I think that our attitude to St Pancras sums up the commitment of the London Men's Self-Help Pub Crawl Group. St Pancras is no more than two hundred metres from King's Cross (with which it shares an Underground stop), yet we steadfastly insisted on catching a bus from one station to the other, in order to validate our transport-based crawl. As mentioned, the Stationlink service had dried up by this point, so we just hopped on a normal bus (the number 10) and travelled a short distance down Euston Road. Unfortunately the length of one stop was much further than we needed to go, so the walk back to St Pancras ended up being longer than the distance from King's Cross. But that's dedication for you.
When we eventually got there, we again visited the station pub – in this case, the Shires, where we had originally thought up the idea of the Stationlink crawl on our return from Liechtenstein. Unlike our last visit, however, the Shires was now absolutely kicking, by contrast with Coopers. We therefore concluded that people travelling to the Midlands party harder than those travelling to the North-East and Scotland.
We had of course been partying fairly hard ourselves by this point, which may explain why in this picture I am either about to be sick in a paper bag, or I'm earnestly slurring the words "I'm not drunk, honest". (Or both simultaneously.) Simon, on the other hand, appears to be shouting that he is drunk, honest.
Our condition was not improved by drinking a round which consisted of three alcopops and two bottles of Diamond White. But this did help us to fit in with the "fun" atmosphere.
I think I was a bit harsh on the Shires here – it's considerably better than Coopers, though I've only given it the one point extra; and the idea that it's anywhere near as bad as the next pub (which I also gave four points) is preposterous. But this may be to do with the fact that the (small-screen) TV was broadcasting sports at everyone, though it was not as intrusive as the football in the Railway Tavern.
| Robert | 4 |
| Pad | 6.5 |
| Simon | 7 |
| Tim | 5.95 |
| Alan | 7 |
| Average | 6.09 |
Given that the next stop, Euston, was almost as close as King's Cross, and given that I frequently make the same journey, I'm really not sure why I had to consult a map. Or why anyone saw the need to take a photograph of me consulting a map. But here it is anyway.
Actually, if you look closely I think you might find I was just catching up on some sleep...