Operation Motorcycle Silencer (Phases 1 & 2)

In which The Author rewrites his July plans

For the second year in a row, I decided a couple of months ago to put Operation Motorcycle Silencer into action.

Living where I do is a bit of a two-edged sword. The good part is that you're a few minutes' walk from one of the loveliest Victorian municipal parks in South Wales. On the other hand, at the end of July everyone in Trecynon, Glandare, most of the Gadlys and – probably – a fair chunk of Cwmdare and Llwydcoed, is subjected to the noise of the Aberdare Park Road Races. These take place on the circuit around the park, and attract professional riders, bikers and motor sport fans from across the world. (I once met a very pleasant couple from Finland in the Carpenters one Saturday night many years ago.)

It's a great boost to the local economy, of course. When Dad was a councillor he was an advocate of reinstating the races. When the bikes finally returned in 1978, it was just for the Saturday. Now, however, it's a weekend event. After moving to Trecynon last year, Rhian and Steff realised that they'd be right on top of the uproar for two whole days – as, of course, am I.

As an alternative, I suggested spending the Saturday in London. We'd leave long before the first of the bikes arrived, and get home hours after the event had finished for the day. They don't start as early on the Sunday (the local chapels objected), so we'd have a break from the usual routine and get away from the noise as well.

Last year's trip wasn't especially successful, because I think it might have been Steff's first time in London. (Actually, I think it might have been her first time outside the Cynon Valley.) Rhian and I had a great time, as always, as I decided to show her some of the parts we'd yet to explore together.

I've been wandering around the City of London during my recent trips, discovering strange buildings and obscure aspects of history that aren't on the tourist maps. We decided to take advantage of the day to explore in more detail, taking in most of the key buildings (with no intention of going into any of them) so Rhian could see how the whole place hangs together. We'd already done the whistle-stop tour of Westminster the first time we were there. She wants to see the Changing of the Guard, though. As that takes place after the first available coach from Cardiff arrives in town, we've pencilled that in for an overnight stay.

After our first visit I suggested that we tackle the place in stages, just so that I can show her where everything is and how easy it is to get from one part to another. The Bike Races weekend was the perfect excuse.

Needless to say, Steff invited herself as soon as she found out about the trip. I presume she was afraid Rhian would meet an amazing girl halfway down Regent Street, fall immediately in love, and kick Steff firmly into touch. (I wouldn't have blamed her if she had, quite frankly.)

I equipped the girls with Oyster cards (after explaining the advantages to Steff about ten times), an Eyewitness pocket guide – courtesy of The Works in Aberdare – and a small A-Z, hopelessly out of date but covering the centre in enough detail to be useful. I roughed out an itinerary on paper, all of which could be covered on foot and by bus, and we agreed to return to the West End before heading back to Victoria Coach Station.

Earlier this week, the Facebook Memories thing popped up my status from 2016:

London on Saturday to avoid a whole day of bike races. Taking two friends, one of whom is really excited about it, and the other of whom is determined to hate the whole thing before we even leave Aberdare. Wondering if I can convince Person B to install a Pokémon thing on her phone and then send her on a wild goose chase – possibly for ever.

Person B was Steff, of course, and nothing we could show her stood a chance of competing with what was happening on her phone.

We caught the Tube straight to Tower Hill, from where we were heading back through the City towards the West End. Steff didn't like the Tube. It's too far underground, apparently. Rhian was freaked out by it the first time we went there together. Once she'd studied the map and realised how it all works, she was quite happy to follow our route. I even suggested that she could navigate for us. (Easy journeys to begin with ‒ just the one line, with no interchanges. Baby steps.)

We emerged above ground and Steff pronounced herself well and truly underwhelmed. I explained that when it was completed, at the end of the eleventh century, the Tower of London would have been the tallest building in Britain. In Steff's eyes it was too small. And that set the tone for the rest of the day, pretty much.

I don't know quite what she was expecting, but Tower Bridge was 'boring'; the sight of the Shard failed to ignite her imagination; the skyline from the middle of Tower Bridge – the magnificent Wren churches defiantly poking their Baroque towers and spires between the plate glass skyscrapers – was lost on her. I lost count of how many times I had to explain why the City of London was so quiet at weekends, and why the one pub I'd have liked to have taken them to – Ye Olde Mitre Tavern (see Life in the Slow Lane) – wasn't open at all.

In fact, the City of London was even quieter than usual. In a masterpiece of bad planning (on the basis of which I'm retained as a freelance consultant to the Welsh Government), we'd managed to go on the day of the Prudential Ride London cycling event. Okay, so they aren't motorised, but there are still bloody bikes everywhere. When I logged into Facebook at lunchtime, I was amused to find that Cerith and Alyson (both keen cyclists) were also in town. A little bit of forethought would have put us in the same place at the same time, so we could have had a pint together.

With major road closures throughout the West End and the City, our plan to see the sights from the top of a bus (why pay £25 when you've got an Oyster card and the TfL bus map?) went out of the window. I was in Unofficial Tourist Guide mode, pointing out interesting buildings and filling in bits of history – which Rhian always enjoys. If Steff could have used her phone to play games throughout, I think she would have.

We headed along boring Watling Street, down to the boring Monument (Steff didn't want to climb it, naturally; Rhian and I did, and that’s a story in itself), past the boring Bank of England and the boring Mansion House, making for the most boring sight in the entire City of London. Unsurprisingly, Steff wasn't at all impressed by 'the big church' (St Paul's Cathedral), and instead found herself irresistibly drawn to the tacky souvenir shop nearby.

These are an interesting phenomenon in themselves. They've been there for ever, of course – I remember them being dotted all along Oxford Street and Regent Street when I was a student. They're full of model Routemaster buses and red K6 phone boxes, keyrings with tiny Big Bens attached to them, Union flag mugs, T-shirts and biscuit tins, jigsaws of Buckingham Palace and the Palace of Westminster, notebooks with the Tube map printed on the cover, postcards of the obvious sights, and all manner of assorted crap (pencil sharpeners, stickers, mobile phone cases …) to prove you've been to the greatest city in the world.

Nowadays it's almost impossible to turn around in one of these places without bumping into Chinese tourists stocking up on the 'authentic London experience'. It must be quite disheartening for them to take a bag full of crap back to their home city, only to discover that it was all made by their cousins working in a factory down the road.

But Steff had promised to take something back for the kids.

She'd already spent half an hour browsing through overpriced tat (and much more besides) at the 'official' Tower of London tourist information centre trap. But this was the 'official' St Paul's Cathedral tourist information centre trap. Same shit, different location. Literally the same shit. Meanwhile, Rhian and I repaired to the nearest pub: Ye Olde London, on Ludgate Hill, with a fine view of the west front of St Paul's from the entrance. We had a very nice lunch, a pint, and a light-hearted chat with the Spanish barmaid before Little Miss Happy rejoined us and put the mockers on the occasion. We walked around the corner to the boring Central Criminal Court, then on to boring Holborn Viaduct.

