A relaxed crawl of a few London pubs was arranged for a Saturday afternoon. Avril, Richard and I met up in the rather traditional, with leaded glass windows, and pleasingly open-on-a-Saturday Bloomsbury. Not that large a pub so we perched ourselves near the front for some well-kept Shepherd Neame offerings.

Toddling down to Endell Street, we paid an extended visit to the Craft Beer Company (Covent Garden) which is a new establishment and one that I had heard good things about. As expected the selection was more than enough to keep any bearded hipster happy and whilst there were plenty of expensive keg ales on offer, and some cheaper ones, they also had some quite reasonable cask ones too and it is here that I made my selections. The building is on a corner and quite small on ground level, with bright, light wooden fixtures and fittings, so we had a nice stool in the window observing passers-by. It was not until I paid a belated visit to the toilets that I realised that there was a much larger drinking area downstairs. No windows though so no passers-by to gawp at. Another highlight is that during our stay I learnt that QPR had won 4-1 at West Brom.

We have been to Frevd before too and fancying a cocktail or two at quite a reasonable price, we went back in. The Skunk Anansie lookalike made us a selection of tasty ones, including Negroni, Martini and whatever the closest approximation to an Old Fashioned is. Not plush at all, being in a basement, and with quite horrible toilets, it is still strangely pleasant and if you can get a cocktail of 7 or 8 quid, you'll probably understand why.

Needing the toilet quite urgently we ducked into the Belgo Centraal Bar thinking that it would be easy to find, but in such a subterranean warren, it was actually more difficult than expected, though fortunately still found just in time. We decided to sit upstairs though, as this was not to be a long stay, and we did not want to get lost. Helpfully there is a small bar upstairs that allowed us to do exactly that, with natural light coming in too.

Back to something more traditional next, and the Sussex quite nearby. This is a bustling Taylor Walker pub, but not a shithole, and they have quite good beers on tap on most occasions. As is to be expected, there was very little seating available and so we had to make do with a ledge around a pillar. This brought about a pleasant surprise as we engaged in conversation with a nice Swedish father and son combination rather than the expected dribbling pond life that might otherwise try to strike up conversation in places like this.

The evening again ended well in a safe pub, the Nell Gwyn, allowing access to the juke box, some decent beer and a precarious staircase to the toilets in what must be one of the smallest pubs that I have seen in central London, but also one of the best. And strategically placed for the Bakerloo back to Marylebone too.