Month: February 2026

London Thirteenth Trip

In the summer of 2024, we finally made the eminently sensible decision to purchase a Two Together railcard which chops a commendable third off the price of your train fares. This is especially beneficial when considering the extortionate Avanti prices down to London and this inspired us to arrange a day trip down to the smoke.

Unfortunately, the train we were scheduled to be on was cancelled but we picked this news up in sufficient time to undertake a scamper to Stockport station and jump on an earlier one. As a result, we had no seats booked so commandeered some unoccupied ones that were booked from the earlier station of Manchester.

Twenty minutes later and by this stage comfortably ensconced in situ with coffee and croissants in hand, we were approached by a lady who claimed our seats. To my perfectly reasonable question of ‘Why did you not sit here from Manchester?’ she replied that she wanted to obtain some forward facing seats for her and her son, but she had now been slung out of the ones that she had purloined. Grudgingly and with some under the breath muttering we packed up and vacated but thankfully we found some better seats in the next carriage!

Covent Garden basement. Image Credit storage.googleapis.com

It was fine summers day so en arrival we walked down towards the river and arrived at London Covent Garden Basement and undertook a pit stop. Covent Garden is dually linked to the Royal Opera House and to the old fruit and vegetable market in the central square which is now a regentrified and touristy shopping area. It is bordered on one side by Drury Lane, where I believe the Muffin Man lives (the Muffin Man!!).

The Covent Garden metro stop also lays a claim to fame as having the shortest tube journey, a princely 270 metres to Leicester Square station and the London Transport Musuem is also in that district. There are sixty pubs and bars in the borough, which sounds like an attendance challenge I would have undertaken if I was a local resident! The area is referenced by Charles Dickens, Hitchcock and within My Fair Lady and Pygmalion. Whilst we were in residence there was a local singer called Joe Corti performing.   

We then had an al fresco lunch on one of the rare precious green spaces purchasing some tucker from the nearby Pret et Manger. Now I am always astonished regarding how many Pret’s are in the capital as it seems there is one on every street corner and undertaking some quick research, I have gleaned that of the 474 branches they currently have in the whole of the UK, 369 are contained within London.

We then mulched over to the southern side of the river where there numerous summer events and stages set up for entertainment later in the day. We deviated into theLondon Southbank Centre, which is linked to the Royal Festival, a venue I have covered in a previous blog when I saw Mogwai there. Within the open area of the centre, we saw an act called 3318 performing.  

  

Southbank Centre. Image Credit fabrique.com

Within the territory lines of Covent Garden there are thirteen different theatres, including our intended destination of London Adelphi Theatre for a matinee showing of a musical version of Back to the Future. The theatre, originally built back in 1806 is now located on the Strand and has traversed through three previous derivations and the latest building is now Grade II listed.

In 1997 the London production of Chicago opened at the theatre and had a subsequent eight and a half year run. In 2006, Brian Wilson had his last UK performance of his album Pet Sounds on the stage there.    

Back to the Future was a movie released in 1985 and I personally think it is proper popcorn fun and a very fine film and was immensely popular garnering around $400m at the box office. The musical soundtrack was provided by Huey Lewis and the News.

One of the amusing legacies is that a Chicago band was named 1.21 Gigawatts after possibly the most renowned line in the film, which is in itself a classic example of life imitating art. Also, to this very day it appears I cannot help myself from exclaiming ‘The Libyans’ every time I see an old blue Volkswagen campervan!     

1.21 Gigawatts. Image Credit facebook

We then headed onto the Somers Town Coffee House pub which is a regular go to establishment situated on an adjacent street to Euston train station. The hostelry dates back to the eighteenth century, and its name derives from the simple fact that it was previously a coffee house! There is also apparently a late night speak easy cocktail bar called Cosy located in the basement.

Nearer to the station, some essential drinks and snacks were then purchased for the evening train back. Upon reaching our carriage and our booked seats, I was surprised when a lady turned round to me and said whilst grinning that hopefully nobody was going to move us from our seats, at which point I realised she had also been on the morning train and witnessed my earlier altercation!   

