Old Father Baldpate say the bells of St Botolph-without-Aldgate

So come on BGC, how on earth can it be the bells of St Botolph’s who are saying “Old Father Baldpate” when it says any such thing in the rhyme at all!

Well of course my research into the origins of the Oranges and Lemons rhyme is scratchy at best but I am reliably informed that the Old Father Baldpate figure referred to in the song is none other than St Botolph, or Botwulf of Thorney as he’s sometimes known. The nickname must come from the fact that he’s the saint with a perfect monk’s tonsure hence the reference to his shiny slaphead.

I’m not sure why the rhyme refers to this particular church, St Botolph-without-Aldgate, as there are a couple of others bearing his name in London but as far as the tour is concerned, this is of great providence as it means we have another tour location within walking distance of the office and this was a factor we were only too happy to take advantage of.

The 3 Lords hanging in the pub of the same name.

So there were no tube lines to negotiate and as we went for the “meet in the pub” routine again it was only just a few minutes after 5 that James James, Mags, new-Guy Micky and myself found ourselves in the Three Lords on the Minories. This is a Young’s pubs and has only recently been renovated, turning it from a much darker East End boozer type place to a bright and light, hipster and trendy type place. The beer range was admirable with 4 ales and about the same about of interesting keg products alongside.

Even the glass was wrong.

I plumped for something I’d never heard of before, Red Car IPA although I’m not 100% sure it’s the same brewery as the one I’ve linked to here. I probably should have asked for a taster as the beer was just on the turn with that horrible vinegar scent overpowering any chance of smell or taste.

Luckily with the arrival of the girls (Gemma, Lisa, Brenda and Nicola) 15 minutes later and then the arrival of Buddy Rob 10 minutes after that gave us the opportunity to have a second round which for me was a much more palatable pint of Gentleman’s Wit from Camden Town Brewery.

Loverly bit of stuff! (and the beer)

For all its fresh paint and beer range there was something sadly lacking about the Three Lords, certainly the atmosphere was wanting especially as there were hardly any other folk in the place. The same couldn’t be said of the second pub of the evening, the tiny Still and Star, tucked around the back of Aldgate Bus Station in Little Somerset Street.

The girls. (Godzilla is on the end.)

Now this place is everything a proper little boozer should be. Good solid British ales on sale, from which I choose Adnam’s Lighthouse for Brenda and I, a crowd of regulars playing darts in the back of the pub, and enough room outside to relax in the nice early evening sun.

and the boys.

You could see the church from our position outside the pub and in an amazing show of knowledge firstly Brenda asked me if I was going to mention the “plague pit” which was dug in front of the church – I wasn’t but had read about this mass grave for plague victims – and then Gemma asked whether this was the church also known as “the prostitutes’ church”.  Now this was something I was going to mention (no…no….not for any other reason than it’s interesting, thank you very much!) and I can only presume that this secret was imparted to her by the power of her hooker tights.

Mind you this great show of knowledge and intelligence was quickly undone when Rob asked everyone “who was Godzilla?”, which is a pretty normal pub question to be honest, to which Brenda answered, “A monkey?”……..time to leave.

Not one of them do sex for money......apparently.

Crossing Aldgate High Street we passed by the entrance to Aldgate Tube Station and into the paved frontage of St Botolph-without-Aldgate church. As Gemma had correctly stated earlier, due to its position on the traffic island it had attracted more than its fair share of “working girls” and has become known as the prostitutes’ church as it provided a safe haven for these “fallen” women. Whether this has any connection to this place being one of the leading lights in the LGBT movement I don’t know but it’s always nice to hear about a more progressive outlook from within established religions. The final fact I imparted on my knowledge-hungry audience was that Daniel Defoe, he of Robinson Crusoe fame was married in the church, which made a nice link to our Monopoly visit to Super Tax which ended in a reading of a William Blake poem by the gates of Bunhill Cemetry and visitors to this most atmospheric place will know that Blake’s very well-known final resting place neighbour is none other than Mr Defoe.

The third place was somewhere I’d stumbled on whilst wandering aimlessly around the area and isn’t really pub in the true sense. The Trident is marketed as a bar and restaurant but when I’d wandered past the other day I noticed that sitting proudly atop its bar was a barrel of beer complete in cooling jacket and thought that this looked worth a second look.

Tartan carpet in The Trident. Note hooker tights on the right.

