Chance? #1

Just as when I encountered the first Community Chest square, I was left slightly wondering what to do for Chance? There were some obvious suggestions, stick a pin in the tube map, or use Google's “I feel lucky” search to find somewhere, but it was Aussie Pete who came up with the pearling idea of visiting the National Lottery offices of Camelot.

Apparently they used to have offices just off Piccadilly Circus, but now seemed to have moved all their main functions to Watford, no doubt saving them millions of pounds in the process, but they have kept a small Corporate Affair presence in the capital, located in Brettenham House, just on the end of Waterloo Bridge. So it was on a glorious sunny Thursday evening that I confused tourists by having my portrait was taken for prosperity, clutching my lucky Euro Millions ticket for the following day.

"Who wants to be a millionaire?" - Well I have to replace a rail ticket now!

I was accompanied by the same group who had visited the Angel Islington, minus Spiky haired Ed who had decided to join a rival works outing. So we were without the youth but at least we wouldn’t either be delayed for hair styling reasons, or get knocked over by London transport.

First notable point of the visit was the amazingly attractive young lady on the tube whose short summer dress and gravity defying cleavage rendered us all into giggling schoolboys. The walk from Embankment tube through Victoria Embankment Gardens was no better with seemingly crowds of young nubile females descending on the capital for no other reason than to make 4 middle aged men question their moralities.

Once the photo op was captured outside the Camelot offices, it was just a short walk across The Strand into The Wellington, a well positioned Nicholson’s pub, right next door to the Lyceum Theatre for all those thirsty Lion King visitors.

The Wellington - Note lack of mash outside.

It’s certainly an attractive pub, with lovely original features, long wooden bar, moulded ceilings, and neo-gothic exterior. Ok, I got that from the website, but it’s all true! Alas the experience wasn’t up to the expectation. Firstly, there was no Cask Marque certificate to be found, the first barman I asked didn’t have a clue what I was talking about, I might as well have been asking for a barium enema and the second guy earnestly took me to the Cask Marque sign outside the pub. Once I’d explained that I needed the certificate with the QR code he fell into that last retreat of all bemused staff – “Oh, I’m not sure then. You’ll need to come back tomorrow and speak to the boss, she’ll know where it is.” Well, she might know where it is, but she should have it on the wall and she should have told you what it’s all about! 2/10, try harder and how about serving decent potions of mash with your sausage and mash?

Charlie demands more mash in his pint at the Wellington.

Leaving as soon as we could, it was a quick hop back across the Strand, into Savoy Street and the fantastically named Savoy Tup. This, from the exterior signage would seem to be an old Young’s pub but seems to be an independent free house now. The interior is light and fresh and alongside the selection of ales was quite a range of lagers, including one I’d certainly never heard of before, Brauhaus Riegele. The website calls it an “ale” but I’d suggest it’s a standard Bavarian Pilsner, but whatever, it came in a brilliant handled mug and was cool and refreshing on a hot evening. The jolly barmaid also seemed very chuffed that someone was scanning the Cask Marque code (note to the Wellington – there it was proudly displayed on the wall!) – “It never works for me” she commented, grinning when I showed her the pub now sitting in my list of pubs visited.

Savoy Tup, note handled glass resting on belly. Note rail pass falling out of pocket.

The pub was heaving with other drinkers and we stood outside to enjoy our drinks and it was at this point I innocently placed my suit jacket over the top of my man-bag to free up a hand and made the mistake of the evening which was only noticed when we reached the final pub, The Coal Hole a hundred yards further west down the Strand.

My rail pass was gone! I can only presume it had tumbled out of my inverted suit jacket pocket but however it had actually disappeared there was no sign of it even after retracing our steps a couple of times. This obviously brought somewhat of a dampener onto the evening, no matter how many times the boys tried to take my mind off it. Even a fine pint of Purity’s Mad Goose ale, another easy Cask Marque capture from the wall (Wellington, looking at you here!) and a bottle of Duvel failed to raise my spirits and I rather missed all the fine points of the Coal Hole in my depression.

The only photo of the Coal Hole. This was my depressed expression rendered impossible by the botox-ing property of the Duvel

There was a last minute stay of execution for “good times” when a chatty American girl in McDonald’s was tempted by my Hot Chilli Sauce (?) but this was soon snuffed out by the £4.20 charged to go from Embankment to Paddington (get a grip Boris!) and the rail replacement coach laid on by First Great Western.

So much for chance hey!

