Countries I have visited - best places, worst moments, wish lists

 I have visited fifty countries.

 My family have had homes in the UK, the USA, Spain, and Singapore.

We have had au pair girls living with us, who came from France, Germany, Italy and Yugoslavia. 

I speak French fluently. I have restaurant Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, German and Dutch. I am struggling to read menus and signs in Greek, Hebrew and Russian (Cyrillic also in Bulgaria) and Chinese symbolic signs (also used in Japan).

ALBANIA

The Best Thing In Albania? 

The colourful capital is Tirana. The colourful buildings in the capital city centre and throughout the country were designed to raise morale at a time of economic crisis.

The Scary Thing In Albania

- Cliffside roads in the remote north. More near Greece, up to wonderful mountaintop cafe viewpoints, and resort south to busy beach resort. 

ANDORRA

Best Thing about Andorra - learning linguistics, languages.

The country's capital is the city of Andorra la Vella. Like the Latin word villa, the word vella originally meant city. 

Wishlist. 

Three countries tour in one day from Barcelona, covering France, Spain and Andorra. 

The Caldea Spa my daughter in law visited while our son was skiing. The Caldea Spa is the biggest in Southern Europe and has multi-level lagoons.

AUSTRALIA 

The best things in Australia

Super cities, Sydney and Perth. 

Pavlova meringue dessert with fresh fruit in the middle. Lamingtons, sponge cubes covered in chocolate and coconut.

The Twelve Apostles, on the great Ocean Road photo opportunity of rocks in the sea.

AUSTRIA

Best things To See And Do in Austria

 Grinzing wine tasting area in Vienna. Learning about Sachertorte cake. I loved Salzberger Nockerl, a large soft floating meringue. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salzburger_Nockerl. Mozart Chocolates sold on the plane and everywhere.

Worst Moments In Austria: The hotel where are room was on the top floor and you needed a coin to operate the lift going upwards. 

The city map which had south at the top which made me as map reader say turn left when signposts told the driver to turn right. 

Wishlist For Austria

Esperanto Museum of the National, library, Vienna, Austria. 

BAHAMAS

The name comes from the Spanish for shallow water.

Wish List for the Bahamas. Hear calypso and watch dancing to soca music at the New Year parade. 

BELGIUM

We went to the Melipark, based on bees, which is now Plopsaland.

https://www.plopsa.com/en/plopsaland-belgium

Best Things In Belgium

Chips (potato chips). Waffles. Chocolate. Beautiful Bruges. Looking at lace, buying lace ear-rings.

Worst problem in Belgium. We were looking for signs to Ghent and only saw signs to Gand. Place names in two languages, French and Dutch languages. You need to know both when driving and looking for signposts. 

Serious and saddest sites, are all the WW2 area of Flanders, such as the Menin Gate. We always seem to stop at In Flanders Field in Ypers. You can find monuments to various nationalities in the places where they fought.

https://destinationwwii.com/wwii-sites-in-belgium/

https://whichmuseum.com/place/belgium-2/t-war

BRAZIL

Wish list. Rio Carnival. 

BULGARIA

Best. Opportunity to learn Cyrillic script, used in Bulgaria and Russia.

CAMBODIA

Best moment - Siem Reap for a tour of: Ankor Wat. Wat means temple, but it is a walled city, takes most of the day to walk along the causeway and around the walls and into the centre and up a central temple. 

Angkor Thom, approaching South Gate, 

Scary moments. Losing our rickshaw at the entrance. One rickshaw when we said goodbye. At the end of the day, a national holiday, there were hundreds, and our vehicle had been told by police to move to the next car park. 

Second scary moment. I lost my rickshaw. Supposed to meet me by the gold Buddha at the entrance. The route through a temple was in one entrance and out the other side. All four entrances had a large gold seated Buddhas. 

CANADA

Best Views - Niagara Falls. 

Quebec City - you can see history, the cliff climbed to conquer the city, by British General James Wolfe. Historic hotel Chateau Frontenac.

Canada Wish List - see the mural revealed by falling tide on the wall of the St John Harbour at the Bay of Fundy.

