It was Saturday and I had planned a fun day in inner London. It was supposed to be a more relaxing day without as much walking. However, thanks to a geographical error on my part (we aimed and arrived on foot at the wrong station. We should have aimed for Hyde Park Station, but we ended up one stop east at Green Park). So we walked a lot further than planned. By the time we got to our first stop, Apsley House Museum, we were pretty bushed. The pub crawl was supposed to be later, but we started early. Our walk was in the rain, a light rain. It took us past Buckingham Palace, where only madmen and women would voluntarily go on a Saturday during a long weekend. We bustled our way through crowds, eventually surviving and gasping for air in Green Park. We stood under a large tree in the rain for a time, enjoying the smells of wet grass and leaves, and watching groups of people hurry past, heading for the palace.
We chose a pub close to Apsley House, and eagerly entered The Grenadier, one of London's oldest standbys. We had left our home station, East Croydon, 90 minutes earlier, and we were thirsty. The pub has its own ale, called Grenadier Ale. It was beautifully kept (cellar temp of 50 F) and was quite delicious. We also shared a juice before heading towards Apsley House.
Even with a good map and directions, The Grenadier is not an easy pub to stumble across. It seems to sit within its own dimension.
Apsley House was the home of the Duke of Wellington. It's address is Number One London. How about that? Designed by Robert Adams in the 1770s, the Duke purchased it in 1817. It houses a collection of china and silverware together with paintings. The staircase has a 12' statue of Napoleon, naked. For us the highlight was the paintings, with Spanish masters prevalent. We last visited this place in 1991, on our very first visit to London. We still had fond memories of that visit, so it was high time we returned.
https://tmlighting.com/projects/apsley-house-london/
The main gallery. Internet photo.
https://www.thegeographicalcure.com/post/guide-to-apsley-house
Not far from the museum was a little corner of London we had never explored. Shepherd's Market is a small warren of narrow streets with shops and restaurants. It was still raining a bit, so we didn't spend a lot of time here. However, an unplanned stop at the Market Pub brought us great joy and happiness. We had a half of Harvey's Best Bitter (brewed in Lewes) and some remarkably good Rhubarb Cloudy Cider from Rosie's. We also ordered and split an order of mushrooms on toast, which turned into one of the best meals we had on our trip! Vegan food is plentiful at most puts. We only went to an all-vegan restaurant once in two weeks.
Now the official pub crawl resumed. I use London By Pub: Pub Walks Around Historic London by Ted Bruning. Last time we did a walk in the Strand with Caroline. This time we were just two and we chose the chapter called "Belgravia: Masters and Servants." We had been to a few of the pubs many years ago, but the revisits were welcome. Many of them used to be divided into smaller rooms. Grooms and servants would use one part of the pub while the upper class (men) would use the fancier part. Today most pubs dispense with such class divisions, but still retain their historical integrity. In addition to the two pubs visited earlier today we managed to visit four more. Not bad for a day's work.
The pub is infamous for being the safe haven of a woman, Lady Lucan, whose husband had just murdered the nanny to death and was trying to kill her. He escaped and was never seen again. This occurred Nov. 7th 1974. We kept our eyes and ears open. We had two brews from Greene King, their standby IPA, usually quite bland unless, like today, perfectly kept and fresh, and London Glory, which was even better.
Exterior of The Antelope, on a rainy Saturday. The area surrounding the pub also has a dark history, in the age of ruthless brigands who preyed on travellers as they attempted to cross nearby "Bloody Bridge."
Kevin no longer seems to run the place. The Asian bartender barely spoke English and did not know what cask ale was. Sigh. The interior remains majorly quirky. We had Adnams Southwold Bitter, a very fine ale in reasonable condition. If you know anything about Fritz Leiber's Lankhmar, this is where Faffrd and the Gray Mouser would most likely be found if in London. The pub is straight out of their home city (Lankhmar).
We walked to Victoria Station, taking a train directly home. We were back in the room by 8 pm, with supper from a Japanese place at the nearby Boxpark in a take away container.
Sunday was to be a local day, visiting our favourite pubs and cafe in Croydon. There was still a fair amount of walking, and no less than four pubs. But we mixed in some outdoor culture. Croydon is this year's London Borough of Culture, and they are having events all year. For four days this weekend they were featuring something called Unexpected Croydon, with seven colourful inflatable sculptures spread around the town center. By Monday we had found all of them, most of them high atop buildings. Near our hotel was a giant fly high on a building wall. In the mall across the street was a large paint can and brush. Here are photos of some of them, including one atop our favourite London pub!
A favourite local pub for us, it's about a 15 minute walk from the hotel. Sunday from 1 -3 was
a jazz trio, so we got a free concert with our ales. We had a perfect glass of St. Austell Tribute and a glass of Southwark Brewery's Routemaster Red.
On our way to our next pub we stopped at Urban Coffee, a really fine cafe and enjoyed our afternoon fix. There were expensive coffee table books about coffee and growing areas which we browsed as we sipped.
Next came The George, a Wetherspoon pub and the closest one to our hotel (about 5 minutes walk). With about 15 handpulls there is always something interesting to try. They also offer a ton of vegan food options. We always visit here, usually several times on a journey. Today they had an Oakham Brewery (we visited there a few trips ago, in Peterborough) Omarta. I wasn't too crazy about this ale, though I usually adore Oakham offerings.
Next it was finally onward to the Green Dragon! I could spend a whole week here. They have 8 hand pulls, all from small breweries, about a dozen drafts and usually 4 or more ciders. It's big and roomy inside, though they do show 'the football' on a big screen above the bar. We had the blueberry porter, shown above, as well as a pear cider from Pulp.
Lastly came Arts and Craft taphouse, with offerings similar to the Green Dragon, just a few yards away. No food, though they do have several Banksy works on their walls. Even better, there is one in situ just across the road!
The journey continues in Part 4. Check back soon.
Mapman Mike
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