Number of Cask Marque Pubs visited  = 44

Rallying cry for the next visit = More Mash Now!

Did we miss Spiky haired Ed? = Too bloody right. None of this would have happened if he’d been there with his jack the lad attitude and devil may care trousers.

Next Stop = Euston Road

P.S. There is an obvious Post Script to this in that I now realise I’ve visted three pubs in The Strand when of course I have to visit The Strand later in the tour. Hopefully there’ll be another Cask Marque pub somewhere along the street!

The Angel Islington

Oh weep ye gentlewomen of England! Clutch your creased posters of the modern day Adonis to your hearts, wrent you clothing and claw at your haggard faces! Spiky haired Ed is no more!

Torn all too early from us, we are cast adrift in this living purgatory without a stylistic rudder to guide us! And all because he tried to cross the road looking the wrong way!

OK, ok, panic over, tissues away, he’s not dead. But he bloody nearly was!

Now that this blog is gaining something of a reputation at work, probably the wrong sort of reputation, there was a group of co-workers who were gagging to join me on the next instalment of this epic saga, which is why I’ve ended up doing two squares in one week. It was a group of 5 of us who strode boldly out on a pleasant Friday evening to sample the delights of The Angel Islington. But first we need to take a history lesson.

BGC points out to Charlie the orginal "Angel" - Rare picture of Spiky haired Ed in the middle of the road not being hit by traffic.

The Angel, of Islington fame, was a coaching inn near to a toll gate on the Great North Road and now finds itself smack bang in the middle of modern day Islington. It’s gone through a couple of rebuilds over the years but the inn that was built in 1899 is still there, seeing life in the 1920’s, 30’s, 40’s and 50’s as the famous Lyon’s Corner House tea rooms and is now used as a bank. This place was mentioned in Dickens’s Oliver Twist no less and is also the first square on the board where I’ve managed to drink a pint right on the location itself, because although banks don’t serve pints, Weatherspoon’s do, and next door to the “old” Angel is a pub, called amazingly enough “The Angel”.

So emerging blinking into the evening sunshine we exited from Angel tube station (pub facts: Angel tube station has the longest escalator on the London Underground and the third longest in Western Europe (thanks Charlie) and is also one of only 5 stations on the Underground named after public houses – no prizes if you can guess the rest) and Spiky haired Ed must have been blinking more than the rest of us and he dashed to cross the busy Islington High Street, looking in completely the wrong direction only to be bounced by a couple of tons of Big Red London Bus. Saved only by the amount of hair gel protecting his precious face he nonchalantly continued to the cash point leaving the rest of us to joke with the bus driver who remained amazingly humorous considering the circumstances.

Couple of Angels

The Angel (the Weatherspoon’s one) is another open plan, pine floored, drinking cavern but it does have some of the friendliest bar staff ever. Being unable to locate the Cask Marque certificate I asked the manager where it might be, this caused him to leap batman like into action by racing around the pub, scanning the walls like he was searching for a hidden panel, only to also come up blank. He was then told by another member of staff that the certificate was up “in the office” and so off he went again returning with the treasured item allowing Aussie Pete and myself to scan it, explaining how it had been on the wall but had got knocked off and the frame smashed (what are the chances of that happening?) Now in how many other places would the reply have been, “it was around somewhere mate but dunno where it is now”! So top marks for the Angel’s staff, and also top marks for the couple of excellent pints of Cotswold Spring’s Stunner and Thornbridge’s Jaipur.

It was back to the history book then, as during my research into the Angel (the Islington one now) it mentioned the Red Lion Inn, (now the Old Red Lion) as being the place where Thomas Paine wrote some parts of “Rights of Man”.  The Inn is now a theatre pub and lies just across the crossroads from the Angel – rather confusingly the pub sign shows a picture of a boxer dog rather than a lion, but the pub’s website explains this as being Rolo, a much missed pub dog. The website also gives a full listing of what’s on in their upstairs theatre as well as mentioning that it welcomes “Monopoly Crawlers”!

Catalog pose on entering the Old Red Lion

The pub is a real mishmash of styles, with a glass panelled snug, the theatre box office and big screen teles all vying for position in the bar area. There’s a chirpy familiarity about the place that makes you feel like everyone would know your name after just a couple of regular visits.

For my first pint I plumped for the classic Timothy Taylor’s Landlord which came in a Abbot Ale glass and Charlie’s three pints of Grolsh (not all for Charlie (well not yet anyway) came in Carling Glasses (Grrrrrr). Again being unable to locate the Cask Marque certificate the bar staff finally found it under the bar – “ah, I remember what happened now” said one “It got knocked off the wall and the frame smashed” – What are the chances………..eh?

