No Wellies Required: How to Walk a Flooded Thames Path

Thames Path flooding: many a walker has found themselves stuck when heavy rain makes the 181 mile Thames Path impossible to follow. Those who have booked accommodation on a multi-day journey may have been left frustrated with no help to hand as none of the popular guidebooks provide suggestions. Until now!

So we've decided to draw on our personal experience of recommending alternative routes to those unfortunate souls walking with us and caught in floods.  We’ve put it down on paper and its now available in the form of a book. So how does it work?

We cover each section of the Thames Path as far as Shepperton Ferry, the last likely place for flooding. (There can be tidal flooding in West London but that's easy to avoid as this is a residential area with plenty of parallel roads). For each section we’ve shown where the highest risk of flooding is (in red) and medium risk (in yellow). We’ve then shown an alternative route (in grey) for each section. We’ve also shown “escape routes” so, if you do run into trouble, what’s the best way to get off the Path and onto dry land. All this is overlaid onto an OS 1:25,000 map. Some of the alternatives use roads but we know which roads are generally safe to walk on: those with pavements, those that are quiet, and those that are straight. There’s a written narrative to each section and we have some rather dramatic photos of some of Thames Path flooding.

The book has been written by Richard Luxmore, founder of Walk the Thames, who has extensive experience assisting walkers on the Thames Path.