City Road Basin east of Angel
Start: Paddington Station, Praed St, London W2 1RH
Finish: Limehouse DLR Station, Commercial Rd, London, E14 7JD
Distance: 16.3 km (10.1 miles)
Elevation change: + 86 / -110m. Net -24m
GPX File: get via Buy Me a Coffee
Other routes touched (walk): Jubilee Greenway
Other routes touched (cycle): NCN 1, C1, 2, 6, 13, 27
Pubs / Cafes on route: Loads. It’s London.
Map: London North Map | The City, West End, Enfield, Ealing, Harrow & Watford | Ordnance Survey | OS Explorer Map 173
Links: Regent’s Canal (Wikipedia / Canal & River Trust), Paddington Basin, Little Venice, Camden Lock, Islington Tunnel, Limehouse Basin
The Regent's Canal is a fascinating 13.8km waterway that links the Paddington Arm of the Grand Union Canal at Little Venice with the River Thames at Limehouse Basin in the east of London. I have cycled or walked bits of it over the years, but never a full end-to-end walk. So, with canals being the theme of our weekend adventures this winter, Timea and I set out to walk the whole route.
Because it cuts right through the north of central London, there are excellent public transport links to the start and finish. You can easily chop the walk into smaller sections, returning to nearby tube or bus stops along the way to pick up exactly where you left off. On a long summer’s day, we might have tackled it all in one go. However, with a winter walk on shorter days—and wanting to take our time looking at all the interesting places—we cut it in two, using King's Cross St Pancras as our midpoint. Navigation is incredibly easy as you are mostly just following the towpath. There are a few sections where the canal plunges into a tunnel and you have to follow the route above ground, but the Jubilee Greenway mirrors the canal and is well-signed, so just look out for the ground-level markers to keep on track.
We chose a west-to-east route starting from Paddington Station. There is an exit near the Hammersmith and City Line platforms that leads directly onto the canal, but rather than start there, we exited Paddington at the southern entrance to walk down Praed Street and begin at Paddington Basin. The Basin has completely changed since I first went there as a child on London outings. Back then, it was an unloved patch at the back of St Mary's Hospital. Today, it is a bustling, lively development of apartments, modern businesses, and restaurants.
From Paddington Basin, follow the canal for 1km to the famous junction at Little Venice. The bridge at Westbourne Terrace Road brought back some great memories, as it was the finish point of my first Ultra Marathon back in 2015! Once you cross over the bridge and onto the northern side of Browning's Pool, you have officially joined the Regent's Canal.
For the first section, you will need to step off the towpath for a while, as the Lisson Grove Moorings are a private, residential stretch of boats. From there, you pass above ground for roughly 250m to bypass the Maida Hill Tunnel—one of the few canal tunnels in London built entirely without a towpath, meaning original narrowboat crews had to lie on the roofs of their boats and "leg" their way through the dark! Once over the tunnel, you can drop back down to the towpath for an uninterrupted 5.4km stretch to the Islington Tunnel at Angel. Along the way, you pass right through the back of London Zoo at Regent's Park (look out for the Snowdon Aviary and the warthog enclosures right on the water's edge), through the bustling food stalls of Camden Lock, and into the beautifully redeveloped area behind King's Cross.
When you reach the Islington Tunnel, leave the towpath again and follow the Jubilee Greenway south down Penton Street, then east along Chapel Market to Angel. Cross over Upper Street and follow Duncan Street in an easterly direction to return to the water. This eastern section is slightly quieter but no less interesting, taking you past old Victorian warehouses and gas holders. You will need to briefly leave the path for food and drink, but there are brilliant options along the way. We found a great cafe at the start of Broadway Market in Hackney, just a couple of minutes off the towpath.
The final stretch passes along the green edges of Victoria Park and Mile End Park before finishing at Limehouse Basin. Our original plan was to walk a lap around the basin, but it was getting dark, so we cut straight across to the Limehouse DLR to head home. We did get some fantastic shots of Canary Wharf lit up in the background, though. We will definitely return another day to properly explore the basin and walk the nearby Hertford Union Canal and Limehouse Cut!
The Bridges
Bridge numbers counting up from 1 at Little Venice to 64 near Limehouse Basin. Not all bridges have numbers on them.
More London Posts
If you enjoyed reading this post, there is plenty more to explore across the capital. I have put together a dedicated London Outdoors page where I keep track of all my other adventures around the city. It is a handy index where I group my posts by the different types of places I have visited: including historic boundary lines, canal towpaths, and some surprising urban high points.
The collection covers a bit of everything: from long-distance cycling routes to tracing the underground network on foot, and ticking off another Saturday morning parkrun. If you are looking for some inspiration for your own weekend outings, head back over to the London Outdoors page to see what else I have been up to.
