2. Haydons Road, Friday 28 December 2001

A fantastic crawl undertaken with Mr. R. Bradshaw. We embarked on this odyssey on the 7.40pm train from West Sutton station, arriving at Haydon’s Road slightly before 8. The nearest establishment to the station where alcohol was to be found was ‘Bar China’, a Chinese bar type place where fizzy carling was available, though I imagine most punters come here for the solids. Storming along Haydon’s Road passing a sadly closed ‘Haydons’, we encountered a large South London-type boozer in the form of the Horse and Groom with not particularly interesting ales. A few steps up the road we went into the Marquis of Lorne, a bit of a hole of a place and with a few gay punters festooned around.

The Sultan, down some back streets, affords the opportunity to drink some decent real ales from the Hopback brewery although lets itself down by not broadening to other suppliers. Slightly trendy looking inside too. More alleyway navigation led us to the Freedom and Firkin in Tooting, complete with Citizen Smith paraphernalia. Apparently we went to GJ’s next, couldn’t have been memorable, probably trendy with shite beer.

The Royal Standard and Victory, average boozers, followed as we marched westwards along Merton High Street. At the ‘Kiss Me Hardy’, a family pub that adjoins the Savacentre, Richard felt that Dubonnet should be drunk instead of the customary half pint of beer. We pressed on and over the road to the deserted Royal Six Bells, though the jukebox did have some interesting music [Theme from S’Express possibly]. The eleventh pub of the evening beckonned, and we were keen to maintain our pace of 5 pubs per hour, or one every 12 minutes if you prefer. The rapid completion of the pub evaluation forms actually contributed to our rapid pace - we were spurred to complete them quickly and this was echoed by our drinking speed!

The eleventh pub was the King’s Head, again nothing to write home about. Nor was the Nelson just across the road. A brace of interesting alehouses were soon at hand. The Princess Royal is quite a small boozer with an interesting bar and interesting toilets. It seems to be frequented by old men, but its talkative landlord and clientele seem quite welcoming. The Trafalgar is a thin pub around the corner with spartan décor and a handful of real ales though wasn’t very lively.

With last orders on the agenda, we hot footed it to the Kilkenny Tavern next door to South Wimbledon tube station and had a couple of pints of ale/Guinness. Fortunately they had a bit of a lock in allowing us this pleasure which seems customary when there is some live music.

Fifteen pubs, three hours, not bad!

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Dan Lovegrove
dan@doctor-lovegrove.com

Last updated 26th July 2002.