The last day of the year is an excellent time to tot up what you've been doing all year... assuming you've been counting, which obviously I have. Cue my Counts of 2025.
(I'm aware there's still one day to go, so I'll provide final accurate totals later) (If you don't count these kinds of thing, look at all the fun you're missing out on)
Let's start with the number of London stations I've been to.
And by 'been to' I mean entering or exiting the station, not just passing through.
stations in zones 1-3: all of them
There are approximately 350 stations in zones 1-3 and I went to all of them. In January.
In March I replaced my z1-3 Travelcard with a 60+ Oyster card and carried on.
stations in zones 1-9: all of them
There are approximately 640 stations in zones 1-9 and I went to all of them. By June.
It takes longer to do zones 4-9 because the stations are further apart and the trains are less frequent.
Several of these I had never been to before, and now I have.
Not everything about turning 60 is great, I can assure you, but being given a card that allows free travel around London is excellent.
Next let's check up on how many London bus routes I've ridden.
Buses: all of them
I have again ridden on every single TfL bus route this year (nightbuses, schoolbuses and mobility route excepted). It may only have been a few stops but hell yes, that's every single route from 1 to W19. I'd previously achieved this in four other calendar years, in one case by the end of January, but this year I eased off and it took until May.
I've also checked which bus routes I rode most often (because if TfL insist on sending me a weekly spreadsheet I am darned well going to make use of it).
The underlined routes are local and stop at Bus Stop M, which is why I've caught them so often. The 425 is top because I take it in preference to the parallel 25 because it's always emptier. This list was more interesting last year when I kept catching certain radial routes (57, 66, 93, 132, 173, 174, 265, 487) beyond the range of my z1-3 Travelcard. My most-ridden Superloop routes are the SL2, SL3 and SL7, with the SL1 and SL4 not far behind, because these buses are useful as well as speedy.
For the avoidance of doubt, yes I went to every tram stop this year and no I did not ride the Dangleway.
As usual I've also been counting the number of times I visited each London borough.
• Technically I counted the number of days I visited each borough.
• If I set foot in a borough on a particular day, that counted as 1.
• Standing on a station platform or riding through on a bus didn't count.
Here's the annual spread of my 2025 travels.
Enf
40
Harr
40
Barn
40
Hari
50
WFor
50
Hill
40
Eal
60
Bren
50
Cam
95
Isl
88
Hack
75
Redb
50
Hav
40
Hou
40
H&F
60
K&C
50
West
90
City
144
Tow
351
New
267
B&D
40
Rich
40
Wan
50
Lam
88
Sou
88
Lew
60
Grn
64
Bex
40
King
40
Mer
50
Cro
40
Bro
40
Sut
40
And yes, these are extraordinary totals.
During the past year I have been to every London borough at least 40 times, which is both ridiculous and extreme. Even farflung Hillingdon and Bexley I've been to (on average) once every 9 days. I confess this is no accident, it's required a deliberate roaming focus, aided and abetted by knowing exactly where all the borough boundaries actually are. If you're not ticking off six different boroughs every day, on average, you're never going to get anywhere near my totals. I'm willing to bet that nobody else in London has made 40 visits to every London borough in 2025, or indeed in any previous year.
But the truly extraordinary thing, as you may have twigged, is how many of those numbers end in zero. These are not naturally-arising totals, they've been cajoled by careful scheduling and route-planning. I realised in November I could get a dozen boroughs to a minimum of 40 visits by the end of the year, so went ahead and did it. A few weeks ago I realised I could get seven more boroughs up to 50, and just before Christmas three more up to 60. Five 90s wasn't doable by the time I twigged, but I'm still quite pleased with how anal the final tally is. And never again, because there are definitely better ways of spending the festive season.
As for number of visits to counties outside London, this year's tally is poorer than it might first appear.
Thirty-two times: Surrey Twenty-nine times: Essex Twenty-five times: Herts Eighteen days: Norfolk Twelve times: Kent Eight days: Dorset Seven times: Bucks Four times: East Sussex Twice: Cheshire, Somerset Once: Berks, Derby, Devon, Durham, Manchester, Merseyside, Notts, Suffolk, Tyne and Wear, West Sussex Never: everywhere else
A lot of the visits to the Home Counties were just minor boundary incursions. Norfolk did well because I have family there, and Dorset was the location of a family wedding. I only visited counties other than those on a dozen occasions, which is pitiful. This is why the 'Beyond London' list in my 2025 index was rather short, and I need to do better next year.
Furthest north: Roker Park (54.9°N) Furthest west: Seaton, Devon (3.1°W) Furthest south: Portland Bill (50.5°N) Furthest east: Deal Pier (1.4°E)
These are all better compass point extremities than last year, latitude- and longitude-wise. Best of the lot is a beach outside Sunderland up north, while west and south are both courtesy of a week spent in Dorset. But my range is only 4½° north/south and 4½° west/east, which is less than 0.01% of the surface of the Earth so I really should be doing better. Rest assured I intend to smash the envelope next year.
As for how far I've been walking, here's the average number of steps taken and miles walked each day.
year
Daily steps
Walked daily
2019
13250
6 miles
2020
16400
7 miles
2021
22700
10 miles
2022
16100
7 miles
2023
14600
6½ miles
2024
14800
6½ miles
2025
14300
6½ miles
My perambulations peaked during the pandemic with an amazing average of 10 miles a day in 2021. I'm now down to a more reasonable 6½ miles a day, or almost 15000 steps daily, which I'm pleased to see is still better than I was doing before lockdown. I do however weigh two pounds more at the end of 2025 than I did at the start, which is about 1kg, so I'd better go easy on the Creme Eggs this spring.
Please allow me to slip in my usual analysis of Archers episodes. These are the characters who made the most appearances in Ambridge this year.
1) Joy (66 episodes) 2) Emma (57) 3) Susan (53) 4) Helen (52) 5) George, Lillian (51) 50-something episodes: Fallon 40-something episodes: Lynda, Amber, Brian, Jolene, Brad, Tracy 30-something episodes: Jazzer, Tom, Zainab, Justin, Alice, Freddie, Ed, Rex, Tony, Pat, Kenton, Stella
I am amazed to see that incomer Joy has topped the list this year, and by a convincing margin, boosted by Rochelle's chaotic return. Emma and Helen are a familiar presence here, Emma the top character last year and Helen top the year before. Susan is spending her fifth year in the top 10. George is due to be the focus of tonight's momentous episode as the serial celebrates its 75th birthday tomorrow with an earth-shaking whodunnit. In unexpected comparisons over the course of 2025 Esme appeared more than Elizabeth, Lawrence more than Alistair and Annabelle more than Jill.
Other things I've been counting this year include...
Number of photos taken: 20,500 (↑500 on 2024) Number of photos uploaded to Flickr: 950 (↑400) Number of visitors to the blog: 1,130,000 (↑10000) Number of comments on the blog: 10,045 (↓250)
I'm taking a few more photos but showing you lots more of them. The number of visitors to the blog is up 1% on last year, which is encouraging for a 23 year-old website so many thanks everyone. The number of comments is slightly down on last year, by about one a day.
If you've been counting something interesting this year do share it with the rest of us. And if not then do consider starting to count something in 2026 because I'm likely to ask you again next year.
n.b. Proper counts only, thanks. If your count is zero or one then you're not a proper counter, more a raconteur.