We were heading towards Holborn Circus when the rain started. As if the day could have got any worse.
The cycling event meant that a bus into the West End was out of the question. We only wanted to get as far as Piccadilly Circus. I let Rhian work out the route again.

I've already told you that Steff hates the Tube. And escalators? Yeah, those too.

We picked up a couple of books in Waterstones in Piccadilly. Steff wanted to go to Soho – which these days really is boring – because someone had told her that there were gay bars there. (It seems to be fine for her to go to a gay bar and eye up the talent, but if Rhian does the same all hell breaks loose.) Fortunately, we were running short of time. We walked to Leicester Square and down Charing Cross Road to boring Trafalgar Square. The bike race had closed most of the roads around there, too, so we had no choice but to get the Tube back to Victoria. Did I mention that Steff hates the Tube?

All of which brings us to July 2017.

As soon as the dates of the Road Races were announced, I hit the National Express website and found out the fares to London. I got in touch with Rhian (she and Steff were still an item at this point) and asked if they fancied a rematch. They did. I booked the tickets weeks ago; Rhian booked time off work; we were ready to rock and roll.

Over a drink on Tuesday evening, we drew up our plans for the day. Steff shocked us both by expressing an interest in something – namely, 'the Cutting Shark' [sic]. I'd last visited Greenwich in December 2014 (see Going Deeper Underground), when I decided to have an adventure I hadn't had since my student days. I grabbed a bit of paper and started drawing out an itinerary. How does this sound to you?

Victoria Station to Blackfriars, so Rhian could see the Millennium Bridge; Ye Olde London (a five minute walk away) for lunch; walk to Bank station and join the Docklands Light Railway. Go past Canary Wharf and through the Isle of Dogs to Island Gardens. Walk through the tunnel under the Thames. Steff could visit the Cutty Sark, I could call to Waterstones, and together we could check out the Old Naval College. After that (time permitting), we could go across to Woolwich, cross the river on the ferry, take the DLR to Stratford (passing the Olympic Stadium), and head to Waterloo via the Jubilee Line. Cross over to Trafalgar Square and catch the number 11 bus to Victoria Coach Station, taking in Whitehall and Parliament Square en route.

Please note that I did all this without any artificial aids, boys and girls – no A-Z, no Google Maps, and no TfL website. It's nowhere near enough 'Knowledge' to get me a London taxi licence, but it’s good enough for jazz and always impresses the ladies. (It's just a shame that they're usually gay.)

On Thursday I checked out the area beyond Greenwich, to make sure we wouldn't stray into Zone 3 and end up paying extra on our Oyster cards. I topped mine up at the same time, knowing I could activate it as soon as we got to Victoria. (Rhian had suggested topping theirs up on Friday evening, but Steff apparently decided it wasn't worth 'wasting' two minutes online.)

Then the Facebook Memories thing popped up with last year's status. I shared it along with the following comment:

The plan for the weekend is exactly the same. Remember, folks, on the Tube you're never more than a judicious elbow nudge from a live rail.

Now for Today's Topical Tip: When you see a taxi firm advertising a '24 Hour Service', remember to ask them how many hours are in a day.

It was absolutely barrelling down on Friday afternoon, so we decided a taxi for the morning would be a good idea. The girls rang half a dozen numbers to try and book ahead. Not a sausage. One guy even told them that they’d be lucky to find anyone to do a run at 6.00 a.m. Thus it was that we walked through Robertstown to the station on Saturday morning.

We were so early that the train driver was able to chat to us for a while. He was a bit shaken, because coming non-stop through Cwmbach on the first run from Cardiff, he'd nearly hit someone. The guy in question was walking along the railway track, and wearing camouflage gear to boot. It's that sort of idiocy alone that makes you wish they’d hurry up with electrification.

We got to Cardiff without any further incident, and called into Sainsbury's to pick up newspapers and a snack for the journey. We walked up to Park Place, where there was already a large queue at the stop. Our seats were bought and paid for, but we knew that we probably wouldn't be able to sit together. As it turned out, a fair number of people were catching the Megabus, which now leaves from Park Place as well. About half of the others were catching the Birmingham coach. Even so, we ended up in separate seats, but not too far apart.

Note to National Express: It's not sufficient to simply sell tickets – you really need to sell the bookings for individual seats, as train companies do.

The selfishness of one family meant that two young boys had single seats. (The seat next to one of them was occupied by a large rucksack, which should have gone into the luggage compartment anyway.) I ended up next to a sulky teenage girl, who'd seemed quite content to stretch out across two seats until I told her she’d have to shift her legs.

Anyway, we made good time out of Cardiff and got to Newport slightly ahead of schedule. While we were waiting for passengers to board, I heard a familiar demanding whine from behind me:

'Why have we stopped?'

Oh yes, Steff was in her accustomed sunny and life-enhancing mood.

She'd had to wear a jacket because it was raining when we left the house. She'd also put a jumper on, because we were out early and would be getting home late. She'd been too hot walking to Aberdare, then too cold on the train when she took her jacket off.
With the scene set for the rest of the day, I buried myself in my book, Rhian read the paper, and together we more or less ignored her.

Something in the paper had caught my eye while I was flicking through it, so I logged onto the TfL website to confirm it. For the second year in a row we'd managed to get to London during the Prudential Ride London event. It wouldn't bugger up the first part of the plan – the Tube to Blackfriars – but it buggered the last part totally. Never mind.

We disembarked at Victoria Coach Station and walked to the mainline station, about five minutes away. It was at this point that Rhian told me they hadn't topped up their Oyster cards. The queue to use the machines was three deep, and snaked around to halfway up the steps from the concourse. To make matters worse, last time we were there Steff had failed to 'touch out'. Instead of going online (as I'd told her to at the time) and completing the journey, she'd incurred a penalty charge. I was in London with the only person I've ever met who's managed to go overdrawn on a fucking smartcard! Instead of spending two minutes online, she'd managed to cost us nearly twenty minutes in the Real World.

Still, she wasn't the only useless person on the Tube yesterday. A guy with a massive suitcase and a paper ticket (Do they still make those? — Ed.) was making very heavy weather of the barrier to the Circle Line platforms. After he got through on his fourth attempt, I just glanced at the guy in the next queue and said, 'Bloody Muggles.' He nodded and smiled knowingly. Sufficiently advanced technology and all that jazz.

At Blackfriars we met a pleasant young guy, who I think was Italian. He approached us to see if we could change a pound for the station toilets. Steff was already in there, and Rhian and I were wondering if we could give her the slip before she got back through the turnstile.

'First time in London,' he said when he emerged.

I pointed at Steff and said, 'Second time.' We laughed and wished him a pleasant stay before moving on.

We headed into Queen Victoria Street and immediately encountered a stream of cyclists. We found some interesting nooks and crannies, including the College of Arms, on our way to the Millennium Bridge. (I've shown you photos of this in Life in the Slow Lane already. It's boring.) Then we walked back to 'the big church', where – just as last year – there was an exhibition of stunt cycling in St Paul's Churchyard. History was definitely repeating itself.

