Blog2022 ≫ The magnificent seven

The day out in London that has been about six months in the planning finally happened, and it was awesome. I will not say it all went according to plan but it went as well as I could have dreamed.

It started early with a late change of plan. Regular readers may remember my plan to parkrun, well that was all out of the window. I got up just before five, parked in Earls Avenue and walked to the bus station. In fact I dictated this bit to myself at some point, so let's get that content back:

Got my coach up to London then! Woke up early before the alarm. I didn't make a coffee so as not to make too much noise and I left in plenty of time parked the car where we usually do for shopping in Folkestone. So it should be ok when I get back. About ten minute walk to the bus station and I was fifteen minutes early for the coach. Quite a few other people waiting, some on day trips, seems like a lot of people coming up for football at that time. Coach was fine, clean and seemed comfortable but I couldn't get my head in the right position to sleep. So I sort of dozed and went through Lewisham without stopping because I change the plan not to do the parkrun today. I did notice as we were traveling through that I probably could have got off a bit later and done Southwark Parkrun and that might have worked out better because I've done public transport from there before.

I'm walking through St James Park now and it's quiet. It's very hot already. It's just gone 9:00 and I'm sweating. This is the time I should be running1 but it would have been very hot. I've cut through the park, past Buckingham Palace. I decided to walk to Covent Garden because I'm here way too early to meet my friends. I came this way thinking I might see squirrels for one thing, but no squirrels yet. Just some geese and some swans. I'm walking to Covent Garden to buy the boys. Some particular sweets. I forgot to get them last time we were here, when I had to come back to Covent Garden to collect the bags2, so hopefully that'll be a nice surprise. And I'm going to use my self addressed envelope, to post sweets back to them so I don't have to carry them around today. So that means I lose one more thing from my bag, and I'm no longer going equipped for envelope-based burglary. And yeah we'll figure the rest out after that. I've still got a bag. Still got some things to carry but some of that can go in my pockets, and some of it's going to be distributed on my friends. Still haven't had that coffee. Really want coffee now.

Right that ends the dictated bit, and back to writing it up after the event.

I think I would get the coach again, even though it's an early start and it took nearly three hours. There was a toilet on the coach, I sat near it, but no-one used it all journey.

I got coffee in Covent Garden but did not get those sweets. They were particular ones they had bought a few trips ago, and then I failed to get them on the last trip. This time I think I was just in Covent Garden too early and the sweet stall wasn't set up yet. Next time then.

At this stage HILARIOUS messages started to appear on our friends group on Signal. "Today I'm doing this" and "no no special plans for me today" all pretending they had got the wrong date for our big adventure. Eventually one of them had to break silence and say "where are we meeting then?". This was Jules, flown in from Copenhagen just for the day. I headed to Waterloo, earlier than planned, but then it turned out four more - Andy, Dave, Chris, and Ro - had arrived already. We headed up to where the Sports Bar in Waterloo was, for pictures. The bar is gone but it is a place we had to visit as Ro used to talk about it a lot. We're still waiting for one more, so the proper plans can't start yet.

Dave suggested a bar in an area of Waterloo I'd never been, so we arranged to meet the final member of the day Rich there. This area is cool, https://www.leakestreetarches.london somehow I had missed this. That doesn't look like a domain that is destined to last forever so I'll quote them a bit

Eight former railway arches have been brought back to life to provide a community of independent restaurants, bars and entertainment spaces that are united by their approach to celebrate the creativity of urban culture.

Adjoining London's longest legal graffiti wall on Leake Street (which has made its name as a democratic cultural venue for street art) Leake Street Arches is an exciting street-culture led destination.

The bar there, Draughts3 turned out to be a boardgaming place that also had a bar, rather than the pub we were hoping for, but all good. Not part of my original plan but being with friends was most important. Rich arrived, I shared the plan for dice based random travelling fun and the bingo cards and they shared more gifts for me, including a t-shirt they'd had made with my face on it and a copy of Highlander on VHS. The copy of Highlander on VHS surely? There can be only one! This is a long running joke among the group, who was it who stole my copy of Highlander on VHS..?

I knew you had my copy of Highlander!

The morning ran away with us and the plan to roll a dice to see where to go next went out the window. We stayed there for two rounds and then to Puttshack for mini golf. That went well I think. Then to Home Slice for pizza. I knew this time not to try one each, so we had three pizzas between seven and it was about right. Disappointing beer choice there and crap wine.

After here we went maybe to Coal Drops Yard? I found my hotel, a Hub by Premier Inn and checked in so I'd have a key and dropped my small bag, now with a spare t-shirt in as I was wearing the new one. From Coal Drops Yard probably to Camden, a lovely walk up the canal. I wanted to take them in the Mixer as I feel it is part of my heritage but the beer is not good, so we went to The Hawley Arms, much cooler, though I don't remember going "back in my day". Had one awful ale, it was off, but that got fixed, we got replacement beers and then the landlord gave me a free half of the new barrel of the original. I think everyone liked this place, for me it was so nice to just sit and chat. It's the kind of place we walk by a lot as we're up with the kids usually, and then sometimes I would come here for my "after they've gone to bed" pint on my own, but so much nicer to be there, in the day, with friends.

From there probably up to Chalk Farm and Primrose Hill, and The Queens, a regular haunt from my Channelfly days. Lots more chatting, and watching people go by.

From there probably back into the market to get food? And then I could not convince them to go to the goth bar, there could not risk missing trains back. So we went back to Waterloo. We nearly didn't, as we'd got on the wrong branch of the Northern Line somehow. Got to feel sorry for the guys who asked if they were on the right train and we said no, get off here, you need to change. Hope they made it home OK. Anyway, then in to The Hole In The Wall, somewhere I've always seen and never visited. Bit rough and ready but then so am I. Five left for different timed trains, leaving just Jules and me, then we went to Leicester Square so he could stay up all night playing poker and then on an early flight home. I went back to the hotel.

This hub hotel was good, it's very small by design. My room was very neat, though with a fake window to stop you getting freaked out by how tightly packed in the rooms are.

Next morning I got a train back, it was busy, but running normally. I did have that return coach ticket, well sort of. Turns out I'd booked the return for Monday. I was going to try and get a train back anyway, honest, because it would be a lot quicker. So all well.

I realised I did almost none of my original "planned" things, I thought we might get the boat to Greenwich and we'd definitely go in The Harp, Brewdog, Good Mixer, and Devonshire Arms. None of them! The day developed a life of its own.

Not done much the rest of Sunday. Clare worked, we just watched the football, good work the Lionesses defeating Germany.

Now to put the boys to bed and then write up my actual birthday trip from a couple of days previously.

It has been pointed out, I have been very very lucky to have triple birthday celebrations.

The magnificent seven

Estimated 444 cups of coffee from my espresso machine4 probably comes to £2.23 a cup (including actual coffee and now servicing4 but not the electricity).

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Paul Clarke's blog - I live in Hythe in the deep South. Wed and father to 2, I'm a full-stack web engineer, + I do mostly javascript / nodejs, some ruby, python, php ect ect. I like pubbing, parkrun, eating, home automation and other diy stuff, history, genealogy, TV, squirrels, pirates, lego, + TIME TRAVEL.