The Middlesex Border Walk was developed in collaboration with the Association of British Counties and first walked in a series of weekends in 2025. It is a county boundary path; the development page hosted here on WildþingUK.
Circling Middlesex, for most of its length, the Middlesex Border Walk actually runs on or within a few hundred yards of the county border. Elsewhere it follows closely around the border as far as is practical, trespassing over the border very rarely.
In some stretches admittedly it would have been a better walk across the border, as for example on the Thames Path, but to explore the edges of Middlesex, you have to be in Middlesex. I love a countryside walk, but to see the fringes of a county, even the odd abandoned council estate and industrial waste are part of the experience – though these proved rare, in an eye-opening walk.
The route takes in a variety of scenery, including the city and the suburbs, “Metro-Land”, industrial lands, canal towpaths, riverbanks, farms, woods and open countryside, in particular in the north of the county. It allows for excursions from the path to explore places of interest around the county’s edge, in a miscellany of towns, villages and their innumerable pubs.
When this page was first written it included a proposed route, with a total length calculated at 121 miles, but actually walking it showed that the planned route was sometimes not possible, or better routes were found; sometimes with delightful discoveries on the way. The map shown on this page has now been updated to the route actually walked.
The Middlesex Border Walk can be walked in either direction and from any point. For the purposes of publication, I show it running clockwise from and to the City of London, the chief town of Middlesex – though I actually started and finished in Staines.
The path was initially developed for the Association of British Counties, but building on a great deal of work put in long before by others. The route takes in much of the Middlesex Greenway devised by Stephen J Collins, along the western and northern boundaries of the county, the Lea Valley Walk along the eastern boundary, and the Thames Path along the River Thames which forms the county’s southern boundary. Variations, additional and linking sections were developed within this project contributors including Stephen Collins and members of the Saturday Walking Club so as to take the path around the whole county boundary. Finally, my own feet walked every yard.
Route map
Links
[in development]