It’s a funny old place with a nice line in tartan carpets and the clientele seemed singularly formed of elderly businessmen who had started a lunch around 1-ish and were still going strong by 7 in the evening.
The barrel of beer was there though and tonight it contained Partridge Best from Dark Star and the barmaid reckoned she could just about squeeze out the four pints we needed for Brenda, Gemma, me and Mags who had decided to save her “one beer for the night” for this place although whether this was anything to do with Brenda’s explanation of “doing the barrel” is not clear.

In the corner of the bar were three of the aforementioned elderly business men who were joined by what can only be described as a much younger companion is a very form fitting dress. Far be it from me to cast aspersions on what this girl was doing, after all she may have been one of the guy’s granddaughter, but after coming in and joining the men, one of them started performing a back and shoulder massage on her as she sat there perched on a bar stool. As I clocked this rather bizarre exhibitionism I caught Mag’s eye and she asked me if it looked as dodgy as it appeared to be. I agreed and she then said that one of the other blokes was inviting her over too. I wasn’t invited…..

I was forced against my will to pose for these.....

We were then joined by tonight’s surprise guest, Charlie (remember him?) who’s new job is even nearer to these pubs than our office. He wasn’t in time for a drink in The Trident, which was a relief as there was nothing in the barrel now anyway, but joined us on the short trip to the final pub, Hennessey’s in Old Jewry Street.

If you visit the Hennessey’s website you’ll see that this place is undergoing a change of ownership and is being rebranded back to an original name of The Three Tuns. You could definitely see this was a work in progress with the smell of fresh paint in the air and a very limited range of drinks which on the beer front left us with a choice of Doombar or London Pride.

It will be interesting to see how work on this pub progresses as it in a prime location and is also split over several levels with even a roof top patio so it has the potential to be a really good pub again.
What will also be interesting to see in its development is the Oranges and Lemons tour. It’s been a widely known fact between the tourists, but hasn't been revealed on this blog as yet, that this particular evening was my last as a member of the same company as the rest of the tour regulars. I begin a new job in June and will be working from a different area of the city. But don’t despair because I have been coerced into promising to return to my old stomping grounds, much like a cat returning to the scene of its urination, and completing the rest of the rhyme.

And anyway there’s a much more important reason to continue the tour…….rumour has it that a very very special ex-tourist is returning to these shores and will be no doubt, absolutely gagging for some of the good stuff.

Beer! I meant beer! Dirty people!

Kettles and Pans say St Anne’s (and St Agnes)

One of the things that’s becoming obvious as we delve deeper and deeper into the verses of the Oranges and Lemons rhyme is the fact that all the church locations are based around the square mile of the City of London and it’s becoming increasingly more and more difficult to find new pubs to visit and not to make the various evening-outs overlap each other.

This week’s mission had just that sort of problem when the church revealed itself to be that of St Anne’s and St Agnes (poor old St Agnes doesn’t get a mention in the rhyme) which is on Gresham Street, just slightly further on down the road of where we finished the evening out for St Giles without Cripplegate. Although usually you only have to look left and right to fall over the nearest pub in London, this part of the city around Barbican isn’t at all well provided for in terms of pub numbers and it was quite a stretch to gather together some venues for the evening.

The City Tavern before it's demise.

What also didn’t help the mission was that one likely candidate; the City Tavern on Trump Street has now been demolished to make way for another huge office block that probably no-one will ever use. Luckily for the record-keeping of this blog, Google Maps hasn’t quite caught up to modern day events and still has images of the pub if you try to walk around the area using Street View. Perhaps as a Greene King house it might have never had the most interesting of beers on offer but it certainly did a nice line in window boxes.

Anyway on to the pubs that were still standing………

No1 Poultry - Loving the weirdy beardy and the bloke with the afro who have photo-bombed me.

We began the night, in a change to the normal run of events by meeting in the first pub rather than doing our normal herding cats waiting around in the office or waiting for the girls to finish their 2-for-1 cocktails in the Slug & Lettuce. The first pub on this occasion was The Green Man, a Wetherspoon’s basement pub located in the No 1 Poultry Building next to Bank tube station. This was a pub I’d visited before in the company of Aussie Pete (Remember him? Used to eat on his own? Funny accent?) when we were charging around getting the necessary Cask Marque scans needed for one of the Cask Ale Week’s special T-Shirts.

(L-R - James, James-James, James-James-James.)

