Mick Hartley

The Lea through Hackney is now green, as it is always is this time of year:

Further down, the towpath between White Post Lane and Old Ford Lock, closed for a few months now for pre-Olympic refurbishment, has finally re-opened. I should know: I was there.

No ceremony though. "When's this opening, then?" we asked the workman at the other side of the fence. "It's a month late already". "It's opening now" he said, and promptly pulled aside the fencing to let us through. 

Which means you don't have to go on a lengthy detour to get up on the Greenway and see how the ArcelorMittal Orbit is coming along. Which it is:

Which is just as well because it's getting busier and busier up there, with school parties and coach-loads of OAPs coming along to the View Tube to look over the Olympic Park, and frankly there's not much else to see of any great interest.

Also up there (on the Greenway, that is), this:

Here:

Bow Bells Ring is a temporary installation by Colin Priest comprising 100 bicycle bells situated at critical experiential points along the Greenway, Capital Ring towpath and Stratford High Street. Commissioned by View Tube Art, as part of Bicycle Wheel for the CREATE 11 Festival, Bow Bells has been funded by the Arts Council England. 

I like that "experiential". 

That's one of the bells there, on the right. Bow Bells, you see. Cockneys. 

It's installation art on the cheap. On the very cheap. If this Colin Priest just billed the Arts Council for the cost of 100 bicycle bells, I'm not going to argue. Any more and we've been had.

Also, by the new footbridge:

Not really what you expect to see in the Lea.

Finally, this, at the Hertford Cut Lock:

No, it's not a masterpiece. But it's colourful. And I'm fairly sure it wasn't funded by the Arts Council.