retiredmartin

14th December 2022.

From Bow we headed west, and an increasing rare new Guide entry in London tourist central.

Marylebone’s tick means leaving the underground at Baker Street,

and taking the foot tunnel under Marylebone Road,

a passage promoting all the traditional tourist joys on NW1.

Baker Street is where football fans traditionally stop for a pint before heading off to Wembley (a beer desert) for cup finals, the rowdy action is centred on the Globe.

I’d always wanted to see what the Globe was like on a less busy day.

Oh no, World Cup themed beers competing with Rocking Rudolph.

The Globe was packed as 5pm approached, and I’d joined a long queue (at the bar, thankfully) of women with increasingly complex orders.

I took a passing look at the GBG app,

and realised, with horror, I was in the wrong Marylebone Globe !

And that, folks, is why postcodes are as important as opening times when you’re doing your pub planning. For example, there are at least seven micropubs called “The Crafty Cask” in Blackpool these days, and it’s easy to do the wrong one and end up bumping into a tipsy Blackpool Jane in one.

I retrieved Mrs RM by shouting “Wrong pub !” across the room, and we headed north. “Only 10 minutes” I assured her, but she knew I was lying.

Those 15 minutes take in the town hall and the Landmark Hotel beloved of well-heeled tourists.

The Globe on Lisson Grove, opposite famed fish and chip shop the Seashell, is a small place packed with young locals.

Loads of keg, and the one cask beer from Gravesend’s finest Iron Pier (NBSS 3) seems sufficient for lads on Guinness shouting “Do you know who I am ?” (at each other, not the top notch landlord). A proper slice of London pub at Christmas.

It’s so packed, you have to leave the pub by one door and enter again by another to reach the loos.

Which Mrs RM somehow manages, before we decide to brave the London Christmas hordes to see the lights.