Every year millions of Londoners and tourists visit Hyde Park, one of the capital city’s eight Royal Parks.

Hyde Park covers 350 acres and is home to a number of famous landmarks including the Serpentine Lake, Speakers’ Corner and the Diana, Princess of Wales Memorial Fountain. The park also offers various recreational activities including open water swimming, boating, cycling, tennis and horseback riding.

When Strike goes to the park in The Cuckoo’s Calling, “the trip took him across Hyde Park, down leafy walkways and across the sandy bridle path of Rotten Row.”

(Here’s our very own Strike striking a very Strike-like pose not unlike that of the Career of Evil cover art.)

As Strike and John Bristow walk out of Hyde Park together, “they passed the memorial fountain to Diana, Princess of Wales, whispering, tinkling and gushing along its long channel of Cornish granite.”

After leaving Bristow at his office building, Strike’s leg is becoming more painful as he makes his way to Kensington Gore.

As he then heads “for Kensington Tube station, he passed the Queen’s Gate into Hyde Park; ornate, rust-red and embellished with royal insignia.”

“Incurably observant, he noted the sculpture of the doe and fawn on one pillar and the stag on the other. Humans often assumed symmetry and equality where none existed. The same, yet profoundly different…”

These are the statues on either side of the gate. Interestingly, both seem to depict a doe and fawn. We don’t see a stag anywhere. Could this possibly be a mistake in the book?

Make no mistake that a day out in Hyde Park is a good idea. Find it on Google Maps here:

If you’re going to Hyde Park, don’t forget to visit the Serpentine Bar & Kitchen, where Strike talks to John Bristow and Tony Landry.