retiredmartin

July 2024. Northwood Hills. Hillingdon.

Continuing the theme of unloved towns, I bring you Hillingdon, after a lengthy journey to King’s Cross due to shenanigans at Foxton (first time for everything) and a rather quicker tube trip into the Metroland of the real ale desert that is North West London.

Well, possibly Hillingdon Borough (as per the football team),

and I’m not sure there is an actual town of that name, and if there is I certainly don’t want to go there.

Darren Hayman, musical and cultural legend of Hefner fame, will be heading there soon there to paint this,

I’m going to paint every London Tube Station…. maybe. Only one of each. Let me know if you want one. #001 Blackhorse Road #DarrenHaymanUnderground pic.twitter.com/nvticGiy7G

— Darren Hayman (@darrenhayman) July 11, 2024

and goodness knows Northwood Hills needs a lick of blue these days*.

Not far from Pinner of Reg Dwight fame, but generally not close to anything you’d recognise.

A typical 1930s row of cafes and carpet shops and an Asian panini store whose Chicken Tikka on brown is a solid 5/10. Which isn’t great.

My pub, the Woodman, is a mystery. Bing Maps directs me here;

that one might even confound BRAPA, though I believe he has a Grade 3 swimming certificate from Saffron Walden Primary School.

Joel Street, a 15 minute slog south from the tube, is green but hardly pastoral. But then you reach Eastcote Cricket Ground, where the snickometer isn’t working by the sound of it.

And across the road, something approaching the archetypal village pub.

Oooh, great sign.

There’s a private function in one room, a garden full of youngsters, leaving just a couple of Old Boys and me under the beams.

Don’t expect cutting-edge in Hillingdon.

You’d expect Landlord (£5.40) to be the beer of choice, but the only other two cask men are on the Rebellion.

I can’t claim the Tim Taylor was great, just a solid NBSS 3 but in the heat that’s probably good enough.

The soundtrack is completely inappropriate to the setting,

but that’s OK as the conversation was firmly in the “nice weather”/”cricket update” territory, and after a tentative start I was at least allowed to join in the Test Match debate.

But to be honest, I’m clutching at straws now.

*Old jokes are the best