CHINA 

Best - Shanghai waterfront. Great Wall. 

Wishlist - Terracotta warriors. 

Scary moment - losing my tour group in China where I could not speak a word of Chinese. Getting on a coach tour bus and half a mile down the road discovering they were a German-speaking group.

CORSICA 

Worst disaster - Guitarists played late into the night keeping me awake. The coach to the airport broke down and we were told to cross the road. I was knocked down by a car, had multiple injuries and was not expected to survive.  (1984.) 

Wishlist - Maison Bonaparte.

CROATIA  

Best - Dubrovnik which I visited with my parents from a cruise ship back when it was Yugoslavia.

CZECH REPUBLIC

Best Moments - in Prague, Charles Bridge statues; Franz Kafka Museum. 

CYPRUS Greek and Turkish. 

Best moments - The wine museum. 

Walking across to Northern Cyprus, Greek to Turkish and back to Greek.

Worst - Embarrassment, first asking for Turkish coffee, then Greek coffee, being told it was Cyprus coffee.

DENMARK 

Best - Hans Andersen's Home

Wish list. Legoland in Billund, Danmark.

ENGLAND 

Flag of the United Kingdon

Flag of England.

Best sights, so many: Brighton Pavilion, York Shambles, Cornwall , Lake District - Wordsworth's House, Waddesdon, Bronte House Museum, Yorkshire, Oxford, Cambridge, Hadrian's Wall, Cadbury's Factory. London's Keats House, Dickens House, National Gallery, Tate Modern Gallery, National Portrait gallery, London Zoo, Windsor Safari Park. 

Worst moments, wondering whether you have missed the last train and wondering there the night buses go.

FINLAND 

Best moment. Meeting Santa Claus. 

Worst moment, finding we were naked in saunas, with a large group of people, journalists I was travelling with.

Worst moment. On the same travel press trip, I was offered beef steak or reindeer meat. The latter is rare and very expensive in the UK, so I ordered the former. Later I learned that reindeer meat is cheap in Finland, whilst beef steak is exorbitant.

Wish List

Music museum - Sibelius Museum, Turku, Finland.

FRANCE  

Best Paris

You can visit the chateaux of the Loire Valley. Do a Champagne cellars tour in Rheims.

Worst disaster. My family drove from overnight at our ex au pair girl's home in Rheims, across France to the border. I then realized I had left my passport behind in a passport neck bag on the back or a chair.

GERMANY

Best sites: Romantic road cities such as Rothenburg ob der Tauber.

Heidelburg barrel. 

Wish list. Upside down house, Bayern, Germany. Legoland.

GREECE 

Best moments. Restaurant meals in Athen's hillside restaurant district, La Plake. 

Learning the story of Alexander the Great in the tomb at the second city, Thessalonkia. 

Scary moment - Earthquake whilst I was in a hotel on Zakinthos island. The drinks in our glasses shook.

HAWAII

HONG KONG 

Best. Sun Yat-Sen museum. Funicular. Disney. Visiting the famous Peninsula Hotel.

Worst - smog.

HUNGARY

INDIA Scary moment. Losing my taxi at a shopping centre with four entrances. All the taxi drivers had dark skins, dark hair and black moustaches. All the taxis had number plates ending in the same three letters which was code for a taxi from that city.

INDONESIA

IRELAND

ISRAEL 

Best sights: Historic and biblical Jerusalem, Art deco (Bauhaus) beach city of Tel Aviv (founded in 1909), kibbutzim, Ein Gedi waterfall into the water by the cave. 

Worst moments: 

Searched before catching a local bus from the bus station in Jerusalem, riding with teenagers carrying what looked like machine guns. At first scary, later reassuring.

Hitching a lift in a van whose driver fired gun shots into the hills which echoed around alerting everybody for miles that we were there. 

At a university in the 1960s finding they did not take money on Friday night so you had to pre book and pay and get a ticket for the meal. Luckily, a student whose friend did not turn up was able to give me and my friend a spare meal ticket.

In 2026 learning that you might be woken twice or more in the night to sirens warning you to go down to a shelter.

