London Underround Birthday Pub Crawl

No one joined me for the crawl (see earlier post, here, for the details and the actual rules of the Underround challenge), in spite of their promises to the contrary.  This was probably for the best since I was ready to quit after the first 20 miles and had there been anyone along with me that also wanted to bag it we would have probably stopped even earlier.

As it was, this was a fun if lonely project, the weather was fantastic, the beer was good, and I will not be doing it again.  The totals were:

29.0 miles (by GPS, originally planned 24.7 but had to double back a few times to missed stations and inadvertantly detoured a few times)

The time was 6h 23 m 45 s including the 5 pub stops on the trail.  If you take out the time spent in these (I took photo/time points at entrance and exit) then the net run was 5h 38 m 45s.

There were some nice features to this adventure. A couple of Aussies that have been occasional readers of the blog were waiting at the Zetland Arms and wished me luck, bought the beer and proceededto savage the poor quality of my prose. The 400th pub (and on to the 403rd) was added to my list of pub visits (I’m behind on the updates, the most recent posted was the 395th).  And, I spotted a few interesting sights along the way, as well, and they are peppered into the slides below:

11:00 Start at King's Cross

11:08 Euston

11:12 Euston Square

11:16 Warren Street (closed, builder shot this one)

11:20 Great Portland Street

11:30 Regents Park, after doubling back from Baker Street

11:39 Baker Street

11:44 Marylebone

11:46 V&A did not open, used Sportsbar next door instead

11:58 Edgeware Road station closed

11:58 My big head notwithstanding, this is the Joe Strummer Subway

12:05 WWI memorial in Paddington Station (found while trying to find Tube lines that are open)

12:09 Paddington

12:20 Bayswater and superheros

12:26 Notting Hill Gate

12:31 Queensway, gated but open around the corner

12:33 Queensway platform

12:34 fucking Queensway staircase

12:44 end of line for the Whiskey Row Marathon shirt at the Swan

12:48 Lancaster Gate

12:58 Marble Arch

13:06 Bond Street

13:12 Oxford Circus

13:21 Tottenham Court Road

13:29 Holborn

13:35 Belushi's (no relation to the bar in Tucson)

13:39 Covent Garden

13:43 The Sussex

13:58 Leicester Square on the platform yellow line

13:58 Leicester Square

14:05 Piccadilly Circus

14:13 Green Park

14:21 Hyde Park Corner

14:32 Knightsbridge

14:47 Gloucester Road

14:51 Zetland Arms

15:02 South Kensington, scarecrow on platform

15:03 South Kensington, me on platform

15:12 driver in black cab playing some blues

15:13 Sloane Square

15:26 Victoria shirt change

15:35 St James Park, hurtin'

15:41 Westminster

15:43 Bodicea on the bus

15:48 Embankment

15:54 Temple

16:13 St Pauls

16:17 Ye Olde Watling wasn't yet open, did the Railway Tavern a few stops later

16:21 Mansion House

16:24 Cannon Street renovation closure

16:27 Bank

16:41 exit of Railway Tavern

16:42 Liverpool Street gated

16:47 Moorgate

16:55 Barbican

17:05 Farringdon

17:15 Russell Square, one more leg

17:23:45 King's Cross then over to the Betjeman Arms for a beer

If you are going to do this yourself at some point, here are the things I learned the hard way:

1) Pick a route and stick to it.  If you are using a map, make sure the side streets are all labeled in case you have to make an emergency change of plan.

2) Don’t go on the first sunny, warm Sunday of the year.

3) Don’t go on a Bank Holiday weekend.

4) Avoid the tourist clusterfucks like Oxford Street and Long Acre/Great Queens Street.  A few extra steps to avoid these will save you a lot of extra steps zigzagging, dodging cattle, and crashing into penshioners, children, and the generally brain dead that have been released en masse and without supervision onto these roads and pavements.  A taser wouldn’t be a bad idea, but you’ll draw less attention by just going around.

5) Plan around station closings.  Many of these stations are closed for the near term (I knew about Blackfriar’s and used St Pauls as an alternate).  Others are closed on late nights and weekends for some work but generally are open during the main part of the work week.  Others, like Liverpool Street, have some entrances closed on the weekends and it is not worth it to run around looking for an alternative entrance (if you are like me and start to not give a shit about completion once exhasuted).

6) When a station has several tube lines to choose from, go to the platform that is nearest the surface.  Circle Line is usually a good bet, but the City Line is usually pretty far underground.  Those long, spiral staircases are murder after awhile.