We found Ye Olde London without any problems, and managed to sit at the same table as we did last year. While the girls were deciding what to eat, I logged into their WiFi, checked into their location, and updated my status:

Waiting for lunch. According to Facebook I'm 'within 20 metres' of the pub. Good thing about London is you're never more than 20 metres from the pub.

I sent a quick Tweet while we were waiting for our lunch to arrive:

Time for lunch in Ye Olde London. Hope fish and chips is as good as last time. Haven't even lost Chief Muggle on the Tube yet. Still time.

I'm pleased to report that the fish and chips was every bit as good as last time. The staff were very friendly and welcoming, and we had a good laugh while we were ordering. I had no qualms whatsoever about commending the place on Facebook earlier today, when a feedback box popped up. I also started a mini-thread on Twitter, which I'll update as and when the chance arises.

London Advantages (pt 1): Sitting in a pub and nobody putting bloody Stereophonics on the jukebox.

London Advantages (pt 2): Taxi firms that claim to offer a '24 Hour Service' realise that there really are 24 hours in an average day.

London Advantages (pt 3): the Docklands Light Railway. That's it – nothing more needs to be said. #properpublictransport

We finished our lunch rather later than we'd planned, so I knew the extended East London plan was looking rather doubtful. We headed for St Paul's again, because I'd spotted an interesting little street sign as we were passing the first time. Fans of 1960s rock music should recognise this name:

I'd seen it on the street map, of course, but I'd never bothered to walk past this unassuming little spot. Slightly further north we found this remarkable building.

This is the headquarters of one of the many craft guilds which form part of the quasi-medieval structure of the City of London's governance. Some of the larger halls are marked on my A-Z, but this one took me by surprise. There's a great carved frieze running the length of the building, too, but without a tripod (I know, I still haven't replaced mine) it's difficult to get a decent shot. Here's a small section of it to go on with.

I think I've accidentally found a new project – photographing all the halls. I think I've managed to persuade Rhian to join me for the Lord Mayor's Show one year, as well.

We walked around to Cheapside, but the road closures were making it rather tricky to get around. Rather than take ages to get to Bank station, we decided to cut our losses and go one stop on the Central Line.

Did I mention that Steff hates the Tube?

As I reached the platform the train doors closed. Rhian was just a few paces behind me, but Little Miss Happy was still about halfway down the escalator. Pretending to be really pissed off with her, we told her we'd have to wait half an hour for the next one. She was really apologetic, and suggested reverting to the original plan instead. Needless to say, the next train was only three minutes behind – and then the fun really started.

I've only ever used Bank station as an interchange once. It was difficult enough to navigate the place then. Yesterday one of the escalators was out of commission, which really fucked things up. We found our way to the concourse without any problem, but then all the signs seemed deliberately placed to send people in circles.

Even I – a veteran explorer of subterranean London – had to concede defeat and ask the guy at the barrier how to get to the DLR platform. Steff was decidedly unimpressed when we had to go down the escalator, back along the platform we'd just left, up another flight of steps, and Goddess knows where else. We eventually got to the DLR platform in time for the Lewisham train, and set off for the next stage of our adventure.

Rhian was completely blown away by Canary Wharf and the whole Docklands development. I'd already told her it looked more like Tokyo or Shanghai than London, and it didn't disappoint her at all. Fortunately for Steff, she was able to play games on her phone for the entire 'boring' journey. When we got off at Island Gardens, I knew she'd complain about being expected to do the foot tunnel as well.

I told her, 'Get back to the station, catch the first train south, and we'll meet you there.'

I knew she'd be too scared to go off unaccompanied, so she reluctantly joined us for our little stroll under the Thames and up the other side. She cheered up when she saw the Cutting Shark, though. By now it had started to rain, so we took refuge in the Old Naval College for a while.

I hadn't been in there for a good look around last time, and it's worth the visit. I was very impressed by the exhibit showing the locations of all the Wren and Hawksmoor churches. It's pinpointed the last two Hawksmoor churches I need to complete my collection, so I've pencilled them in for my next visit. I hadn't realised that Thomas Tallis is buried at St Alfege's, which I accidentally found at my last visit to Greenwich. Another excuse for a return visit, I think.

I left the girls to explore the ship at thirteen quid a pop. (I don't like sailing ships that much.) I walked around to Waterstones, where I had two books to collect. I'd ordered them via the website on Thursday: the new Ben Aaronovitch paperback, The Hanging Tree, and the paperback of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. The plan had been to collect the final stamp on my loyalty card, and then use the resulting ten quid towards The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, which I'd already reserved at Trafalgar Square. Unfortunately, both books were discounted, which meant that they didn't come to a tenner.

Thinking about it afterwards, I should have asked the guy to hang on for a minute while I grabbed something else. Instead, I paid for them and then spotted something else I fancied while I was on the way out. I got my final stamp, but not in the way I'd intended.

It didn't matter, as things turned out. By the time the girls left the ship we'd left it far too late to do the Woolwich – Stratford – Waterloo stretch of the journey anyway. It was pissing down, too, so we decided to cut our losses and head back into town.

I took the girls to the station (once again amazing them by heading straight there). While we were passing Waterstones, I reminded Rhian that she wanted to get a Roald Dahl book for her niece. Needless to say, like nearly other bloody girl in this story (in fact, nearly every bloody girl in this blog), Carys hadn't made her mind up what she wanted. We made our excuses without even entering.

We made our way down about a dozen flights of steps to get to the DLR platform at the snappily named Cutty Sark (for Maritime Greenwich) station. We only had to go one stop to reach Greenwich station – the one which existed when I first explored the area – and pick up the main line back to town. At which point something else happened which improved my day slightly. I'd never used Cannon Street mainline station until yesterday afternoon. Now I can colour in another small section of my Baker's Rail Atlas.

At Cannon Street, we decided to have a pint in Thereisnospoon on the station concourse. We had to leave before 5.30, though. Steff had somehow managed to convince herself that it would take the best part of an hour to get to Victoria from there. Maybe if we'd caught a bus during the rush hour, she'd have been fairly close. But the roads were still closed, so we headed for the Tube. Out of interest, I asked Rhian to time the interval between leaving the platform at Cannon Street and arriving at Victoria (six intervening stops). In the event, it took less than quarter of an hour. We could have had another pint at Cannon Street. Come to that, we could have had a pint in Victoria itself. Maybe two.

We walked to the coach station in the pissing rain. Actually, it's more accurate to say that I walked down Buckingham Palace Road, and Rhian and Steff tagged along quite some distance behind. We had well over half an hour before the coach left. After I found out our departure point, Steff wandered off to find a 'programme' (in other words, a paper timetable) for the coach services. Obviously she's planning another trip. Not on my watch, as the saying goes.

I don't know where she and Rhian went in search of this non-existent leaflet, but I eventually found them smoking outside ten minutes before the coach left. By this time the coach had started boarding, and I told them we'd be lucky to sit together. Once aboard, I found a window seat about six rows behind the driver. The girls grabbed a double seat a few rows in front of me. Rhian looked at me and indicated the seat opposite. I just shrugged. From where I was sitting, I couldn't hear that voice complaining about every fucking thing. It suited me just fine.