ITALY 

Best Sites

Roman Rome, 

Opera in La Scala Milan, 

Umbria Cliffside Etruscan gateway at the entrance to Perugia. Venice.

Wish List. Trulli.

JAPAN 

Miyajima Torii giant gate on the beach, in the water at high tide in Hiroshima.

Worst moment, being asked to how how to eat a fried egg, with chopsticks.

JORDAN Best sigh - Petra. Scariest moment: getting on and off a camel which knelt down and tried to tip me off.

KOREA (SOUTH KOREA)

LUXEMBOURG

MALAYSIA

Best sites. Hill stations. 

Museum and observation deck in Petronas twin towers centre of Kuala Lumpur.

MALTA

MEXICO

MOROCCO Marrakesh - best moment, pigeon pie, and bread kept under conical rafia hats.

NEPAL Best moments - the domed temples with eyes watching you.

NEW ZEALAND

Best moments. Skiing in New Zealand, at Queenstown, South Island. The maze museum. Lam on every menu. BYO. Vineyard Visits. Op shops (which the Americans call thrift shops and the British call charity shops.)

POLAND 

Best moments: eating Borscht in underground restaurants in rebuilt Warsaw. 

Most chilling moments - Auschwitz  Birkenau, but a little ray of hope in the Schindler's Factory Museum

Wish list - Ludwig Zamenhof museum about the creator of the made up language, Esperanto, in Bialystok. 

Wroclaw dwarfs, tiny pavement statues.

Arthur Rubinstein at his piano, statue in Lodz.

PORTUGAL 

Best site. WOW wine theme park on a city hillside overlooking the river. Restaurant with peacocks parading outside.

Mountainside s-bends along the Douro valley from Oporto to Regua which has a museum with smells of wine and flowers, and onwards to Spain. 

Madeira, saw triangular A frame houses called Casas Tipicas at Santana. Walked along the levadas, cliffside walks originally carrying water to farms, now pleasantly overhung by trees and leading to a waterfall. Madeira wine shop Blany's offering guided tour of their historic building and tastings in the capital, Funchal.

ROMANIA

Best. Second Langauge spoken is Italian. Dracula's castle and tourist area. 

Worst - Dracula's Castle. Beware of bears.

RUSSIA

Wish List

Underground stations.

SAN MARINO

SAINT MAARTEN

Best - two languages, French and Dutch, two experiences. 

Worst - Confusing. You might need two visas or passports.

SCOTLAND 

Best Sites

Edinburgth and Edinburgh Festival. Hilltop Castle. Portrait Gallery. Poets' area of old town and museums.Tartans and bagpipes.

Worst Experience. The first time I had breakfast porridge with salt, as is usual in Scotland, instead of sugar, as in England, and sent it back, resulting in confrontation and embarrassment.

Wish List. Burns House. Shetland Islands.

SINGAPORE 

Singapore Best moments - Giant Jewel waterfall, tallest in the world, in Changi Airport. The airport's free Butterfly Garden (two floors, one way, allow time). 

Any journey on the underground, with glass doors separating you from the rails until the train arrives, protecting people on platforms. Everything running frequently, about five minutes average, so sometimes even less. Free toilets on every station. Demonstrations banned. Litter swept by the elderly attendants given employment in food courts. Durian in season in ice creams and cakes. Hotel and apartment complexes with giant or ornamental swimming pools. Marina Bay Sands with an Observation Deck, and infinity swimming pool at the top, and boats on a created canal in the basement.  Get invited to dinner at the Tanglin Club.

Night Safari. Gardens by the Bay. Botanic Gardens, free, containing the Orchid Garden (paid?) 

Raffles hotel. 

The museums including the history museum, with docents (guides) Philatelic (stamps) museum.

Singapore Worst moments, a live crocodile under a boardwalk.

SLOVENIA

Slovenia wish list - Cliffside castle in a cave. Train ride through caves. Poppyseed pastries.

