Carnival, Political Prisoners & Naked Bike Ride: On Saturday 14th June 2008 I called in at Hampton Hill on my way into London for the 30th annual Hampton Hill & Hampton Carnival Parade, but it turned out to be a rather small event. In Trafalgar Square there was a protest outside South Africa House calling for the release of political prisoners held in prisons around the world and after this I went to Hyde Park for the start of the London World Naked Bike Ride.
Hampton & Hampton Hill 30th Anniversary Parade
Hampton Hill
In Hampton Hill I found cows on the High Street and a large rabbit as well as a few cars and some people on foot including a gardener with a wheelbarrow, but it was a small and rather disappointing parade and I left to continue my journey to London as it made its way towards Hampton.
Hampton & Hampton Hill 30th Anniversary Parade
Free Political Prisoners – Break the Chains
South Africa House
The protest here was also rather smaller than I had hoped but included a group of Kurds calling for the release of their leader, Abdullah Ocalan from a Turkish jail.
Others called for the release of the Miami Five, Cubans who came to Miami to disrupt terrorist raids made by right-wing Cuban exiles living there against Cuba and imprisoned by the USA.
There were also calls for the closure of the illegal US prison camp at Guantanamo Bay and for an end to the continuing torture there and release of refugees and asylum seekers locked in detention centres in the UK.
Break the Chains -Free Political Prisoners
World Naked Bike Ride
London
In 2008 the London World Naked Bike Ride began in Hyde Park, and I went there to photograph the riders getting ready and setting off. The start was very crowded mainly with tourists eager to view the spectacle.
When all had left I took the tube to Westminster to photograph the ride going over Westminster Bridge and then as the ride regrouped I rushed to the footbridge into Waterloo Station (now demolished) for pictures from above as it came down York Road. As the last cyclist passed below me I walked into the station to catch my train home.
As I commented “while bodies are very much on display environmental messages seemed at times to be rather well-hidden, leaving many of the public along the route bemused.” And on My London Diary I recount briefly the reactions of some of the people I talked to and heard as we watched the event.
Those organising the ride say it is a “peaceful, imaginative and fun protest against oil dependency and car culture. A celebration of the bicycle and also a celebration of the power and individuality of the human body. A symbol of the vulnerability of the cyclist in traffic.”
The annual ride continues to take place in London and in other cities. The 2026 London ride is today, Sunday 14th June 2026. Riders are starting from Clapham Junction, Croydon, Deptford, Hackney Wick, Kew Bridge, Regents Park, Tower Hill, Hyde Park Corner and all meeting up close to the south end of Westminster Bridge to ride together around Central London.
More on My London Diary at World Naked Bike Ride, London 2008.
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