We got to Cardiff in good time for the 2141 train to Aberdare. By the time we boarded at Cathays it was standing room only with pissheads. We had toyed with the idea of a last pint in town, but we realised that everyone pouring off the train would have the same idea. The rain was still biblical. We decided to get a taxi home instead.

After quarter of an hour trying vainly to flag down a car at the rank, I decided that I'd get just as wet walking home as I would standing around. I'm too old to fuck around at the taxi rank on a wet Saturday night. Been there, done that. I walked up, toying with the idea of a takeaway. The girls must have got lucky, because their lights were on when I got home.

So, in summary, that's two trips to London under my belt, with one great friend who really enjoys herself every time and one acquaintance who hates the whole thing. You can probably guess what I'll be doing next July – and whom I won't be doing it with.

I Hate It When a Plan Falls Apart

In which The Author is leading the Z-Team

Back in the good old days of the Carpenters Arms, one of the boys used to organise regular bus trips to see bands across South Wales and even further afield. (I know – bands actually used to play in South Wales in that long-forgotten century. You try telling the young people that …)

Benji Tours, as they were known, became a great favourite with the gig-goers of the time. I only went on a couple of them, because by the time I got back to Aberdare from Cardiff most nights, the gig had already started in Ebbw Vale, or Tonypandy Naval Club, or Llanharan RFC, or wherever.

[A digression: I'm fairly sure it was a Benji Tour that took a gang of us to see the great East Midlands power-boogie trio Engine at Llanharan RFC one Sunday night. I don't remember a great deal about the gig, because a considerable amount of drink had been taken by all concerned, but it sticks in my mind for two reasons.

There was a young girl in the audience whom I kinda knew by sight from the autumn of 1990. Richard D. and I had run a small pop-up bookstall at the FE College in Rhydyfelin, fairly near our base at Treforest. She was a student there, and used to stop by most days to browse our limited collection of set texts on her way to lunch. I remember her mainly because she was a bit of a goth (long black hair, black nail varnish, studded collar – you know, my type …), and therefore fairly cute; and also because her name was Cariad. (It's Welsh for love, so we're definitely talking hippy parents.) We said hi at the bar and that was that.

The second reason is because just before last orders I went to get a pint. While she was serving me, the barmaid – who was quite a bit older than me – suddenly produced a cat o' nine tails from a hook and, for no apparent reason, flicked it playfully in my direction.

I just smiled and said, 'Somebody's been gossiping about me, haven't they?']

Anyway, Benji was definitely the most successful of the day trip organisers. Jonathan E. undoubtedly came a close second. Compared to those guys, even the commercial bus operators were playing on a sticky wicket. For example, about ten years ago I booked two tickets for a coach outing to the National Botanic Garden of Wales, outside Carmarthen. My brother was a keen gardener, so I decided to treat him to a day out. The day before we were due to set off, the company rang me and told me the trip had been cancelled owing to lack of interest. Quelle surprise! as they say in Paris.

Back at the start of my second student days, I canvassed my friends to see if they'd be interested in a trip to see the Severn Bore. As I recounted in Time and Tide, it fell apart in the week leading up to the Saturday night. In the event only three hardy souls (Gaz, Huw F. and I) made the perilous journey across Arctic wastes, treacherous seas and parched deserts all the way to the previously undiscovered village of Minsterworth in Darkest Gloucestershire. We lived to tell the tale, too.

You'll forgive me for being optimistic, I'm sure, when I decided to try and get a gang together for a day trip to London. I thought it would be a nice break for everyone before Xmas, during that mental period when everyone's got loads of work and/or exams on. I asked on Facebook if anyone was interested, and a couple of people threw their hats into the ring. I invited a number of friends as well: Joe, Lee M., Hannah R.; Chazza, Philvis and Clare (pals of mine from the pub/karaoke sessions); Adrian T., Liz and Wayne B.; Rhian and Steff; Gaz, Huw and Martin H.; Mitch T. and his father Will.

The plan, I explained, was not to have a plan. Once we arrived in the Smoke, they were free to do whatever they liked and go wherever they wanted to, as long as they met us at the appointed time and in the right pub to head back home. As I've already noted, the shops in London stay open until 6.00 p.m. on Sundays. The Xmas lights will be in place. The museums and galleries are free. There's a pub on every street corner. What's not to like?

In fairness, Lee, Hannah and Joe were up for it from the start. Liz works Sundays, so she was a non-runner. Rhian said she'd have to look at her work shifts. Chazza was initially keen, but then started blowing hot and cold (as is her wont). On the other hand, Clare was totally in favour. In fact, she's talked about little else since I first mentioned it. If the worst happened, at least the two of us and Ade would be going. I created a closed group on Facebook and added the likely suspects, so that I could keep everyone posted with developments.

Ade came up with the best suggestion of all: since he holds a PCV licence, he could drive us himself. All we'd need to do is hire the vehicle. Since our friend Paul H. organises guided tours of Wales, he had contact details of a likely firm to help us out. A plan was coming together.

That was about a month ago.

Since then I've added all sorts of information to the group: stuff about Oyster cards, contactless payments on TfL, useful websites, and I've even mentioned the fact that The Works in Aberdare had a stack of little pocket guides to London. Nobody has shown much interest.

Last week Clare and I spent two whole bloody days trying to sort out ID for her. (She's twenty-three, and would have trouble getting served in a strange pub without it, obviously.) Yesterday we found out that her initial application had been rejected, so we were back to Square One.

In the evening Adrian came into the Prince of Wales, so we had a chat about the putative arrangements. Paul had got a quote for the bus hire, which was a hell of a lot more than we'd anticipated. At the same time, the numbers were dwindling. Ade said, only half-jokingly (I think) that it might end up as an excursion in his car.

Talking about fucking your own luck …

I spent a fair chunk of this afternoon running around Aberdare, trying to sort out Clare's second application for ID. About two hours ago she messaged me on Facebook to say she'd changed her mind, and wouldn't be coming after all.

I put a very angry message on Facebook about the machinations of the Goddess of Chaos and her love of Bureaucracy. (How the actual fuck can you get photographic ID when you need photographic ID to prove who you are?). Then I went into the group and asked everyone who was definitely in to confirm ASAP. I also told them that we'd be taking non-refundable deposits to cover our expenses in case anyone else dropped out/ fell ill/ died/ whatever.

Mitch said he'd try to get some pals on board (in the literal sense). I also advertised the spare places on my own Timeline, and opened the group up to anyone who was interested.

That was just over an hour ago. Since then, the activity within the group has been like the buffet at the Dippy Bint's wedding reception: not a sausage.

I can't see this little adventure happening, can you? As I commented on Facebook, I'm looking upon the whole enterprise as a failed experiment.

Except that it isn't quite a failed experiment. If anything, it's vindicated John Archibald Wheeler's predictions based on Einstein's field equations: you simply cannot escape from a Black Hole – especially when said Black Hole is called Aberdare.

