Head of Steam, Euston Station (London)

Me too - but only because I enjoy a drink more when its a bit cold and dark outside - seems more convivial to me - and the beer tastes better :) - and I always miss it coz we go on holiday around then.

Yes about once every couple of months there is sadly a highly publicised plane crash (or two recently in Brazil). However during that there are millions of flights. The odds against it happening are huge. You are statistically far more at risk driving, taking the bus, or taking the train. Not that any of those would be options from Japan though I guess. ;-)

What I don't like about flying is the sudden unexpected turbulence you often get. The last flight I took to Lyon hit turbulence shortly before landing. First it suddenly lunged up several feet, and a couple of moments later it did the opposite. The sick bags did a roaring trade. :-(

Gloan!

In message , F9 writes

It already has The Landlord of the Railway telegraph, Putney heath was justifying in London Drinker his £3 pint for real ale , as he reckoned his real ale was as good as his lager & cider, will not be visiting in That case I would want better quality real ale.

Frying tonight!

Actually, I've been thinking of getting out of Japan. Things are getting a little hot with that loonie in North Korea having nukes. They've been pointing missiles this way and seeing how far they can get them to go in the recent past. It's only a matter of time before they mount a nuke on one and aim it at us. The Koreans love the Japanese... Not! I'd rather fly than fry! Only trouble is I've been here so long and don't have anywhere to go if I went back to the UK and don't really know anyone there. I suppose I could get a job stacking shelves in a supermarket if I'm lucky and find a nice spot under a bridge to sleep :-)

Umm, bubbles stopped coming through the air-lock after only 28 hours! Wonder if the brew is OK.....

Wayne

Hey, Wayne - don't you mean "London is such a rip-off!"? Not all of the UK is as expensive as London, thankfully.

(I paid £2.00 in a Gloucestershire pub last Sunday for an excellent pint of real ale - pity I can't remember the pub name now.)

Cheers

SD

Hi SD,

OK. London is a real rip-off :-) But I did really mean for accommodation. There were some reasonable places to drink while we were there. Beer here is a rip-off. We pay between 950 yen and 1300 yen a pint for Japanese micro-brews. that's 4.25 to 5.80, but the catch is they're US pints which means it's the same volume of liquid as a 90 pence 350Ml can of beer from the supermarket and quite frankly, a lot of Japanese micro-brew does not warrant that kind of price! I buy 10 litre kegs of regular beer which means I get about 20 pints from one keg. A pub selling micro from the same size keg gets 28 US pints! Make of that what you will. Me, I'm not going to pay that sort of money anymore, I'm sticking to my regular kegs, canned beer and I've just taken up home-brewing! I might be able to save enough to pay the fare to the airport next year and pretend I'm on my way to the GBBF! :-)

Cheers

Wayne

In article , Wayne writes

Travelodge. Basic but clean and comfortable. Book online far enough ahead in advance and the rooms are £26 a night. Yes, even in Laaaahndaaahn.

Recently featured on Watchdog, see:-

I tried booking recently in London for 3 weeks ahead and the price was still well over £50 excluding breakfast.

Paul

Or have a look at tripadvisor.com or venere.com for guest reviews. I've found venere.com and expedia.co.uk to be useful places to book hotels online. Nothing wrong with Travelodge though if you like anonymous square boxes.

But beware you don't get bounced - Travelodge was featured on BBC TV's Watchdog a couple of weeks ago and apparently it's their policy to overbook, so people who had booked ahead turned up and were sent away. It's never happened to me, and I've stayed in them several times over the years, but be prepared, just in case.

SD

Despite advertising the rate above, I've never found them to be cheaper than £50-60 a night. No problems with the room but I do find their rates very misleading.

On Tue, 7 Nov 2006 19:16:13 +0000, Brett... wrote (in article ):

We've stayed in them a few times for £15 a night, booking well in advance at pretty crap places - the missus's extended family live in a particularly dismal part of the country.

We've found a great advantage is that our three year old son settles really easily in them because they all look the same!

We've stayed in them plenty of times, but the problem with most of them is there's no pub (with real ale or not) within walking distance (bringing it vaguely back on topic ;-)). Many of them are near motorway junctions and just have a Burger King or Little Chef nearby, and b*gg*r all else. The worst one we stayed in was just off the M4 near Swansea. We were kept awake all night by a 'rave' party or similar in a nearby room (actually, it wasn't even that near but it was very noisy) with loud thudding music all night (the noise finally stopped at 7am). There was supposed to be a security guard on duty all night but there was no sign of him (I looked several times). When I wrote to complain afterwards I was told I should have reported it at the time. I pointed out that I would have done, except the reception desk was closed and the guard had gone AWOL. I eventually got a voucher for another night in one of their establishments after having to write several letters :(

But to be fair, most of the time they've been fine for what they are, but give me a decent pub with rooms, any day.

SD

LOL! We won't ask where :)

Darn sarf, one assumes. London being high on the list.

On Wed, 8 Nov 2006 21:29:37 +0000, loobyloo wrote (in article ):

Well I come from Barrow-in-Furness originaly and even I say it's dismal!

I've never in my life been to such a windy place. They must lose dozens of inhabitants to the sea each year.

Not over-provided with decent pubs of pubs there either, unless the situation's changed in the last 2 years or so. Ended up in the Last Chance Saloon (aka Wetherspoons).

On Sat, 11 Nov 2006 11:49:03 +0000, loobyloo wrote (in message ):

A Lancastrian in Barrow? Blimey, they're getting brave!

The Ambrose Hotel on Duke Street is tons preferable to the McWetherspoons.