I live in Winchester, an ancient (pre-Roman) town in Hampshire which is a county in southern England (yes, for those of you who are old enough to remember it has
that Winchester Cathedral from the old 60s song!). It's 62 miles from London.
Winchester used to be the capital of England until William of Normandy came over from France in 1066, defeated King Harold at the Battle of Hastings (about 40 miles eastwards along the coast) and decided to make London his HQ - probably because the English Channel is only 21 miles across from Dover to Calais and London is nearer to Dover than Winchester is (Dover is at the narrowest point of the English Channel on the map in the first link in my next paragraph).
For more information about Winchester, see
here. I actually live in a flat (apartment) which overlooks the hill that the top photo on
this site was taken from and I can walk along the footpath beside the river shown in the bottom picture for several miles.