Manchester Venues 196 to 198

This week I am continuing the tale of my Manchester gig treasure hunt on the eve of Friday 29th August 2025. So, as you gravitate up Bridge Street away from Salford Central train station you traverse past the impressive People’s History Musuem before reaching the renowned day and night pizza parlour spot Crazy Pedro’s. In the 1960’s the latter location housed Edwardia, a boutique clothing store created by footballers of the day, George Best and Mike Summerbee.

Beyond there are two subterranean bars opposite each other across the street, the one on the right is the Gas Lamp which is housed in the former Manchester & Salford Children’s Mission building. Across the road was the Brink, a cracking real ale establishment opened in 2014 that had a mural of bees on the stairs painted by local artist Qubek, but unfortunately it never reopened after Covid.

 

 The Gas Lamp. Image Credit Time Out

Three doorways further down is a new venue on the block called Manchester No Vacancy. It is virtually an all-day establishment opening at 10am for breakfast and brunch before staging live music from 5pm onwards from Thursday through Sunday before finally closing the doors at 4am, hopefully they operate split shifts for the staff employed there! When I visited there was a local singer/songwriter called Trev playing.  

As Bridge Street hits Deansgate, there is Katsouris Deli with their belly busting portions, diagonally opposite the Sawyer Arms, which is believed to be Manchester’s oldest pub with a continuously held licence, dating back to 1730. Now this compares to the Old Wellington Inn which despite being built way back in 1552 it did not actually become a pub until 1830.  

A further couple of doors down is the Lost Dene public house which was one of my hero establishments during Covid. In the days where you had to book your two-hour boozing slots we visited with Jo and Paul and when we were upfront about having different addresses, they had no choice but to separate us initially but were then gracious enough to arrange adjacent tables so we could converse verbally instead of texting each other across the pub! These small human touches were gratefully appreciated in that bleak period.  Just beyond there is the atmospheric Rylands Library which certainly rocks a Harry Potter vibe.

The Ape and Apple. Image Credit Dreamstime.

If you then follow the route from Bridge Street onto John Dalton Street you shortly find yourself landing at the Manchester Ape and Apple. The hostelry which went through a £400k refurbishment in 2025 is a multipurpose venue with long running Comedy Balloon nights, salsa classes and Murder Mystery events and also contains a heated roof terrace. It was initially opened by the footballer Denis Law in 1997 after its previous life as a bank and is owned by the Manchester brewers Joseph Holt.

A lady called Jane Kershaw is the great great great granddaughter of Mr J Holt and on one dull soggy day at the age of ten, she was tasked with designing a sign by her father. That very sign depicting an ape balancing an apple in its hand whilst perching on a beer barrel still hangs over the pub entrance today and Jane is now within the sixth generation of the family to work for the company.  The walls also contain a blue plaque to honour the scientist John Dalton who has the moniker of ‘The Father of Modern Chemistry’.

I arrived before Marcus so ensconced myself in the homely room armed with a cheeky ale. He arrived just as a singer called Evan hit the stage who despite being acoustic was thumpingly loud drowning out our conversation, so we moved on after a couple of tracks.  

We then progressed onwards to our next port of call, Manchester Founders Hall which directly faces Albert Square. The hostelry was previously called Duttons for a decade from 2014 before JW Lees brewery took over the reins and they decked out the spacious beer hall with dark wood surrounds and black and white tiled floors. A lot of the furnishings were reclaimed from their 200-year-old Greengate Brewery.   

Founders Hall. Image Credit manchestersfinest.com

Alongside the plethora of tempting real ale options, they also have regular quiz nights and ambient DJ evenings. They also stage live music and on the night of our visit a three-piece act called Late Last Night were playing, who in their bio portray themselves as a Wedding band from Stretford. After my flurry of five new venues that evening, we then headed on to my sixth new venue and our feature gig of the evening, one that I will cover in a future blog.