Just Don't Rother

Constructed at the beginning of last century, the Rotherhithe Tunnel is the closest thing London has to hell. 

Built under the Thames to serve foot and horse drawn traffic between the two docks of Southwark and Limehouse, it is now a dankly lit cesspit of carbon monoxide and evil. A survey rated it the tenth most dangerous tunnel in Europe. They seem to have a survey for a lot these days.

Hardly surprising then that the cat who filmed this, soundtracked it with 'Road to Hell'.

So it was with a touch of trepidation and no small amount of crass stupidity that i decided to detour my run yesterday, just for the hell of it. I'd cycled through the tunnel once off my nut and almost died. But fortune favours the brave, and i'd had a bad week. So i thought fuck it.

No warning for pedestrians. How bad could it be.

 Little did i know the tunnel is used by less than a dozen people on foot daily. 

(Half of which are never seen again.)

I was freaked.

But took the plunge.

First things first. An asthma attack.

Then i saw this.

The remnants of a poor infant brutally murdered, vanished without trace.

But for one tragic Croc. 

Then it occurred to me it was probably murdered for wearing the Croc.

Now I was really scared.

The tunnel was unremitting and endless. I was on my last legs.

Then i just got bored.

I had to get outta there. 

Finally, after 3 hours of hyper ventilation, a light appeared out of the darkness.

And I was free. 

I felt like Andy Dusfresne at the end of Shawshank, i actually considered moving to the Pacific to live on the beach and fix up an old boat. But settled for some Lucozade.

 

Safe to say I won't be doing that again in a hurry. It was a pretty fucking crap experience. I can't say i learnt any great lesson from my odyssey beneath the Thames, no great fortune has rewarded my bravery. I didn't kill myself, but i haven't made myself any stronger either. So i suppose the moral of the story is sometimes ideas are just shit.

As the cynic once said..

 Yes there is light at the end of the tunnel, but it is the light of an oncoming train.