Next on my list of the best London walking books is 33 Walks in London That You Shouldn’t Miss. This book features unusual places and under-the-radar areas of London, so it’s ideal if you like getting away from the busy parts of the city. Next on my list of London walking books is Walking London. As the name implies, this book covers a range of self-guided walks in and around the city. London’s Monumental Walks is another of the best London walking books. As the name suggests, it covers the UK capital’s best public monuments, statues, memorials, and obscure public artworks. From Highgate to Canary Wharf, Ealing to Embankment, London Tree Walks reveals all kinds of great greens. The book features architectural, social, and natural history as well, so it’s a good one if you have a variety of interests.

Uncommonly, the walk described in this spellbinding narrative takes place over just a few short hours, and by moonlight. Setting out from his Dorset home one midsummer evening, Yates encounters the terrain and resident wildlife in its less familiar, nocturnal guise. Despite both the brevity of the walk and the book, as the sun rises you feel you have accompanied the author on a journey into an enchanted world, sharing the sounds, sights and smells that are only revealed after dusk. True to conventional travel writing form, at the heart of this book is a Homeric-style quest: a journey the protagonist is compelled to take, often within a specific timeframe. Less conventionally, the quest undertaken in this book is a Sebaldian stroll around the 117 miles of the M25. Sinclair splendidly unearths an idiosyncratic and multilayered edgeland of industrial parks, shopping centres, housing estates and golf courses encircling the capital at the turn of the millennium. Last on my list of the best London walking books is Thames Path in London. This book will take you along the river from Hampton Court to Crayford Ness. It covers 50 miles (80 kilometers) of riverside scenery as it goes.

10. Walking London, Andrew Duncan

You’ll walk by London Bridge, the Clink Prison Museum, Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre, the Rose Theatre, the Queen Square Park and Garden, and Southwark Cathedral. The walk covers everything from green spaces to abandoned railway lines, towpaths, and nature reserves as it takes you around the UK capital. Shepherd spent a lifetime exploring the Cairngorms on foot. This impressive mountain range attracts climbers from around the world, yet this is not a book about climbing. Dismissing macho Munro Bagging as “sterile”, Shepherd instead ventures out in all seasons and all weathers (mostly alone and sometimes barefoot) walking not on to the mountains, but “into” them. It is the meditative rhythm of walking that unveils for her the essence of the Cairngorms – mountains that she comes to know as intimately as old friends. Whether you’re into secret walks or tree walks, loop walks or historic walks, there’s a London walking book for you. The books make great gifts for the walking lover in your life, too. There are also a number of literary diversions in the book, darting off to the history of Croydon’s seven hills, water towers, lost hills, notable people and artificial hills.

From famous areas like Notting Hill and the City of London to green spaces like Regent’s Park and local areas like Islington and Dulwich, it has a lot of walks you can enjoy in both known and lesser-known parts of London. Each of the 15 sections of this London walk features local landmarks like the Thames Barrier, Eltham Palace, Richmond Park, Oxleas Meadows, and the London Olympic Park. The book is a great companion guide as you walk the ring.

The self-guided London walks in this book will take you around to see monuments dedicated to monarchs, military greats, politicians, local heroes, artists, writers, and other notable people. It’s a great one if you like history and art. Rain till mid-afternoon. You set off through Bushy Park, where you might see deer. It’s one of London’s great Royal Parks, a wonderful open space much of which is left semi-wild, though the latter part of the Loop in the park passes through the more formal Woodland Gardens. With Home Park, it features in Walk 16 of my London book. London Tree Walks: Arboreal Ambles Around the Green Metropolis is another of the best London walking books. Given how much greenery the city has, it’s perfect for gaining a greater appreciation of London’s natural highlights. The walks it contains combine Pepys’s diary with lots of historic facts and details about London. It’s a great book if you love history and want to dig deeper into the city’s past. Ambulatory writers usually follow the old ways – whether trade routes like the Silk Road or pilgrimage trails such as the Camino de Santiago. Alfred Wainwright preferred to plough his own furrow by creating an entirely new approach: a 182-mile walk linking St Bees Head in Cumbria with Robin Hood’s Bay in Yorkshire. Complementing Wainwright’s handwritten instructions and detailed drawings are touches of wit, homespun philosophy and lyricism, giving even the most sedentary reader an appreciation of England’s dramatic northern landscapes.