believed to have been built by Kentish Saxons in the 5th century. The earliest medieval settlement was a manor house called Baldwyns, this sold off in 1894 to create a large mental asylum, then in 1924 a wedge of woodland was appropriated to create the Baldwyns Parkestate. Considerably more land was given over to housing after the war, this where you'll now find a library, two primary schools, three dozen streets and a chip shop. This is the suburb now generally known as Joyden's Wood, almost all of which is on the Kent side of a district boundary that once ran almost unnoticed through the woods.
I have instead set myself the task of documenting the London side of the divide which alas includes only a quarter of the wood, all on the unpopulated side, plus six cul-de-sacs, a couple of country lanes and a lot of places where horses live.
The wood Joyden's Wood is a fabulous place to explore, especially at present when its many weaving paths aren't the usual mudbath. Find one of the handful of entrances and you can lose yourself in a forested wilderness, ideally following the broad tracks or minor sidepaths rather than the outer loop of churned-up bridleway. Expect to meet dogwalkers doing a circuit, although rather fewer on the London flank because there's nowhere to park, or if you're lucky absolutely nobody at all. The woods didn't always look like this, the Forestry Commission got somewhat over-zealous planting pine trees in the 1950s, but the Woodland Trust have done a good job of thinning them out again.
I made my way from the perimeter to the path that most closely tracks the Greater London boundary. To my right a break in the wire fence led off to a steepish climb beneath a thickening canopy, the wood's character very much a consequence of its endlessly undulating contours. Birdsong accompanied me along the way, half of it from Kent. Birch trees occasionally (and unnervingly) creaked in the wind. Just off the main track I found a deep sandy dell, crossed a dried-up a stream on a bridge of logs and stumbled upon the last of the season's unshrivelled bluebells. I did not find the wooden fighter plane, the boardwalk or the Saxon earthwork because they're on the wrong side of the line (as previously enjoyed).
Another wood
Gattons Plantation is an adjacent woody oblong, also with a Joyden's Wood sign on the gate but entirely separate. You get here along Parsonage Lane, a proper winding lane liberally dollopped with manure. They totally love horses out here, with any land that isn't woody having been taken over by paddocks, stables and riding schools, also irregular detached houses inhabited by folk who enjoy a ride. As London goes, this edge of rural Bexley is beyond atypical. For the plantation turn right into Cocksure Lane and look for the swing gate into 35 acres of dense oak cover and undergrowth, passing a ripped-up poster on Coppicing before you start your circuit. I'd tell you more but this is probably more North Cray than Joyden's Wood and I might need that for N.
More stables Stable Lane is well named because Mount Mascal Stables is tucked away down the far end. Again it's notionally in North Cray but because Joyden's Wood is immediately adjacent I'm totally including it. MMS is massive, a warren of paddocks, barns and outbuildings with copious car parking, plus the underlying smell of soiled hay. A public footpath passes through so I got to see small children taking trotting lessons while proud parents watched on, also dressage arenas with letters round the outer rails, also smiling passengers arriving for a 90 minute hack or a Standard Pony Party. This is how the active equestrians of DA5 spend their weekends.
Further up the lane are occasional sprawling cottages, a half-occupied business estate and a permanently closed nursery (perennials, not toddlers). I passed a sign saying 'New Laid Chicken Eggs £2.00 box of 6', just before the man whose chickens they were emerged and took his half-dozen back indoors. The only modern intrusion is the entrance to an electricity substation, a chicane of barriers and warning-strewn fencing leading to a huge fizzy grid cunningly concealed in a grassy dip. Hurst 275Kv Substation is one of the stopping-off points for the London PowerTunnels 2 project, a 20 mile high-voltage connection between Wimbledon and Crayford which went live hereabouts last summer. I should have guessed it was important from the glare the security guard gave me when I took a photo of his portakabin.
The other lane
Tile Kiln Lane is proper ancient, the original link from Bexley to Baldwyns and still the same width too. It climbs and curls between stone walls, then up past yet more horses and the entrance to a single private cottage. Vehicles are barred from the central stretch, a part-grooved lane encroached by twiggy trees where you could imagine it's still the 18th century. Alongside is a meadow called Coldblow Field because this smidgeon of outer Bexley generally goes by the Coldblow name, but I shall be claiming the next suburbanised quarter mile as proper Joyden's Wood because its houses were built when all this was incontrovertibly Kent.
Residents of this mix of bungalows, townhouses and squished detacheds get to vote for London's Mayor but pay for it by having a ULEZ camera perched at the entrance to their mini-enclave. In the grounds of St Barnabas Church I found a mysterious knobbly boundary marker rusting away in one corner, also a coal tax post so peripheral it occupies a sawn-out slot in somebody's garden fence. The last cottage before Kent is the oldest by far, a hexagonal oddity with a thatched roof which was formerly the lodge for the big manor beyond. The bus stop outside has a B12 tile saying 'AM only' because it's part of a unique TfL loop that operates clockwise before noon and anti-clockwise after. Pictured is the last bus before the switcheroo (although it's actually timetabled for twelve minutes past twelve).
The shops
The Kent side of Joyden's Wood has most of the shops but the Bexley slice does merit one short parade, so close to border that there's a coal tax post outside the Chinese restaurant. The salon nextdoor recently switched from curlers to skin fades while the dry cleaners at the far end sold up in 2019 and is now a kebabbery. Astonishingly one shop still specialises in TV sales and satellite repairs, admittedly now doubled up with a strong sideline in vapes. But the finest shopfront here must be that of Modern Screws, still ready to sell you a pack of steel pop rivets or a Grub Screw Micro Assortment, even if its '60s typeface immediately contradicts the 'Modern' half of its name. There is much of joy in Joyden's Wood, even on the flank that's barely Joyden's Wood at all.
