11th December and London SE1.

Started off early last Tuesday, 11th, walking along the Thames Path from Putney to Tower Bridge and a new pub for us both, Simon the Tanner, which is situated near the Tower Bridge end of Long Lane, and pleased we were to have made it at last, just after opening, so it was empty... 

 

This is another great find for me, yet another lovely pub near my Victorian paternal forebears' south east London homes, the interior is nice and simple, bare floorboards, and wooden tables to seat fifty or so.  Of course, the real cider and 3 real ales served from handpumps was my main quest and delight. 

 

The cider was Crazy Goat Lilley's Cider (6.8%), actually a cider and perry blend, and the 3 ales were O'Hanlon's Port Stout (4.8%), Saltaire Bavarian Black (4.9%), and Titanic White Star, which we both drank.  I have to own up, I love Titanic ales, and the 4.8% White Star is no exception, a full-bodied pale ale, a peachy aroma, but more of a dry bitter grapefruit flavour, and beer flavour, of course, loved it! 

 

We then ventured back to Borough Market, and decided to go to The Rake this time, which was serving up Summer Wine Brewery (SWB) Mokko Milk Stout (6%), Coniston No 9, an 8.5% barley wine, and Roosters YPA (Yorkshire Pale Ale), a 4.1% pale and hoppy, yet smooth drinking ale. I also had a bit of a debate about pubs in West Yorkshire with a fellow customer, which I won, of course, though I did later check on one of my assertions with the Teameister up int' Haworth, who confirmed my belief.

 

We then walked back westwards and, coincidentally, a BBC film crew we had seen in the Bricklayers on the Monday were this day filming on the south bank opposite the Houses of Parliament.  I guessed they must have been covering the following days mass lobby of Parliament in connection with the extortionate beer tax, which seemed a reasonable reason to be interviewing someone in the Bricklayers, and the exact same half a dozen people filming opposite the home to democracy in the UK... but no! I later found out that the person doing all the talking is an Oxford professor, and they were filming a programme to come out on BBC about Oliver Cromwell, oh well... 

Cheers!