Been up and over The Hill recently?

I don't know how often lcoal residents wander up to Hampstead Heath to enjoy the natural beauty or indeed the constructed natural beauty.

This - The Hill Garden - is one of the finest pieces of constructed natural beauty around.

http://www.ukattraction.com/london/map/the-hill-garden-and-pergola.htm

Completely unknown to many locals it is overlooked by the even more stunning and amazing Pergola and is just a great location of quiet charm and solitude.

The views out across North West London are truly amazing - over to Harrow.

http://www.opensquares.org/detail/Hill.html

This was orginally/constructed to be the back garden of Lord Leverhulme's Inverforth House - the Pergola, as i think I have mentioned before, was constructed using the earth from the Hampstead Tunnel when the Northern Line was constructed in 1906/07.

If you haven't been up there you are missing a treat - of a summer evening it is breath-taking... oh and The Olde Bull and Bush and The Spaniards Pubs are also to be recommended!

"High on bleak Hampstead's swarthy moor"

Not my words but those of Macaulay describing Hampstead's Whitestone Pond - it was of course such a high spot that it was the location of one of the Armada Beacons of 1588.

There is still a white stone (though I haven't taken the time to hunt it down yet) which apparently reads "4 miles from St Giles Pound: 4.5miles from Holborn Bars".

Now the area feels curiously drab and run down - part of autumn of course, but on a wider point the signage has had some attention but needs proper repair and so it's welcome that the refurbishment application for Heath House has attracted a section 106 payment and combined with some serious investment between camden and the Corporation of London (time and money) the area is to get a serious facelift.
http://474towin.blogspot.com/2008/02/blue-plaque-for-george-crabbe-in.html

Of course it could be so much better and this now lying on the route of the Olympic cycle ride.

It was the Horse Pond whereby carriages comming from up the hill or preparing to descend the hill would pause to water and also to clean their wheels of the mud from the journey - usually these were the coal carriages.

It was also much in use during the construction of the underground as the earth from the Hampstead Tunnel was taken up to Inverforth House to build the Pergola foundations.
http://474towin.blogspot.com/2008/07/tranquil-and-idyllic-thanks-to-northern.html

For details of the Whitestone Pond development appraisal have a look via this link on Camden website:
http://www.camden.gov.uk/ccm/content/council-and-democracy/having-your-say/consultations/street-policy/whitestone-pond/whitestone-pond---development-appraisal/whitestone-pond---development-appraisal-consultation.en;jsessionid=AAE99ABE37AC44CA586B8C65AF730265.node2