Hyde Park Pet Cemetery, London

Hyde Park Pet Cemetery

(visited October 2015)

Since I blogged about this site in April, with photos taken a few years ago through the railings, I’ve been lucky enough to actually get inside the cemetery, as part of a guided tour for London Month of the Dead.  And what a splendid place it is too – row upon row of tiny gravestone, with epitaphs fit for beloved spouses and children, not just the family pet. Tales of long lives, faithfulness and sudden death are captured here, along with stones which simply record a name, and perhaps a date. Goodness knows what personality poor old Scum had, one can only imagine he/she was a cat who ate the family budgerigar!

The Royal Parks, who manage the site, hope to have more tours running in the future which will include access to the cemetery. The site is small (no more than the back garden of the gatekeeper’s lodge), and fragile, so it’s never going to have unrestricted access, but it’s well worth a visit to this tiny Victorian curiosity if you can get on a tour!