George Washington's revenge, Yanks coming to the UK..

[mufc1959]

Meanwhile, at Burnaby's ...

[Burnaby49]

That is the kind of Xmas present I get. A few years back I scored a $100 gift certificate at the liquor store from my next-door neighbour. It was like giving me cash.

[YiamCross]

Meanwhile, at Burnaby's ...

Cat seems to be remarkably unimpressed. Or has Burnaby passed out in the cat basket again?

[YiamCross]

Looks forward to going into a pub and asking for a big pink Canadian beaver......

That one I want to watch...

[Pottapaug1938]

That is the kind of Xmas present I get.

This would be perfect for my son (who works for a craft brewery in Boston) and me.

By the way -- if you like good beer, do not head for the Dominican Republic. The stuff here makes Budweiser look good.

[Gregg]

When you're in London, please check in at the George IV pub for me. Truth be told, its where I REALLY earned my MS in Economics and its kind of the unofficial "pub laureate" of The London School of Economics, where this conservative American came to England to learn economics from communists.

Do not go to the other pubs around Houghton Street (or Red Square, as some call it), they're undergrad hang out kind of places and by American standards the undergrads are pikers, but they're still teenagers/early twenties and as such are kind of annoying to grown ups when they've been drinking.

But it was a good pub for all that, one of the places that inspired my Life's Essential Policies #7 "Never drink in North America, never drive in Europe" which has served me well over the years.

[Burnaby49]

I've been to 193 different pubs in the London area (London, Richmond, Greenwich, Camden Town, etc) but not the George IV on Portugal St. So it's on my 2016 List. We have 5 days in London to try and cover as many missed pubs as possible while revisiting old favorites like the Black Friar and the Salisbury.

[Joinder]

In the spirit of reconciliation and peace I am more than happy to buy you a pint...BUT you have to promise you will not wear the Real Ale uniform of sandals, socks and shorts and unkempt beard.
Otherwise Brighton is up the road the road from me .
Hey, bring Yiam along too, but no medallion please. Peace

[Burnaby49]

A few more days booked in. Sheffield July 2nd and Nottingham July 3rd & 4th. So our schedule to date is;

June 8 to 12 - London
June 13 - Worcester
June 14 - Chester
June 15 - Bolton
June 16 - Preston
June 17 & 18 - Barrowford
June 19 - Durham
June 20 to 22 - Edinburgh
June 23 to 25 - Glasgow
June 26 - Inverness
June 27 - Aberdeen
June 28 - Dundee
June 29 - Newcastle
June 30 and July 01 - Leeds
July 02 - Sheffield
July 03 & 04 - Nottingham (Pie and a pint at the Elwes!)
July 05 to 09 - not yet booked
July 10 - Brighton

Plenty of opportunity to swill a nasty brown coloured liquid mixed with suds.

[Joinder]

You are guaranteed a warm welcome in one of those pubs !

[vampireLOREN]

You are guaranteed a warm welcome in one of those pubs !

I can only suggest giving the pie a miss (even if washed down with suds ).

[SteveUK]

Burnaby - will these sessions tend to be daytime or evening affairs?

[Pox]

Burnaby - will these sessions tend to be daytime or evening affairs?

Given the alleged liking for the stuff - probably both! And the morning too - HIC!

[SteveUK]

Good!

[Burnaby49]

Burnaby - will these sessions tend to be daytime or evening affairs?

Whichever works. I'm trying to fit people in on our travels from point A to point B (wankspittle is an example) but others, Such as pox and peanut I'll probably meet in the evening. I'm doing detailed route scheduling right now. Here's how I'm planning our trip. We've picked and booked most places we plan to stay. I've posted all our bookings to date. I think Nottingham is the last we'll book. After that a we'll just roam around. But I'm fixated on strip-mining this;

http://www.heritagepubs.org.uk/pubs/pub ... +Inventory

I'm trying to fit as many of these into our trip as possible. So I've spent two evenings just planning our route from Worcester to Chester to get some of these in along with a stop for lunch at the Bull and Spectacles,

https://www.tripadvisor.ca/Restaurant_R ... gland.html

For no better reason than we stopped there by chance on a prior trip and had an excellent lunch. Two women serving food cafeteria style. Apparently much changed but we're going back anyhow. We're going to the Tan Hill pub (highest elevation pub in Great Britain) on our route between Barrowford and Durham because I went there once a decade ago and want to go again and the scenery is fantastic. In no way the most direct route but that is of no importance. In other words we are very flexible where we go and how long it takes.

Essentially that is how we plan trips. So if somebody pops up who isn't near a town we are staying at but can be met while we are on the road I'm good with daytime. Otherwise it's evening.

[SteveUK]

Excellent. If you require a copy of the 'book' aka Camra good beer/guide book , shout and I'll post a spare as they sent 2 this year by accident.
It's not as good as it used to be since they started charging pubs for entry, but still a handy guide albeit no replacement for local knowledge.

[Burnaby49]

Thanks but between this;

http://whatpub.com/

this;

http://www.heritagepubs.org.uk/pubs/pub ... +Inventory

and my CAMRA London and Edinburgh pub walk guides I'm already overwhelmed with choices. My problem isn't finding great pubs it's culling the lists.

[NigelJK]

Try using tripadvisor in the UK, reviews are usually genuine and accurate.

[Burnaby49]

Try using tripadvisor in the UK, reviews are usually genuine and accurate.

Watch what you say buster! If you can't trust CAMRA who can you trust? I'm a member! And, seriously, I'm overwhelmed with choices. Like this;

http://www.heritagepubs.org.uk/pubs/his ... ?pubid=300

How can you beat that? Here's how;

http://www.heritagepubs.org.uk/pubs/nat ... ?PubID=123

or here;

http://www.heritagepubs.org.uk/pubs/nat ... ?PubID=126

We're a pair of old geezers in a losing race with decrepitude and senility! I don't drive so the idiot I travel with does it all. We're trying to pack in as many out of the way pubs as we can while he's still capable of driving us to them. That's why we have a relentless five week rat race of one night destinations. We only plan to stop and take a breath in major pub locations like London, Edinburgh, and Glasgow. Sheffield and Newcastle deserve more than a single night each but that's all they get so we can go pubbing in Bolton (Ye Olde Man and Scythe) or Preston (Black Bull). Why else would tourists from Canada spend a night in either one of those dumps? In future trips when a car isn't in the picture we'll revisit places like Liverpool, after London my favorite pubbing town (Philharmonic, Vines, Lion Tavern, Railway Tavern, Baltic Fleet, Dispensary, Fly In The Loaf, Peter Kavanagh’s, White Star, Ship and Mitre) stop, must stop. You get the idea. I'm already on top of the planning and can't handle any more options.

Once the trip is done I'll post a list of the pubs we visited and you can see how successful we were in maximizing our time in different real ale pubs. And that will even include irrelevant pub killing diversions like meeting you Quatloosers or hiking to and climbing Pendle Hill, a long standing tradition.

[NigelJK]

I was thinking that CAMERA are a tad biased, and the TA crew are not above rubbishing a 'real ale' pub or 'micro brewery' if it's not what it's cracked up to be. Leaves you more time to enjoy those that do things 'proper'.