merse
TFF member
Posts: 2,684
|
Post by merse on Jan 7, 2009 16:50:56 GMT
 My missus treated me to lunch today and it cost her somewhere in the region of £110! ....................A tenner for the food and a "oner" on some furniture (in IKEA of course)  Before that I decided to end my fortnight's holiday with a little walk around the old racecourse at Alexandra Park N22 which last saw racing in September1970. Situated in the bottom of the park beneath the Palace, it must have been an atmospheric little venue and it's track footprint is still clearly visible and easy to follow to this day, although all the stands and periphery buildings have long since gone. Similar in shape to Salisbury and Hamilton Park to those of you familiar with our racecourses, the "Ally Pally Banjo" required horse and rider to run up the single straight, round a loop and back down the same straight to finish in longer races..................in fact I would estimate the length of the actual straight to be barely four furlongs (half a mile) and even that had a "dog leg" in it. It was eery walking round the "loop" to day in the morning mist (going: "good to frozen"), with the remnants of the running rail amongst the saplings that have sprouted up. I'm sure I heard the thunder of hooves behind me as Lester Piggott, Geoff Lewis, Scobie Beasely et al tried in vain to prevent George Duffield bagging the last ever winner at the Pally and as I walked up the home straight, I could imagine the crowds of the long gone Edwardian era packed onto the open roof of the club stand on the bank to my right with wonderful old Ally Pally itself sprawling along the natural ridge high above with it's own superb panoramic views of London in the foreground and it's alter ego - Crystal Palace, magnificent in itself some fifteen miles away to the south on an equally high and natural ridge.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jan 7, 2009 18:50:38 GMT
...with wonderful old Ally Pally itself sprawling along the natural ridge high above with it's own superb panoramic views of London in the foreground and it's alter ego - Crystal Palace, magnificent in itself some fifteen miles away to the south on an equally high and natural ridge. We dropped in at Ally Pally on that swelteringly hot day when we last played at Barnet. Worth visiting if you're looking for an alternative view of London. Apparently football is played down on the old racecourse by Alexandra Park of the Southern Amateur League, rivals of the wonderfully-named Crouch End Vampires. As Merse intimates, there's a wonderful symmetry with the Crystal Palace site in South London (aim for one of those big TV transmitters rather than Selhurst Park which is several miles away). Both Ally Pally and Crystal Palace were Victorian entertainment and leisure ventures. The Crystal Palace was, by all accounts, the more successful even though the building itself burnt down in 1936 (my dad once told me how he watched the fire from his home in New Malden). The FA Cup final was staged at Crystal Palace between 1895 and 1914 - with 120,000 watching the 1913 final.   |
|
|
|
Post by chrish on Jan 7, 2009 20:46:32 GMT
Fantastic images Barton. I saw the photo of the blokes standing on the wooden posts when I was very young. Ally Pally is a wonderful London landmark, along with Battersea Power Station.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jan 9, 2009 21:15:30 GMT
circa 1850: A horse race at Alexandra Park in north London, with Alexandra Palace in the background. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)  5th July 1947: Crowds watching the horseracing at London's Alexandra Park. (Photo by Fred Morley/Fox Photos/Getty Images)  |
|
merse
TFF member
Posts: 2,684
|
Post by merse on Jan 9, 2009 21:44:10 GMT
Wonderful images of the "Frying Pan" (as I have been reliably informed today) as it was known. The image of the Palace high on the ridge is indeed timeless and the stand in the foreground of the second picture was the one where folk stood on the open top for an on high view of the action.................reminiscent of the one still currently in use at LudlowThe centre of the loop (the cricket ground) almost gives the appearance of having water in it - although I don't think this could ever have been the case, and it is this loop that has been the object of a study into turning it into a trotting track, which in my view would be a poor substitute for horse racing but nevertheless, a fine attraction on a summer's evening as part of the "People's Palace" ethos of the site when it was first laid out in Victorian times...............................a London equivalent of Paris's Bois de Vincennes.
|
|