SOUTH AFRICA 

Johannesburg. Pretoria. Cape Town's Table Mountain, with inquisitive dassis (a bit like squirrels) ogling crumbs when we had cake. Memorable Moments in South Africa. Table Mountain. Nelson Mandela sites. Jewish museum mentions Mandela hidden on a farm bought for that purpose by his Jewish supporters.

Wishlist for South Africa - wine trail.

SPAIN

My parents had a one bedroom home in Marbella for years.

Best Moments:In Spain, weirdly shaped hotel Marquez de Riscal, Rioja region. 

In the Canary Islands in 2026, Tenerife, Hotel La Joia Mirador, Absurdia illusions attraction. Vino Museum and Honey Bee museum. 

Worst Moment in Spain - my bag stolen in Marbella. Previously my mother's bag was stolen.

Spanish wishlist - Barcelona's Gaudi Cathedral and other Gaudi monuments in Barcelona and other cities. Some of them require you to park your car and can't be seen from the road. 

Spanish Scary Moments. Cliffside S bends in Picos de Europa.  

SWITZERLAND 

Best Sights

Alprose Chocolate Factory. 

Covered bridges.

THAILAND 

Best sites - Royal Palace. Floating Market.

TUNISIA

TURKEY 

Best sites:

Istanbul Blue Mosque; and Green Mosque

UAE (United Arab Emirates)

Best site: Dubai, largest city

Huge hotels, opulent and gold. Shopping.

UK

Best: London Tower Bridge, British Museum, Science Museum, Victoria and Albert Museum. Handel and Hendrix museums, Madam Tussauds, Trafalgar Square, Bethnal Green Museum, Horniman Museum and mini zoo, London Zoo, Dickens House. Out in the suburbs, Ruislip Lido train. Harrow School. Sherlock Holmes Museum. Get invited do dinner at the Cavalry & Guards Club or the Civil Service club, or one of several clubs, some with military or overseas associations.

Day trips to Roald Dahl Museum. Waddesdon Manor, 

Lake District. Cornwall, St Ives.

Wishlist Charles Rennie Mackintosh House, Northampton, England. Optical Illusion museum in London. Any Winehouse statue in Camden. Museum of Illusions. Paradox Museum. Twist Museum. Legoland, Windsor. Last Night of the Proms, promenade concert in the Royal Albert Hall.

USA

Best Sites

New York. Empire State Building. Boat tour. Smithsomian Museums, DC. Lake Tahoe, California and Nevada. Blue Ridge Mountain drive along the East coast. Washington DC. Florida art deco. Disney. House museum of Webster who gave us the dictionary and American spelling. House museum of Nobel prize winning author Pearl Buck. Peabody Ducks. Bryce Canyon. Dallas. San Francisco. Golden Gate Bridge. LA Disney. Hollywood stars walk.

Wish List - Graceland, home of Elvis. Napa Valley Wine train. Hemingway House at Key West, Florida. Houdini Museum at Niagara. Queen Mary on Long Beach, LA.

Worst list - crocodiles in Florida.

VIETNAM 

Halong Bay. best sight

Scary moment - first tuk tuk ride at speed from airport to checking at hotel.Tuk-tuk (motorcycle carriage) transfer to hotel in Siem Reap. 

YUGOSLAVIA Dubrovnik, now CROATIA

WALES Brunel's bridge Fishguard Last Invasion Tapestry, Caerleon Roman Museum. Worst disaster. I was driving to my annual writers summer holiday in Caerleon, Wales. On the M4. Another car drove into the back of my car. I had to transfer by train to my destination.

USA Disneyland LA, Disney World Florida, Grand Canyon, Bryce Canyon.  New York's Jewish Museum, Sex museum and many more.

WISHLIST

CHINA

Terracotta Warriors are on my wishlist.

UKRAINE

BEST TRANSPORT

Tuk-tuk (motorcycle carriage) transfer to hotel in Sien Reap. 

TRAVEL TIPS

1 Keep a track of your own best and worst holiday experiences.

2 Make an Excel document of trips, hotels, museums, favourite food.

I am compiling this all week. Come back every day for updates on mine.

