If you'll allow your ghoully Halloween bent to run into the weekend then you could partake of life beyond the burial ground at the magnificient Victorian Kensal Green Cemetery. Last night, its famed and beautifully restored Dissenters Chapel was host to the launch of the latest One Eye Grey and resounded to the ooky tunes of an eccentric organist, lit by candles and populated by mask wearing folklore fiends, quaffing far too much rum punch.
After dark, the burial ground stretched into frozen oblivion and our own inky explorations consisted largely of posing with masks behind gravestones and wondering if that big monument up there really was a bath. But then we'd been let loose on the punch and hadn't had any dinner.
Your trip, enlightened by the Friends of the Cemetery will be a proper guided tour whatever the weather and will even descend into the catacombs beneath the Anglican Chapel which apparently has only three quarters of its 4000 places filled so bear that in mind if you're making post-death plans.
Kensal Green Cemetery is resting place for many notable people, royals, engineers, literary types, a cross-dressing Army doctor and the surgeon who attended Nelson at Trafalgar among others and a historic and beautiful, 72 acre garden site, perfect for whiling away a gloomy November Sunday afternoon.
Tours run every first and third Sundays of each month at this (dark, cold, wintry) time of year, beginning at 14:00 at the Anglican Chapel in the centre of the grounds, and finishing around two hours later with tea and biscuits at the Dissenters’ Chapel by Ladbroke Grove. Suggested donation £5.
Photo by Matt Brown
