68.
Quick Pub Crawl of Wimbledon, Saturday 14th August 2004
Richard Bradshaw and I had evidently not
punished ourselves enough the previous day on our gruelling trek around the
City of London, so we decided to have a couple of scoops with
Adam Sharr in Wimbledon. Rich had been drinking on the way back from Southampton's visit to Villa; I had had a quick scoop at
Spelthorne Sports FC somewhere near Staines/Sunbury. Quite a reasonable thirst
quenching Fosters as I recall.
I met up with Adam at the 93 bus terminus
at Priory
Road, and
an uneventful trip to Wimbledon ensued, whence we selected the Alexandra within
which to commence drinking. In actual fact we weren't inside, but outside, on
their really quite good roof terrace, overlooking the main road. It's a very
nice pub, and the beer's kept well, even though it is all Young's products. On
the occasion of our visit, they were serving Summer Zest, Waggledance, Bitter
and Special. Richard had been delayed, so Adam and I elected to meet up with
him next door in the Hogshead, a typical and fortunately quiet fortress of this
brand. The range was reasonable: Deuchars IPA, Abbot, 6X and Boddingtons, but
the excellent quality of the Deuchars more than made up for this. Good set of
bar snacks too, the local South African crowd must have had some influence.
Up in Wimbledon village, we went first into the wanky Players'
Lounge, which used to be the wanky Pitcher and Piano. It was really quite
expensive and packed, though the Coors was nice. I however fancied a sit down,
so we bolted that half, and made haste to the Dog and Fox, part of a sprawling
complex of Young’s outlets. Three varieties of Young’s (most
probably Bitter, Special and Summer Zest) were on in this large, old-fashioned
boozer; a classic South
London design actually.
We didn't actually sit down and instead had a play on the quiz machine.
Final stop - for me at least - was the
once again excellent Brewery Tap. The bar snacks menu has improved even more
since our last visit, and I think that octopus is an option. Once again, just
about everything was right about this place. They again had an excellent array
of good beer: London Pride, Tetley Mild, Adnams Bitter, Deuchars IPA and the
strange High House Farm Matfen something-or-other. The only complaint is that
it's slightly expensive. However, it remains streets ahead of anything in
Wimbledon, and there is room to drink outside should you wish to. Adam and
Richard for some reason went on to Putney for continued drinking, but I did not
want to tempt fate too much after the previous evenings' exertions and wisely
went home to sleep.
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Dan
Lovegrove
dan@doctor-lovegrove.com
Last updated 2nd September 2004.