How To promote walking, cycling, tourism and events in Harrow

I just filled in a survey on transport in my area and it got me thinking. Everything was rated from good to bad. What would I like to see, and what do we already have?

Hurray for Harrow Walking Routes

 Informative and entertaining signs about walking routes are at Hatch End station. Another sign about a walking loop is on the corner of the main street, called The Broadway.

Would I trot off along the footpath? Maybe at weekends with the family. I would not walk alone through woods. Maybe public streets and remote paths at junctions should have help points, like railway stations. Yes, this would cost money. Everything costs money.

Guided Walks

Historic guided walks might attract people, eg passing Grimsdyke Hotel, along Grim's Dyke. Add photo selfie points and sculptures, arches, murals. 

How about a guided walk every weekend? Who would run it? Council staff, student volunteers?

 They could show sites, and plaques including famous people along every high street. Hatch End had Mrs Beeton.  Pinner had Nelson's grand-daughter. Pinner also has her grave in the nearby cemetery. 

I asked Gemini. do we have guided walks of Harrow or Pinner. Yes.

Yes, there are several guided and self-guided walking options available across Harrow, Pinner, and Hatch End:

Guided & Local Heritage Walks

• Pinner Historical Walks: Organised locally (including free regular walking groups associated with The Ramblers and health groups), offering regular ~1-hour walks exploring Pinner's historic High Street, churchyard, and local heritage routes.

• Headstone Manor & Museum Heritage Walks: Headstone Manor & Museum periodically hosts guided heritage walks focused on local Harrow history, historic buildings, and surrounding green spaces.

Self-Guided Routes & Trails

• Harrow-on-the-Hill Historic Trail: Self-guided walking routes take visitors up the hill around Harrow School, St Mary’s Church, and the old village center.

• Harrow Health Walks: Harrow Council runs free, regular led group walks across local parks and open spaces to promote fitness and local exploration.

• London Loop & Capital Ring: Major long-distance walking routes run directly through the borough. Section 14 and 15 of the London Loop pass through Hatch End and Pinner, connecting local woodlands, parks, and historic sites.

• Go Jauntly App Walks: Walking apps like Go Jauntly feature detailed community-created routes through Hatch End, Pinner Village, and Harrow-on-the-Hill.

Weird and Wonderful Places in Pinner and Harrow

Harrow, Pinner, and Hatch End feature several unusual, quirky, and curious sights. Pinner has the coffin in the sky at the church in Pinner. 

In the park is the Heath Robinson museum.

 More details:

Eccentric Sights & Architecture

• The Triangular Coffin (William Loudon’s Tomb): In the churchyard of St John the Baptist in Pinner sits a stone pyramid structure where the coffin of William Loudon (and his wife) was placed above ground. Local legend holds that he receives a money transfer so long as his body remains above earth, leading to the bizarre "coffin in the sky" design.

• The Heath Robinson Museum: Located in Pinner Memorial Park, this museum is dedicated to William Heath Robinson—the famous illustrator known for drawing absurdly over-complicated, whimsical contraptions ("Heath Robinson machines").

• The Nazi Diplomat's Mansion (Sans Souci): High up on Pinner Hill, a villa named Sans Souci was constructed in the 1930s for Joachim von Ribbentrop (the German Ambassador to the UK who later became Hitler's Foreign Minister). Built using German materials and architects, local urban legends long rumoured it was designed as a observation point or future command hub.

• The Zoroastrian Centre Cinema: In Rayners Lane (Harrow), the Grade II*-listed Zoroastrian Centre is housed in a former 1936 Art Deco cinema (the Safari/Fremont) designed by Frank Ernest Bromige, featuring dramatic, sweeping modernist curves.

Local Quirks & Traditions

• Ye Olde Wheelbarrow Race: Every St George's Day, Pinner hosts a unique charity race where teams of two take turns pushing each other in wheelbarrows from pub to pub while drinking beer along the route.

• The Royal Charter Pinner Fair: Held every May since 1336 (granted by King Edward III), street vendors and funfairs completely take over Pinner's historic High Street for a single day, fulfilling a nearly 700-year-old medieval charter.