So, boys and girls, my days of trying to organise anything more sophisticated than a quick walk to town are officially over. If anyone wants to join me for my next London adventure, you can make your own fucking arrangements and I'll meet you when we get there. I hereby resign my position as the leader of the Z-Team.

In fact, I might change my name to Howling Mad Murdock.

Crazy fucking fool …

The Oyster is Your World

In which The Author makes up a bus tour as he goes along

As I said previously, I was awake at the crack of dawn on the Monday morning. From the outset I decided to forgo breakfast in the hotel. There was no guarantee that there'd be anything more than cornflakes as a vegetarian option (as I found out in Putney in 1991), so I decided to eat out for the second morning in a row.

I had a quick shower, gathered my things together, and checked out at about 8.30. I walked up London Street as far as Paddington, then made my way past St Mary's Hospital. There were plenty of cafes and coffee shops open, but they were packed with people on their way to work. I bought a paper, then headed down the Edgware Road, more or less retracing my steps from the night before.

This is an area I'm not very familiar with, even though it's where the mainline trains from South Wales arrive. On the handful of occasions I've travelled to London by train, I've usually gone straight onto the underground from the concourse at Paddington. In most cases, I was able to get my fare refunded afterwards, so the train was a viable option. Nowadays, I get the coach and hit the tube network at Victoria, Earls Court or West Kensington – purely on the grounds of cost.

There's some amazing architecture in these parts, including some of the oldest Underground stations. Look at the above-ground part of Edgware Road, for example.

There are little side streets and mews tucked away, and it's a very cosmopolitan area. I passed no end of restaurants, some of which were open until the early hours of the morning during Ramadan. I thought that was a brilliant idea – I could have had a very late supper/early breakfast if I'd felt like it. There's a fantastic old pub in Praed Street, too, which has been converted into a Greek restaurant. At least it's still there, and retains much of the original design.

A couple of minutes away I came to St Mark's Church, tucked away in Old Marylebone Road. I can't tell you very much about it, but it's obviously Victorian and probably much bigger on the inside.

I made my way down the Edgware Road, and after a few minutes I arrived at Marble Arch. I'd seen a couple of statues in the vicinity when I was passing on the bus on Sunday, and I wanted to check them out in more detail. I can't explain anything about them, but they're intriguing works of modern art nonetheless.

I don't think I've ever paid much attention to Marble Arch itself, in spite of passing it many times. On the Monday morning I decided to investigate it further, and was amazed by the intricate carvings at the top of the arches. It's probably possible to walk around London with a camera for the whole of one's life and not see all the interesting and intriguing statues and monuments for oneself.

I walked into Hyde Park, purely to kill time. There were plenty of walkers, cyclists and joggers around. I haven't been into the park for years, and it took me a while to get my bearings. With Marble Arch behind me and Park Lane on my left, I knew I could walk diagonally to the Serpentine, and from there make my way to the museum area. The sky was fairly bright to the west, but there were dark clouds everywhere else. I set off towards the Serpentine, and then felt a couple of raindrops. I didn't fancy getting caught in a sudden downpour, so I turned back towards Park Lane and checked out the bus routes.

The beauty of the Oyster card is that the daily fare is capped, depending on how far you've travelled across the city and how many modes of transport you've used. If you combine buses and tubes, and stay in Zone 1 and Zone 2 – which encompass most of the tourist spots you're likely to want to visit – the most you'll pay is ₤6.50. On the other hand, if you stick to the buses, the daily maximum is ₤4.50. (By way of comparison, a Day Rider ticket on Stagecoach in Aberdare costs ₤4.80, and is next to useless after about 6.00 p.m.)

[A digression: If you're planning a trip to London, bear in mind that the iconic red buses don't accept cash. You can pay by Oyster or by contactless bank card, but cash has been a no-no for about a year or so. The daily caps also apply to contactless payments. It's a hell of a lot cheaper than buying a one-day Travelcard, and much more convenient.]

Anyway, I found out that there was a bus to Camden Town from Portman Street, a couple of minutes' walk along Oxford Street. It sounded like an interesting journey, too – route 274 takes you through St John's Wood and skirts Regent's Park. I was just in time to jump on, and sat back to enjoy the view.

My cousin Mary lives in St John's Wood, so it's an area I know fairly well. I wondered how close we'd get to her flat, but the bus doesn't go into the heart of the village. Instead, it follows Prince Albert Road and curves around the northern edge of Regent's Park, with the Regent's Canal between the two. Primrose Hill is just to the north; my friend Paula H. lives in a tower block on the other side of the hill, with breathtaking views across the whole city. (I'd swap with her tomorrow, if she ever fancies moving back to Aberdare.)

From the bus you don't get to see very much of the sights, though. Prince Albert Road boasts some stunning John Nash villas, but – perhaps fortunately – he didn't get to build along the whole of the thoroughfare. You can have too much of a good thing. We passed the Anglican church and the London Central Mosque, but the view of Regent's Park was obstructed by hedges and fences. (Watch this space for some more photos of the area in a forthcoming project, though.)

There seem to be a lot of bus diversions in force at the moment, so we entered Camden Town by a side road. One passenger didn't know about the detour, and complained loudly to the driver when she missed her stop. She should have spent ten years trying to commute to Cardiff when Shambles Shamrock Coaches were still in business, that's all I can say on the matter.

I jumped off near the tube station and walked to Camden Lock, where there's a pleasant Thereisnospoon overlooking the canal. By then I was ready for breakfast, and while it was cooking I logged into my emails and sent the edited manuscript of Christian Cameron's forthcoming book back to my contact at Orion Books. I checked out the weather forecast – heavy showers all day – and ate my breakfast while watching the first fat raindrops splashing against the window. I'd got to the pub with a few minutes to spare, and that was to be pretty much the story for the rest of the day.

I finished my breakfast and decided to check out the market stalls at Camden Lock. I was there on a Friday afternoon in March, but it was thronged with tourists and not the ideal time for browsing. First thing on a Monday morning it's a completely different story. As I left the pub a narrowboat was making its way out of the lock, and I stopped to take a couple of photos. This is one holiday idea which I've fancied for many years, but I've never been able to interest enough of my friends in joining me. Perhaps one day I'll do it for real.

On my last visit to Camden Lock I’d spotted an interesting second-hand bookstall tucked away among the noodle bars and racks of t-shirts. At the time, it was packed with tourists (which doesn’t take much – more than about six customers at a time would probably constitute a fire hazard), so I decided to have another look now that I had the place to myself.

I hadn't been browsing for long when I came across the screenplays to Dennis Potter's last two TV dramas, Karaoke and Cold Lazarus, in the original Faber paperback bind-up. That was a bargain, so I snapped it up straight away and carried on browsing. I didn't find the elusive Thucydides (was everyone copy-editing Christian Cameron's latest manuscript that weekend?), but I was tempted by a good many books on the shelves. After about ten minutes I found a copy of Ginger Geezer, the biography of the cult musician, artist, broadcaster, piss-artist and all-round English eccentric Vivian Stanshall. Two books for under a tenner? Don't mind if I do, guv'nor.

