Wow I am so far behind with these county stats. However London is certainly one of my favourite regions and cities in the UK. However I am one of those people who love London, but only on my terms, i.e. typically a short visit, day or weekend and then leave. I simply cannot imagine living in such a huge city, but visiting, on the other hand, is fantastic. In terms of beer, we used to visit regularly well before the craft revolution kicked off, at those times we were probably spending more time in many of the fantastic historic pubs that the capital has to offer, so the establishments run by Fullers, Sam Smiths and Youngs would have been regular haunts back then.
It always amazed me how slow London was to jump onboard the Craft beer juggernaut, the likes of Sheffield were streets ahead of London who were really, really late to the party, however when they joined wow! such an explosion in breweries, it was absolutely staggering. Along with many of the other veteran RBāers here, it was great when Kernel started up, but for a while that was it and I donāt recall what order the rest come in but I think maybe Partizan and Four Pure followed and then the rest and all of a sudden Bermondsey exploded and suddenly the Beer Mile was a must tick beer thingā¦ But whilst that area was becoming a destination, all of a sudden things started happening in Hackney, it really was incredible with places cropping up around there. Also I recall going to the original Beavertown venue when they had that smokehouse place and then but again in what seemed no time they had the huge place in Tottenham. London just went ballistic, I loved meeting all of the RB guys, I loved and still love the Craft Brew Coā beer places, visiting the many taprooms and seeing an emergence of great bottle shops.
We used to take the camper down to London and either stop at Queens Park (near Chris and Ruth) wild camp on the street or Pickettās Lock campsite, Edmonton, north of Tottenham, it was all very dependent on where we were visiting on a given weekend because we used to combine our trips to London with lengthy walks. Btw there is a great series of books (three volumes) called Londonās secret walks, weād pick an area, then a walk, start off with breakfast somewhere close by and walk for maybe 8-10km the books are so informative about the area. I loved the markets, I love the fact that London has so much green space and really even now seems just like a motley collection of towns and villages it really has so much character and for a big city (I may be biased of course) in terms of its diversity and when I mention diversity I mean in people, places, the whole package, it is unbeatable. Other things we liked, inclā record shops (big shout out to Rough Trade East which was our favourite), going to gigs, museums and we loved walking and visiting the many places along the river. The Thames Tipple which I have mentioned many times before concluded in London, near the Thames Barrier, we visited so many great places on that multi year, many trips jaunt.
London totals
I sit in 27th place with 785 beers, a decent total but I suspect I will have slipped over the last 2-3 years and will continue to do so.
Top Beers
I am quite pleased that my top ten beers is actually quite diverse with 6 different breweries represented. I really miss Brodies and The Kernel is still world-class, Weird Beard quietly continues doing their thing, yes there are some great beers there.
London Places
I think that I have rated 73 places in London, however I look at my top ten and I think that there are a few that I would re-rate and change now, having said that there are some great places. Craft Beer Co Clerkenwel is a favourite, I probably havenāt been there for 3 years or more but I used to visit regularly, I was sad to see the Clapham venue close.
London Breweries
I have rated 72 breweries with The Kernel registering almost twice as many totals as my second place brewery (Fullers).
Ok that is London, a great city. I hope to get back here later in the year!