The evening then started to unravel into hilarious visits to the unlit toilets and much joviality around the fact that upstairs there was a performance of a one-man Tommy Cooper tribute show. “I wonder if he’ll do it like that?” mused Rob “Or perhaps, not like that, but like this?” and the mileage we seemed to get out of this joke went on far far too long. Far too long………………..

I remember a pint of Abbot Ale (served in a Woodforde’s glass) and trying Ed’s awful sickly sweet Kopparberg (served in another Abbot Ale glass) a pint of Spitfire (served in a branded thimble possibly) and a final pint (that should have been a half – thanks Charlie) of Landlord (served in a Landlord glass! Horay, got there in the end!)

Which brought the evening to a fitting end, a dash back down the longest escalator on the tube (luckily not like this guy) a race onto the just departing train from Paddington and a sprint round the monstrosity that is Reading Station. Cheers guys! Top evening!

Number of Cask Marque Pubs visited = 42

Highlight of the evening = The barman in the Old Red Lion bemoaning that the picture of David Beckham pinned up to advertise the Olympic Football had had the C-Word scrawled across it after being there for about 10 minutes.

Final Pub Fact = The licensees for the Monopoly board game used to meet for tea in the Lyon’s Corner House (see above) which explains why it was included in the game. So there!

Next Stop = Chance?

Kings Cross

So far I’ve tackled the stops on the journey by calling in after work, which perhaps as Judy might have told Mr Punch, is not necessarily the “way to do it”. Deciding that a change to this routine was required I thought that to mess things up I would venture into the big smoke after a day “working from home” – just to give the visit a new frisson of adventure…………..well ok, it’s still not hiking across the Andies, but at least I’m trying!

I’d been looking forward to completing Kings Cross as it’s very accessible, was somewhere I knew I could easily get to, and I knew that there were several good pubs along the Euston Road. Also eminent Beer Writer Roger Protz had just wrote an interesting piece for his own website which only served to whet the appetite even more.

I was in a really good mood arriving back into London in the early evening, firstly because it was a very rare pleasant summer evening, something that’s been in incredible short supply this year but also because I managed to snaffle a leberwurst and gherkin sandwich with me for the train. Til my dying day I’ll claim that one of the best beers I ever drank was a can of Co-Op Pale Ale which I’d “stolen” from a party and secretly drank in bed. I was about 14 and the illicit nature of the consumption made the flavour that much more enjoyable. It must have been a similar effect that made the sandwich so tasty, that and the fact at that time of night you’re guaranteed a double seat to yourself and complete control of the arm rest!

Ooo, look! Shiny Shiny!

 The last time I’d had to go to Kings Cross for any length of time was well over 10 years ago and to be honest the ½ hour or so I had to wait there for someone was pretty grim. The place was a veritable dump, dark, dank and grey and full of dodgy characters, some of whom kept asking me for “business”? Now though, the place is a gleaming, futuristic terminal looking more like an airport than a regional train station.

This can't be London. Where's all the litter?

The other good thing about going to Kings Cross is that you can also see neighbouring St Pancras from the outside. Honestly, the building is amazing and almost worth visiting this non-touristy area of London for that alone. It’s a real shame that probably 99% of people who go there  are only there to catch the Eurostar and I would seriously suggest to any passengers that they try to take 5 minutes to view the place – I’m still wondering what they keep in the turrets.

I was trying to get the dramatic skyline over St Pancras - Honest!

Anyway, according to the trusty Cask Marque app the nearest pubs to Kings Cross would be along the Euston Road, but thinking ahead I might need them for a later visit (check the board, check the board) I instead headed to Grey’s Inn Road and the Lucas Arms, a corner pub from the Greene King stable. The place has a very nice cosy back-street boozer feel to it, especially as the hustle and bustle of Kings Cross and Euston Road are just around the corner.

The Lucas Arms - Note lovely old style lamp on the corner.

The ales on offer were disappointing common and disappointing few, only GK’s IPA and former Moreland’s Old Speckled Hen but the good news was the IPA was served in a very nice handled mug which I’d never seen before. I’m not a huge fan of mugs to drink beer out of (tea is fine, but not beer) but I do have to say that this version had quite a nice feel to it. The beer was actually very good as well (if a little chilly). GK’s IPA usually comes in for some stick from the so called beer experts as it’s not (apparently) a true representation of the IPA style, but when served well it can be a very pleasant pint. This one was full of grassy freshness and there is a serious amount of hop punch for a beer that is after all only 3.6% vol. And anyway, as someone reminded me this week, “When will people learn that there's no such thing as good music or crap music? It's just a matter of whether you like it or don't like it!” – Quite right!