I made my way back to the canal, and just as was I crossing the bridge the rain returned with a vengeance. I dived back into the pub, ordered another glass of Pepsi, and settled down to read about Mr Stanshall's remarkably conventional childhood. When the downpour ended, as suddenly as it had began, I walked back to the main street and jumped on a 134 bus to Bloomsbury.

I'd taken that route into town on my birthday, so I wasn't surprised when the recorded voice message announced 'Mornington Crescent' as we approached the station. It comes to something when the bus beats the human players in an absurd panel game, doesn't it? It was drizzling again when I jumped off near University College Hospital, so I didn't take any photos of the amazing Cruciform Building – yes, that's what it's called – or the other fine buildings in the area. I know this area pretty well now, so I made my way towards the British Museum with a little detour past Waterstones. That turned out to be a good decision. They had a box of clearance stock outside the main door, and Kurt Vonnegut Jr's novel Breakfast of Champions was reduced to a whole pound. I needed a replacement copy, so I snapped it up and then headed for the back entrance of the museum.

That turned out not to be a good decision. As with the Science Museum, they've recently instituted bag checks. As with the Science Museum, there was one person doing the checking. As with the Science Museum, there was a queue of schoolkids out of the door. I decided to leave the exhibition on Egypt’s sunken cities until I'm travelling more or less empty-handed (as usual) and concentrate on exploring instead.

I walked down the side of the museum into Russell Street, made my way past the Museum Tavern, and called into Atlantis Books for a good look around. The place has been rearranged since my last visit, and looks a lot more welcoming. There was plenty there that caught my eye, too, but I decided that buying five books in one visit to London was enough to go on with. In particular, I was shocked by how expensive the New Falcon list has become since I finished in the book trade. I don't know whether Airlift still handles their UK distribution, or whether Atlantis were sourcing them directly from the States – either way, I might try and plug the gaps in my collection via the second-hand market.

At the corner of New Oxford Street I made my way to St George's Church (again) and had a quick look at the buses heading east. The 55 to Leyton was just pulling in. While I had no intention of going that far, it would take me into Clerkenwell – a part of town I don't know at all, and according to Peter Ackroyd's London: the biography (Chatto & Windus, 2001), a psychogeographer's dream.

I have been to Clerkenwell twice before. The first time was late in 1984, when I went in search of a unisex hair salon which – according to Time Out, anyway – offered a student discount. (I found it, but it was closed on the afternoon I was there.) The second time was late in 1991, the evening after I'd recorded Fifteen to One. Ross D. was a student at the London College of Printing, and his after-lectures local was in Clerkenwell Road. Clerkenwell doesn't even feature in my little Dorling Kindersley pocket guide to London. It's not part of the City of London, as it lay just outside the city walls, but it's got a rich and varied history dating back to medieval times. It's also got some quite amazing architecture, and fascinating nooks and crannies which are definitely worth a return visit.

I jumped off the bus immediately after we'd crossed a fairly obvious bridge and retraced my steps. I'd guessed straight away that we'd crossed a railway line, and I decided to try and photograph the infrastructure below. The walls enclosing the railway cutting were easily my height, and I had no idea how thick they really were until I looked at the photos afterwards. I suppose they have to be relatively unclimbable to prevent people jumping onto the tracks. If ever a selfie stick was called for, photographing this little gap north of Farringdon Station was the time. I was lucky to get one half-decent shot while a train was coming through, but that was about it. If you've ever been on a tube train when it breaks cover for a couple of seconds, this is probably the sort of thing you're surrounded by.

I was able to get another half-decent shot of the approach to Farringdon Station itself, with two iconic London buildings – an enduring symbol of post-Fire reconstruction, and the ultramodern – side by side. (I know they're on opposite sides of the river, but you get the idea.) It's not often you get to peel back the layers of history like this, and even though it's not a great photo I quite like it.

The cutting itself is lined with some beautiful old buildings, which somehow survived the Blitz (and the sixties) relatively unscathed. In fact, Clerkenwell is crammed with unusual and eye-catching architecture. I came across a poster advertising guided walks, so I'm going to try and join one next time I'm in the area.

I wandered towards Clerkenwell Green, which Mr Ackroyd has described as 'a small area enclosed by buildings with a disused public lavatory in the middle. On both sides are narrow streets which in turn lead off into alleys or other streets, The green has its restaurants, two public houses, commercial premises and offices for architects or public relations consultants. It is, in epitome, a typical area of central London' (Ackroyd, 2001, p. 461).

Its history is much more intriguing than that, though, as Mr Ackroyd explains in the pages following that brief introduction. Wat Tyler and his rebels gathered here in 1381; in the centuries after that a whole host of proscribed (or barely tolerated) religious, political and occult-tinged groups have made it their base, just outside the City and therefore beyond the long arm of the law. It's been a notorious haunt of criminals and prostitutes until comparatively recently, too.

There's little sign of its radical history now, but just to the north I spotted a lovely church. I knew it wasn't one of Nicholas Hawksmoor's, and I didn't think it was a Wren design either. It turned out to date from quite a bit later – the end of the eighteenth century, in fact. St James's Church was designed by a local man named James Carr and built on the site of a medieval nunnery dissolved by Henry VIII.

I took a few photos of the exterior and then noticed that the door was open. I made my way inside and was struck by the perfect interior, the beautiful stained glass, and the quaint little organ in the gallery. My camera isn't best suited to interior photography (especially in low light), and I remembered – again – that I need to buy a new tripod for this sort of thing.

The churchyard seems to be a popular spot for people to sit and relax on their lunch breaks, and there were quite a few locals using it as a short cut across this mysterious district of London. I took a few more photos and then headed back towards Clerkenwell Green. Here's a fantastic street name, one of the many you'll find in this part of town.

A green plaque on a corner caught my eye. Unsurprisingly, Mr Ackroyd can shed some light on this curious character:

He was an itinerant vendor of coals who lived above the coal-shed in Jerusalem Passage … despite his humble trade, in the words of Walford's Old and New London, he 'cultivated the highest branches of music, and drew round him for years all the great musicians of the day, including even the great Handel'. … Britton's death was no less fanciful than his life. A ventriloquist named Honeyman or 'Talking Smith' 'threw' his voice and announced that, unless Britton recited the Lord’s Prayer immediately, he would expire within hours. Britton fell on his knees and prayed 'but the chord of his life was unstrung by this sudden shock'; he died a few days later … It was rumoured that he was a Rosicrucian, one of the sects which haunted Clerkenwell, and naturally believed in the efficacy of invisible spirits. So the trick of the ventriloquist, or the atmosphere of the area, deeply affected a credulous mind (Ackroyd, 2001, pp. 471–2).

I decided to walk along Jerusalem Passage and came out in St John's Square. Here I found a fantastic shop which seems to have fallen through the Rift and planted itself in modern London. I could almost picture Charles Dickens coming out of the door, armed with a ream of foolscap and some Indian ink.