• The 50-Metre Ceramic Wall Mural: On the exterior wall of the Hatch End Swimming Pool / Harrow Arts Centre, an expansive ceramic mural created by artist Alan Cox depicts aquatic life and local scenes.

• The Ancient Moat at Headstone Manor: Headstone Manor & Museum features the only complete 14th-century water-filled moated manor house remaining in Greater London.

Signs and Symbols Of Harrow

Have a simple cartoon or symbol for every high street. Or a diamond enclosing silhouettes of four famous people or places.

We already have assorted symbols.

The official coats of arms, historic heraldry, and recognized civic symbols represent Harrow and Pinner through key icons:

Official Civic Symbols of Harrow

The Coat of Arms of the London Borough of Harrow combines symbols representing the history, geography, and famous institutions of the entire borough:

• The Silver Arrow & White Lion: Derived directly from the arms of Harrow School (the arrow referencing historical archery contests held by the school).  

• The Torch: Represents education, learning, and local schools.  

• The Quill Pen: Represents literature and famous writers who lived in the borough (such as Isabella Beeton in Hatch End).  

• The Hill & Clump of Trees: Located at the base of the crest, representing Harrow on the Hill as well as the wooded areas of Wealdstone and Harrow Weald.  

• The Green Arched Band: Symbolizes the Metropolitan Green Belt surrounding the borough.  

• The Red Triangle (Pile): Symbolizes the historical Saxon meetings held in the Hundred of Gore.  

• The Goddess Hygeia & Benedictine Monk (Supporters): Hygeia signifies the area's health record, while the monk represents the historical religious connections of Bentley Priory.  

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Unofficial & Local Landmarks for Pinner

While Pinner is part of the London Borough of Harrow and shares its official coat of arms, it relies on several distinctive local icons to represent its village identity:

• The Triangular Coffin (William Loudon’s Tomb): A recognizable motif for Pinner's historic parish churchyard (St John the Baptist).

• Heath Robinson Machine Illustrations: Quirky, over-complicated mechanical drawings inspired by William Heath Robinson, heavily used on signage and branding around Pinner Memorial Park.

• The Wheelbarrow: Associated with the annual St George's Day pub race, often appearing on local event flyers and community heraldry.

• The Medieval Fair Crest: Banners and street signs along Pinner High Street feature medieval market symbols referencing the 1336 Royal Charter Fair.

Longstay Vehicles, Pavement Parking & Signs

We need more parking for cars. 

But we could make space by promptly removing long-stay, untaxed and unattended vehicles which might have been stolen and abandoned. We need signs telling you who to contact in the event of this problem. 

Another sign I would like would tell people that parking on pavements in Harrow and Hatch End is not allowed, because it is in some parts of the country. People who are trying to be helpful by clearing the road and parking on the pavement get slapped with fines and aggression from residents. This unexpected penalty is confusing, unkind, stressful and frightens off visitors.

Cleaner Streets

Clean up the pavements and the facias. Copy Japan. Get every schoolchild and student cleaning their own school daily, and litter picking their own street, weeding, planting flowers. 

Public Toilets At Stations in Harrow and Singapore

Have toilets at every station in London. Apparently we are working towards that.  Singapore has toilets outside almost every station. Google maps shows toilets at stations. But when you arrive, the toilets are out of order, or closed at 9 pm. No good when you are returning at 11 pm.

If you need funding for more toilets, opened longer hours, get businesses to sponsor, and carry ads for businesses around the walls, with a jolly mural on the outside. 

Use the waste water.  

When stuck, look for toilets in shopping malls, or pubs, or restaurants, or fast food outlets, or libraries, or hospitals, or hotels, or supermarkets, or museums, or department stores, or tennis clubs, or golf clubs, or garden centres, or wineries, or big, civic buildings such as town halls.

Harrow Town Centre

• St Ann's Shopping Centre: Accessible public toilet facilities are available on the upper level near the main food court and seating area.

• St. George's Shopping Centre: Clean, fully accessible public restrooms and baby changing rooms are located on the upper level near the Vue Cinema entrance.