A Mug Shot! (God, I'm on fire!)

I then made my mistake of the evening by trying to quickly fit in another pub before catching my train home. The Cask Marque app suggested that the Doric Arch (Head of Steam) pub was just behind St Pancras when if fact it’s much further up Euston Road, nearer to Euston Station. So after 10 minutes of wandering around Brill Place (which wasn’t that Brill – Geddit! See what I did there!) I gave up and returned home.

There's an app for that........but not for this!

So only one more scan for the Cask Finder but at least my evening didn’t end as badly as the guy trying desperately to get off the train at Reading, only to find the door was now locked. “Sorry mate, you’re too late” shrugged First Great Western’s sympathetic platform staff as they watched him vainly try to escape. They must put them on special training courses for this level of service!

Number of Cask Marque Pubs visited  = 40

Worth repeating the “evening excursion exercise” = Only with the right sandwich

Any offers of “business” = Zero

Next Stop =The Angel Islington

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Two quick updates after posting this episode:

1. The excellent Alastair at @caskmarque has updated the co-ordinates for The Doric Arch and it now points to the right place!

2. Fellow beer blogger, @timofnewbury tweeted today about a BBC2 program which discussed the architecture of St Pancras station.

Result!

Income Tax

Due to an extremely busy week I had to bring forward this week’s venture into the fantasy world where board games meet beer which is almost as pleasurable as my fantasy world where I can fly and x-ray specs actually work.

A boring Tuesday night wouldn’t on the face of it, seem to hold much incentive to join me for a drink, but you can imagine my pleasure when Spiky haired Ed jumped at the chance to delay his journey home. Perhaps it was the new found fame as star of this blog or maybe just the chance to listen to my dulcet tones for an hour or two…………who know? Who cares? It was certainly going to be better than talking to the walls.

The next square to be tackled is that most dreaded of ones, the £200 Income Tax fine, which usually gets you just as you pass GO. It didn’t take the imagination of an Archbishop to try to find an office of HMRC that would be a suitable venue and the ones just south of Blackfriars Bridge in Dorset House on Stamford Street fitted the bill nicely and also allowed me another foray south of the river.

Poor ITV has such bad breath the other companies won't go anywhere near him.

With the offices duly visited and photographed (the security guard looking most puzzled) a quick consultation with the Cask Marque app showed that the nearest Cask Marque accredited pub was the Fuller’s Pie and Ale house just at the end of the very same road.

Could I possibly get any worse at taking pictures?

The Mad Hatter Hotel is a very smart hostelry, with gleaming handpumps and highly polished wooden bar and a huge number of well turned out uniformed bar staff. The full range of Fuller’s ales seemed to be on and I chose the vastly underrated Chiswick Bitter, a very fine ale you unfortunately seldom see outside of the capital. Spiky haired Ed, after procrastinating for an age, plumped for a pint of Fuller’s Honeydew which came in a lovely stemmed branded glass. The attentive bar staff where more than happy to locate the Cask Marque certificate as it currently wasn’t being displayed due to a change of management and with the visit successfully captured we once more ventured out into the sunny but rainy evening.

Look ladies! It's Spiky haired Ed's shoulder!

Sensing that there was still plenty of moans and groans Spiky haired Ed needed to get off his strapping chest, I suggested we strike out back towards the Thames where there was another accredited Nicholson’s pub, The Doggets Coat and Badge (whose interesting name is fully explained on their website) which must have one of the primest of prime locations in central London. With Spiky haired Ed going for a pint of Blue Moon (just last week he was sucking on pints of Stella so we can see the signs of improvement) I chose the wonderful St Peter’s Mild, which certainly turned out to be the best pint I’ve had for quite a while. I think Spiky haired Ed’s Blue Moon was ok, although his exclamation upon finding the slice of orange in it was most amusing. “I don’t do food and drink! Well not at the same time anyway!”

View from a (Blackfriars) Bridge

So there we have it, possibly not the most exciting round so far, but there again this was meant to be Income Tax……………….and when has Tax ever been exciting?

Number of Cask Marque Pubs visited  = 39

Best Pubs and Best Beers so Far? = Quite possibly!

