Pre-party recce done.
It's a great little place, full of character and a good suggestion by CoG.
I met Sitting duck, Tynan and Mistral for a pint or two of some lovely stout, bitter and lager, all of which was surprising very well priced at about £2.20 a pint. Not bad for a central London boozer.
The bar is split into lots of room on different levels. We decided that the best place to be would in the downstairs bar.
My main reason for this being that the toilets are located at the bottom of some very low winding stairs. At 6ft I nearly had to sit down and shuffle one step at a time to get down and I still hit my head a couple of times.
So let's stay on the same level for as much as possible.
The downstairs bar also has the largest standing area, as well as a separate area with lots of seating.
It's dimly lit to help soften the hardened weathered faces of all us cyclists
so if you want to take souvenir pictures better bring something a bit better than your phone ( a make up artist and a copy of photoshop is also preferred)
I took a few pictures but they didn't come out.
Food is served until 10pm in the cellar bar , they give you a pager when you order to make you feel like a city exec. and to tell you when your food is ready to collect.
The menu is very well priced at £5.95 for the standard meals (pie & chips, lasagna etc) or £7.95 for the posher option of fish/scampi & chips etc. Sitting duck may be able to put his picture of the menu up later.
Boris bike station is right round the corner. Temple tube is a 7 min walk (probably the same for all the other ones I listed), lots of buses. There's various street furniture to chain a bike to or the railings in the same alley way as the pub entrance, and opposite the door. They don't have any "no bike" signs on them, so you could get away using them for a few hours (although you could probably only get a couple on there before they started to block the passage).
If you've never met anyone of this forum before, count yourself lucky, then look for the Cycle Chat cap which will be placed on a table, chair, bar, head, foot.....depending on the time you arrive and don't be shy about introducing yourself.
Clutching a handful of drinks will guarantee that you will have many friends for the whole evening and possibly beyond.
Official kick off at 6pm, but early starters are welcome even encouraged