The first arrivals were yours truly accompanied as usual by several side kicks in the forms of Spikey Haired Ed, James James, New Guy Micky and new converts to the tour Lisa and Reece. We were also joined by a second James, or maybe that should be a third James, who had finally after many promises of joining us made it out onto one of the expeditions. The evening was a damp and drizzly one and the 10 minute walk was made all the more challenging by the dawdling tourists and their dawdling umbrellas. Talking of umbrellas, in order to protect my new hair-do I’d picked up a bright blue stripped monstrosity of a brolly from the office and much to the jealousy of Ed remained bone dry all the way to the pub whereas he seems to take every drop of rain that might damage his perfect bonce as a personal insult..
First beer of the night was Darkest Devon from Exe Valley or at least it was for me, as the others went for continental lagers or vodka fun drinks. The pub is split over two floors and with the upstairs heaving at the gunwales we had to make do with a standing table at the bottom of the stairs As we waiting for everyone else to turn up.

There's a better head on this beer than on the person in the photo - oooo, been waiting to deliver that one for weeks!

We were swiftly joined by Buddy Rob just in time for the second round which in my case was something with “Gold” in the title but due to the reason I couldn’t get a mobile signal in the basement I failed to check into Untappd and therefore don’t have a clear record what it was.

A Comb-Under?

Also in my defence though, I was being put off by the chap stood next to me at the bar as I was placing the order. It’s to the credit of the collective British personality that usually even in the midst of the unruly scrum at the bar we still instinctively know who should be served before who. Now this chap standing to my left wasn’t trying to push ahead in fact his “problem” was the exact opposite in that he was being so meek and mild I was almost embarrassed for him as bar-person after bar-person over looked his proffered empty glass and went on to server someone else. That said it may have been down to one of the weirdest haircuts ever. You’ve all heard of the comb-over, which in my experience is usually centred on the front of the head. Well this chap had a comb-over but it was combed over the back of his head making for this mess of a “do”. Ah well, I hope his pint of “something Gold” went down well which is what I heard him finally order when someone had eventually seen him.

Mid-way through the second round we were joined by tonight’s eye candy in the form of Pissed-Up Phil, Natasha, Gemma and Lucie. Luckily for them it was only vodka fun drinks and halves of cider that needed to be downed before we left for the next place. But mind you, I think Phil still got in two pints in that time…..
The next place was the fabulously named The Old Doctor Butler’s Head, a back alley, wood-timber building currently owned by Shepherd Neame.  Doctor William Butler was the court physician to James I and was described as an eccentric, a drunkard and the greatest physician of his time. So apart from any medical qualifications this was a pub we should feel right at home in.

Unfortunately what we did feel in this pub was extremely crushed as it was absolutely rammed with the usual assortment of besuited city types. Somehow I made it to a place at the bar but that wasn’t enough to see me served before Gemma as obviously the barman had fallen in love with her perfect teeth and dazzling smile. We took the drinks outside where it was still spitting and drizzling and the big blue brolly came into its own as we nearly all managed to get under it and remained the right side of wet.

Wouldn't bother Gemma - hair looks a mess anyway.

No doubt this is a historical and interesting pub but the combination of size of the crowd, the arrogance of the suits and the wetness of the rain led us to scurry off pretty sharpish. But that wasn’t before Gemma had accosted two innocent chaps and accused them of being Italian.
The route now led us along Gresham Street and past the Guildhall and the Red Herring at the bottom of Wood Street which we visited as part of St Giles without Cripplegate, but this time we continued to Noble Street and the church for the evening.

Toilets just around the corner.

St Anne’s and St Agnes is another one of Christopher Wren’s rebuildings after the Great Fire of London. It’s built in the shape of a Greek Cross which apparently is quite rare in terms of church architecture and John Bunyan, author of Pilgrim’s Progress, was a parishioner here once but as you can probably tell I was struggling for anything else interesting to say about the place. I think the tourists were quite glad of that though as the sound of the rains was making everyone need a toilet.

Note - The barmaid was not a Heavenly Blonde, she was actually a bit of a mardy cow.

Luckily then for everyone’s bladders that the final pub was just around the corner in St Martin’s Le-Grand, a Taylor Walker place called the Lord Raglan. Luckily this place was large enough to cope with the amount of people in there so it was relief from both crowds and rain, and relief for the bladders as well. The beer chosen was the delightfully named Heavenly Blonde from Oldershaw Brewery and perhaps it was so obviously named after Mazars’s very own Gelfling, