Gunpowder parkrun

Updated: Dec 9, 2022

"Remember Remember the 5th of November..." It was the morning of the 5th of November and where else could we go but Gunpowder parkrun. We weren't the only tourists to have the same idea, and it had a really great buzz about it on the morning of our visit, and I've never seen so many tourists in the same place. It was so busy in fact that we broke the attendance record, and the core team had to hand out paper tokens once the barcode tokens ran out. For me it was Course #53, and for Gunpowder it was their 502nd event. Gunpowder park was fairly easy to get to and is in the town of Waltham Abbey just north of London and just inside the M25, accessed off of junction 26. Gunpowder is a two lap clockwise course, around the grounds of Gunpowder park, it is footpath all the way, is fairly flat and is a quick course, and I came very close to setting a new overall parkrun PB here. [I first visited this parkrun on 5th November 2022]

Had to queue for the 'sign' picture today!

Bit of History

It turns out that Waltham Abbey had an ‘explosive’ past, Gunpowder Park was formerly a Royal Ordnance site concerned with munitions testing. The Royal Gunpowder Mills at Waltham Abbey were in operation for over 300 years, dating back to the Second Dutch War of 1665. The site was later purchased by the Crown in 1787 to secure supplies of Gunpowder and also to establish a site for the development of manufacturing processes and to establish quality and cost standards by which the private sector could be judged. The site remained in Crown ownership for the next 204 years, and was one of only three Royal Gunpowder mills for the United Kingdom, the others being based at Ballincollig and Faversham. The Royal Gunpowder Mills served an important role in both World Wars before becoming 'The Explosives Research and Development Establishment' in 1945 and remained a research site for the next 40 years. After the site was closed in 1991 the south part of the site was vacated, decontaminated and redeveloped, and much of the remaining land was converted into the 255 acres of Gunpowder Park, which was opened in 2004. For more information on the history please see the Waltham Abbey Royal Gunpower Mills wiki page.

Briefings

We were a bit tight for time on arrival so I didn't get chance to record the briefing like I normally do, but the highlight of the briefing was an amazing poem specially written for the occasion by Terry M Bailey (A7989713) and read out as part of the briefing. Rather than reproducing it here, please click on the following link to read it 'The Gunpowder Poem'

The Course

The course starts a 200m or so West of the briefing area, and from the start you head back past the briefing area, before taking a sweeping right and staying right to head roughly West through the park, taking a sweeping left followed by a sweeping right before eventually coming to a left turn some 500m from the briefing area, you then head South before taking a sweeping right to head West, then a sweeping right to head North, through an S bend still heading North before taking a sweeping right to head East, eventually the path will bring you all the way back to the start, continue through the start and back all the way to the briefing area and lap 2. Lap 2 is the same as Lap 1 and the finish area is close to the Main Briefing area and Car Park.

Difficulty

All Footpath and no major inclines, I think I'm going to have to give this one a 1 out of 5. Road shoes all the way here. On a normal morning this is usually a fairly quiet parkrun with a reasonably small field, but on the 5th of November it was rammed and we broke all the previous attendance records. In summary this is a easy and straightforward parkrun to run.

Elevation

My Garmin says there is 24m of total elevation, and there are some inclines but nothing really of any note or of any particular challenge. The little 'bump' you see on my elevation graph below is coming out of the briefing area towards the start of each lap.

Parking, Facilities and Coffee

Gunpowder park has it's own small car park at EN9 3GP and parking here is £1 for up to an hour and £2 for up to 24 hours. It was full on the morning of our visit mainly due to the fact it was the 5th of November and lots of tourists had made the same journey. We parked 1km North of the park at Tesco and jogged back to the park from here. I even managed to get on an EV charger at Tesco for the journey back to MK. Also at Tesco is a lovely little independent Tea Room called the Teapot Cafe, which is good because there is no café at Gunpowder parkrun itself. However Gunpowder does have toilets clearly marked at the main car park, and toilets at a parkrun are always very welcome when you've driven or travelled a long way.

Other Points of Interest

There were loads of tourists here today and it was great to chat to a few of them and compare stories of where we had all been and what other parkruns we had done in the local area. There are lots of tourist groups on facebook if you want to meet up with other tourists and a lot of tourists had planned to go to Gunpowder on the 5th of November. It was great to see so many Apricot tourist tops and Cow Cowells/Caps/Bobble hats. Another point of interest was some curious carved wooden rockers for children to use.

Summary

This was a really enjoyable and quick parkrun, with a great buzz to it on the morning of our visit due to it being a special day for the park. The poem at the start briefing was a real highlight, and it was great to have a chat with the other tourists before and after the run. I even got given a sparkler to write my name with after the run. We then visited the Teapot Café shop for an amazing breakfast afterwards, so I can recommend this for your post parkrun coffee, again we bumped into some more of our fellow tourists. A really great morning out, and a really welcoming parkrun.