• Harrow-on-the-Hill Station: Toilet facilities (including accessible facilities requiring a RADAR key) are located inside the ticketed station concourse area.

• Who has a RADAR key? No use to most of the elderly, including me and my husband.

Pinner & Parks

• Pinner Memorial Park: Public toilets (including accessible units) are located next to the park cafe and the West House building.

• Pinner Station: Restroom facilities are available inside the station premises for passengers.

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Harrow Souvenirs

Have a Harrow shop with souvenirs of Harrow, where walking tours start. Run a contest for Harrow's five favourite foods 

Run a campaign of people of the week. For example, Harrow beekeepers, Harrow honey (which I bought at the Headstone Manor Farm). 

Show a tourist bus map, linking Harrow School, Headstone Manor, Heath Robinson Museum. Have statues or murals of famous people, all the people who went to Harrow School, Mrs Beeton. St George's has friezes but so high most people don't notice them. 

Run a contest for poems and parodies of quotations about Harrow and display them. 

Pinner has a Pinner Fair. Why not a Harrow Fair. 

Tree Walks

Make a tree walk. Label all the trees, like Kew Gardens, name of plant, fruit, leaves, height. This is done in Singapore. A whole riverside walk by Gardens by the bay is free entertainment. Not just the names of trees. Myths, medicinal uses, all kinds of instructive and entertaining facts.

If needed, get sponsors from local businesses or schools. Students can do the research. A small part of this is done near Headstone Manor. At one time trees in Hatch End high street has little notices at the base of a planted trees, placed their by the sponsor.

Roundabouts have sponsors. 

Meeting Points

Every park and major event should have a meeting point with a statue, clock and chairs. Maybe a pond with fish and ornamental plants. 

Parking Places

More parking spaces so you can stop briefly to buy a pint of milk, a gift of flowers, a sandwich, whatever. Not enough parking near Tesco in Hatch End.  More signs at bus stop of when the next bus is expected in Hatch End would make it more attractive to walk to the bus stop, rather than taking a car. 

Restaurants should display signs telling you car parks and bus routes.  People want to drive because loud music from restaurants and people on the pavements (in Hatch End late at night) can be frightening for safety, danger of drunks, pickpockets, people colliding with you. 

We need late night buses to Harrow. Many people want to use cars and park because friends have had phones stolen from motorbike phone snatchers at bus stops.

Traffic Management Schemes

Yellow junctions are helpful. 

Banned turns are a nuisance and make you drive around polluting the air and causing stress.

School Streets

What are school streets? Parents are banned from parking and pick up near schools? Or parents are allowed and others are banned?

Are school streets good? I am not sure. What will parents and schools do? Parents want to collect children to prevent the risk of bullying, fights, stabbing after school. Will the cars block different streets? 

Will schools stagger class finish times? Run a school bus?

What will householders do? Will they benefit? What about deliveries, mail, parcels?

One Hour Free Parking - Insufficient time

One hour is not enough. You cannot shop, queue, and have a coffee in the supermarket or nearby.  You cannot eat a meal in a restaurant or cafe in an hour. You need ten minutes to walk in and find a table, ten minutes to place an order, ten minutes to wait for service,  ten minutes to eat a sandwich, ten minutes for coffee, ten minutes to pay, ten minutes to walk back. Stressful. Or get fined and never do it again.  Will I really meet a friend for lunch for just an hour, when one of us could be ten minutes late delayed by traffic or work?

On Pavement Parking - Warning Signs Needed

Cleanliness

More attention to both cleanliness and litter. Do streetview of Japan. 

Pavements should be cleaned. Shopfronts which are unsightly should be repainted. We should run brighten up Harrow weeks four times a year with sponsors from paint companies, DIY companies, renovation companies. Employ the unemployed to clean the streets. 

Useful Websites About Harrow, Pinner, and Hatch End

Walks and guided walks

www.ranblers.org.uk

School Streets

www.harrow.gov.uk

www.mumsfor lungs.org

en.wikipedia.org

More detail on the coat of arms for Harrow from

en-academic.com

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