I turned around and then stopped in my tracks. I must have seen it marked on the map, but I had no idea what it was, or even that this remarkable place existed.

This strange structure turned out to be St John's Gate, a remnant of the Grand Priory of the Order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem. This building dates from the early sixteenth century, the original having been destroyed during the Peasants' Revolt, and contains a small museum which is open a couple of days a week. However, I wasn't in museum mood after the past couple of let-downs, so I've added it to my 'to-do' list for a return visit. I decided to just wander on and see what else I could find.

I followed my nose back to the main road and found a couple more eye-catching buildings before getting slightly lost and emerging at Smithfield Market. I'd found my way there last time I was exploring the City of London, too (see Life in the Slow Lane). Why someone who hasn't eaten meat since 1987 keeps getting drawn to that spot is another peculiarity of the area, I think.

One of the beautiful things about London is the way that many buildings were fitted into the street layout, rather than the streets being designed around the buildings. Look at this fantastic space-packing exercise in bricks and mortar, for instance.

A few yards along the lane I found one of the unusual pub names that also pepper the oldest parts of the city: the Fox and Anchor. It was open, but I decided against a pub crawl – that could have turned into a lengthy and expensive exercise. Instead, I walked on and (somehow) emerged in the middle of Charterhouse Square. There's a big restoration scheme in progress at the moment, and many of the medieval buildings are hidden behind fences and sheets of polythene. Even so, I managed to get a couple of photos of this remarkable hangover from bygone days. Like St John's Gate, I'd seen it marked on the map, but I had no idea what it looked like on the ground.

I was going to carry on exploring, but as soon as I got to the Barbican the rain returned with a vengeance. I jumped onto the first available bus (which, oddly enough, was going to Liverpool Street) and took advantage of an effectively free ride along the northern perimeter of the City.

That was the end of the photographs, too. The weather was too wet for me to use the camera outdoors, so I criss-crossed the City back as far as Tottenham Court Road, walked along Oxford Street in a gap between showers, then cut through Soho (via the Coach and Horses) to Piccadilly Circus, and down Charing Cross Road to pick up a bus to Victoria Coach Station. I've written about these areas before, so I won't recap them here.

The good news is that after many years, I'm starting to know my way around the City of London. This fascinating little square mile is rich with centuries' worth of history, packed with unusual buildings, and contains surprises around every corner. Thanks to my ever-growing knowledge of the place, and armed with Tom Bolton's handy little book, I can plan systematic walks through London and bring the results to you here. Watch this space …

One Evening in the City

In which The Author explores more dusty corners of London

The weekend before last I spent a night in London, which is something I haven’t done for about twenty years. My friend Andrew C. had booked a hotel room for work purposes, and then discovered that he wouldn’t be able to use it after all. Unable to get a refund at short notice, Andrew offered the room on Facebook on the Friday morning.

I saw his posting a couple of hours later, and sent him a quick message to ask whether the offer still stood. I imagined that by this time he’d have been inundated with messages, and the room would have been snapped up within minutes.

But this is Aberdare, remember. At least half the people I know would see a night’s stay in London as equivalent to Major Tim Peake’s recently completed mission in space – a nice idea in theory, but completely beyond their reach. On the other hand, I’d missed on a trip just after Whitsun, and I still needed something to compensate for the disastrous trip on my birthday.

Nobody had taken Andrew up on his offer in the interim period. He gave me the details of the hotel, and arranged to pick me up just before midday on the Sunday morning. By this time I already had the Megabus booking form open, and it took me a minute or so to finalise the journey home.

I made my way into town early on the Sunday morning and had breakfast in Thereisnospoon. A late breakfast would set me up for the day, and save me having to take a packed lunch. I wouldn’t be short of places to have something in the evening, so the plan was coming together nicely. Andrew and his partner Dawn picked me up outside the pub, and we drove to Pontypridd to pick up Steve H. and the ‘works van’, for want of a better term.

The boys were filming in Imperial College London late in the afternoon, so they were heading for Cromwell Road. This is the area which contains ICL itself, as well as the Natural History Museum, the Science Museum and the V&A. It’s not exactly central, but it’s close to Kensington Gardens and a short tube ride from the West End. We got there at about 4.00, the lads dropped me off and headed for their rendezvous.

I headed straight for the Science Museum, which is another place on my list of things I haven’t done in London. Unfortunately, there was a queue of kids a mile long waiting to go inside. There was also heightened security at the entrance, with one person searching everyone’s bags on the way in. I decided that if I hadn’t been inside in thirty-two years, another couple of months wouldn’t make any difference. I headed to South Kensington station, topped up my Oyster card, and caught the tube to Victoria.

I thought I might have more luck with the British Museum, so I jumped on a 73 bus and sat upstairs to watch the city unfold before me. The first thing I came across when I reached Tottenham Court Road was a fairly large branch of Waterstones, so I called in. In particular, I was trying to track down Thucydides’ account of the Peloponnesian War, as background material for a project I was just finishing off. I drew a blank there, but I had a nice cup of hot chocolate and checked out the hotel in my trusty A–Z.

Andrew had told me it was on ‘the other side of Hyde Park’ and ‘near Paddington’, which doesn’t really narrow it down much. It turned out to be in Sussex Gardens, which is pretty convenient for the station.

With that sorted out, I walked across to Waterstones near the University of London. I didn’t find Thucydides there either, but I picked up a remaindered book on the Great Fire of London, and Tom Bolton’s walking guide to the lost rivers of the city.

It struck me that the shops stay open much later on a Sunday than they do in Aberdare, and quite a bit later than they do in Cardiff. The mystery was solved when I saw the opening hours on the door. They don’t open until midday, and close at 6.00 p.m., which seems a lot more civilised and user-friendly than the 10.00–4.00 arrangement in Aberdare, or even the 11.00–5.00 arrangement in Cardiff city centre. Then again, when you’ve got public transport that operates pretty much 24/7, it doesn’t make a great deal of difference. And it was these extended running hours that enabled me to take full advantage of the evening in the city.

It was too late to bother with the museum by the time I came from the shop, so I ducked into the Museum Tavern to dodge a sharp shower of rain. It's not bigger on the inside, and it was crammed with people who'd had the same idea about avoiding the weather. It charges about average London prices, and allows families in for meals, which will be worth bearing in mind for future visits.

I walked back to Oxford Street and caught a 98 bus towards Sussex Gardens. I don't know when it was built (I'm guessing early to mid-nineteenth century), but just about every one of the grand villa-style houses in the street is now a hotel. The place I was staying in was a few minutes' walk from the Edgware Road, with friendly receptionists and a nice comfy room on the ground floor.

The weather forecast had been for heavy showers, but they hadn’t materialised by the time I reached the hotel. I checked in, had a quick look at my bus map of the city centre, and decided to take my camera for a wander around.

The whole area around Paddington Station is being redeveloped as part of the Crossrail project (as is much of London, in fact), so I decided to catch a bus and see where it took me. The first bus that came along was on route 23, heading to Liverpool Street. An idea came to me, so I jumped on and made my way upstairs to get the best view of the sights.

