The Regent’s Canal Islington Tunnel runs deep beneath Islington — an eerie, echoing waterway that passes unseen under the very streets where Douglas Adams lived and wrote *The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy*.
SEARCH 51.5329978, -0.1014487 Regent's Canal, London, Greater London, England, United Kingdom
The tunnel stretches nearly a kilometer, linking Poppy The Canal Boat and Noel Road at its entrances. Built in 1820, it has no towpath, so in its early days canal boats had to be “legged” through by workers lying on their backs and walking along the tunnel walls — a wonderfully Adamsian image of human ingenuity and absurdity.
Though never mentioned directly in *Hitchhiker’s*, the Islington Tunnel feels like something straight out of it: a hidden artery of London, unseen by most, filled with quiet improbability. It evokes the sense that beneath the ordinary, there are strange worlds — a theme central to Adams’ writing.