And how did the evening end? = Onion rings on Reading Station. AGAIN!

Next Stop =Kings Cross

Whitechapel Road

You may have gathered from the last entry that I was determined not to repeat last Friday’s “Jonny-no-mates” routine again, so in a desperate effort not to appear to be a social pariah I asked a group of work colleagues whether they would like a “swift one” after work this Friday. Luckily the next square on the board, Whitechapel Road is only a brisk 10 minute walk away from our offices and as such I wouldn’t need to put this gallant gang of volunteers through a forced march to get to the pub.

Quick word about the Whitechapel Road in that it houses the infamous Blind Beggar pub which most Monopoly tourists use as their stop for this square. Unfortunately not a Cask Marque pub this didn’t fit my criteria but it worth mentioning this place not only for its links to the Krays but also as the place that William Booth made his first sermon, which led to the creation of the Salvation Army. And if you want one more interesting beer related fact, it’s also the former brewery tap of the Manns Albion Brewery where the first modern Brown Ale was brewed. Now you too can be a pub bore……………………

The nearest Cask Marque pub is the Aldgate Exchange just 50 or so metres down from Aldgate East tube station. I’d previously been in this place and been unable to find the Cask Marque certificate so I thought it might be a prudent step to visit somewhere else on the way.

The Brown Bear

My selection was The Brown Bear in nearby Leman Street which caused one work colleague to squeal with both delight as this is apparently one of her favourite pubs and then groan in agony as she couldn’t join us due to other commitments. So it was with somewhat of a spring in our collective steps that 5 of us entered the pub on an early Friday evening. The pub is a traditional centre bar affair with nice wooden shelving atop which stands the proud statue of the Brown Bear. Beers on offer were Fuller’s London Pride, the ubiquitous Sharp’s Doombar and Marston’s EPA. Only the Pride and the Doombar had the Cask Marque tag on the handpumps which perhaps should have given me a clue as the EPA was rather warm and woolly (and also served in an Adnams Glass (Grrrrrrr)).

BGC at the bar of the Brown Bear

With the pub just starting to fill up and Andy Murray just losing the 3^rd set in his semi-final, like a bunch of wannabe tabloid reporters, 3 of my colleague all made their excuses and left, citing “busy days tomorrow” and “friends coming round tonight”………………….lightweights to a man!

This left me with spiky haired Ed.

Spiky haired Ed is a curious creature, presenting the attractive face of IT with his chiselled jaw, fresh complexion and gymnasts physique he’s very much the eye candy for the office girls. Where as I present the slobbish side of IT with my stupid fat face, binman’s physic and most of the office girls having exclusion orders against me so I don’t get within 5 feet of them.

Anyway, as a modern day “odd couple” we strolled up to the junction of Aldgate High Street and Commercial Street and took a swift jaunt up the Whitechapel Road to record the visit for posterity.

Well at least you can read this sign!

It was then back to the Aldgate Exchange for a rather nasty pint of Adnams Southwold bitter (not served in an Adnams glass (Grrrrrrrrr)). I had always presumed that this place was another Weatherspoon’s pub (based on the style of the outside signage) but it turns out it isn’t. I’m not sure if it is a Free House as they claim but it’s another open plan pine floored warehouse with not a great deal going for it. The staff were friendly and the manager was more than happy to fetch out the Cask Marque certificate which wasn’t on the wall. “How did you like the beer?” he asked as I scanned the code. I went all English and didn’t want to make a fuss, “Oh, very nice” I lied.

One (fat) man, a man-bag and a sign in misleading typeface.

Spiky haired Ed and I were now on a roll, putting the office to rights and deciding who was probably overpaid (everyone else) and who were underpaid (spiky haired Ed and me) so we decided to continue the journey across the road at The Hoop and Grapes, a Nicholson’s pub where apparently the Great Fire of London stopped just 50 yards away. The best pint of the evening was the 4.2% Merlin’s Ale and it was only a pity the visit to this very nice pub was spoilt by them not being in possession of the new style Cask Marque certificate with the QR Code.

Handpumps at the Hoop and Grapes

Before things started to become maudlin Spiky haired Ed and I called it a day and bidded each other a good night. Him, back to his boy-band lifestyle of hair gel and pegged jeans and me to onion rings on Reading station. Cheers!

Number of Cask Marque Pubs visited  = 37

Target for the visit = Successful!

Things I know now that I didn’t know before this visit = According to Spiky haired Ed, I have the best voice in the office? (Should this make me worried?)

Next Stop = Income Tax!