We headed down the Edgware Road to Marble Arch, then turned onto Oxford Street. The whole street was decked with union flags to mark the Queen’s ninetieth birthday celebrations, and I took a couple of photos while we made our way along and then into Regent Street. That was lined with flags, too, and while I’m no ardent royalist it was quite thrilling to see the streets decked out like that.

I was at the front of the top deck, taking photos through the window, when a Japanese girl in her early twenties jumped into the seat opposite and started snapping away as well.

I waved my camera at her and said, ‘We’ve got the same idea.’

She laughed, and we started chatting. It was her first time in London (as I’d guessed at the outset), so I slipped effortlessly into ‘unofficial tourist mode’ and gave her some background as we headed through Piccadilly Circus, down the Haymarket, and into Trafalgar Square. For instance, did you know that the statue of Eros (officially called the Earl of Shaftesbury Memorial) was the world's first statue to be made entirely from aluminium? Neither did I until I read about it Peter Ackroyd's London: the biography.

I didn’t take many photos along this stretch (been there, done that), but I did spot an interesting relief at the top of a building on the corner of Cockspur Street. Quite why there’d be an ancient Egyptian deity here is a mystery.

I filled my fellow photographer in on snippets of history as we made our way along the Strand, through Aldwych, and past the Royal Courts of Justice to Temple Bar. I made her laugh when I pointed to the emblem of the City of London and said ‘Here be dragons!’ Then we headed into Fleet Street, where a remnant of the journalistic profession lingers on in the form of the Reuters news agency.

This area is still fairly unusual in that most pubs reflect the old City working practices: they close early on Friday night and don’t reopen until Monday morning. There were a few coffee shops open (by now it was well past 8.00), but on the whole the place was almost deserted. The area around St Paul’s was crammed with tourists, of course, and my new friend was completely blown away by the size of the place. She took loads of photos as we crawled past, and then picked up speed to descend Cannon Street. Then we hit the inevitable weekend detour, which meant that we couldn’t see the Monument (as I’d intended).

Instead we headed towards the Bank of England and the Royal Exchange, which have some of the most impressive facades in the entire City of London. It’s not easy to shoot from a moving bus (even when it’s stopped at traffic lights), but at least I know my way around for the next time I’m exploring on foot.

It’s only a short distance from here to Bishopsgate, and the terminus at Liverpool Street was a couple of minutes away. My travelling companion and I got off here, I told her to enjoy the rest of her stay, she made her way to the mainline station, and I headed out into Bishopsgate. I haven’t been to that side of town for years, and it’s been redeveloped almost recognition, but I walked along the street until I found the place I was looking for.

When Dad was living in Chadwell Heath in the 1950s, and working on the electrification of the Liverpool Street–Shenfield railway line, he and his mates used to call into a famous pub for a pint or two after work. In the late summer of 1985 he took me in there to show me one of his old haunts. I’ve been meaning to go back there for thirty years, but I’ve never got around to it before.

On that Sunday evening, seeing a bus in the Edgware Road heading right across town, I decided I was going to raise an elbow in Dad’s memory. I don’t know why. Maybe in the back of my mind I had the ‘it’s been ten years’ thing going on. Maybe it was just because I was on my own in London fairly late in the evening, which I very rarely am. Perhaps it was a combination of the two. Or maybe after a long day I just fancied a pint.

Whatever the reason, I was really pleased to see that Dirty Dick’s hasn’t been turned into some dreadful theme bar, or a craft ale outlet full of millennial hipsters, or (worst of all) totally unaffordable flats. It’s still an old-school boozer, with a small bar, a TV showing the football, a few tables dotted around the place, and friendly staff. There’s an area upstairs as well, but I didn’t venture up there. I bought a pint, logged into the wifi on my phone, and sent a couple of tweets about having a nice nostalgia trip. I wondered about having a bite to eat, but it was getting quite late and it seemed as though the kitchen was about to close.

I bought another pint and chatted to the barbint for a while. I told her how long it had been since I first went in there for a pint, and it turned out she wasn’t even born then. I went to the gents, and on the way back into the bar I met a chap wearing an England football shirt. We had a laugh about Wales being at the top of the group, and he took it in good part, fair play.

I finished my pint and walked back into Bishopsgate. Only a short distance from the pub I found one of the many mysterious thoroughfares which pepper the City of London, together with its unusual name.

I didn’t walk through this tiny passageway, but if I had I would have emerged in Middlesex Street – the respectable Victorian renaming of Petticoat Lane, probably the East End’s most famous outdoor market. That’s an adventure for another visit, I think.

I caught another bus (route 8) and retraced my journey through the City as far as St Paul’s. The bus took an unexpected turn here, and I lost my bearings for a few minutes. We were in High Holborn before I was able to work out where we'd been. I spotted a Thereisnospoon on the main road, and it was still open, so I jumped off and walked back a couple of hundred yards.

A Thereisnospoon is a Thereisnospoon wherever you are in the country, so I knew I could have something off the ‘Deli Deals’ menu and not spend a fortune. This one is called Penderel’s Oak. Richard Penderel was a Catholic farmer during the English Civil War, and the future Charles II famously hid in an oak tree on his land after the Battle of Worcester. It seems to be one the few places in the City open on a Sunday night. I ordered a snack and found a table near some bookcases full of law textbooks, a fair number of which predate even my time selling them.

There was a group of people in their early twenties, all of different nationalities, on the next table. I guessed they were students celebrating the end of their exams. One of them asked me if I’d take a photo of the whole gang with his phone, which I was happy to do. By this time, the pubs in Aberdare would have been winding down and people would have been heading for home. The gang next to me seemed as though they were just getting started. What a contrast!

I finished up and headed back to the bus stop, hoping to get a service straight back to Edgware Road. I was out of luck, but the first bus (a 55) was heading to Oxford Circus, which was about the halfway point of my journey. I decided it would do. At least the rain had held off, so I didn’t mind the prospect of walking back to Sussex Gardens if push came to shove. Failing that, I could always get the tube to Edgware Road and walk from there.

At Oxford Circus a 98 bus arrived, which was heading along Edgware Road. I jumped on and retraced my steps from earlier that day. As soon as we rounded Marble Arch I was amazed to see the street thronged with people; the bars and restaurants which line both sides of the road were crowded; even the little supermarkets and the chemist were still open. It dawned on me then that it’s Ramadan – many families would have gone out after sunset to break their fast, and would probably stay out past midnight.

Not for the first time I realised how much I miss the varied and cosmopolitan life that London has to offer. On the way up, Steve H. had said something about Paddington ‘being rough at night’. Well, as usual, I felt a hell of a lot safer walking around London at night than I would have felt walking home from the centre of Aberdare.

I got back to the hotel just before 11.00, and couldn’t sleep even though I’d had a long day. I read Mr Bolton’s book on the lost rivers for a while, and finally turned in at about 1.30. I don’t think I slept at all, mind, and I was awake at the crack of dawn the following morning.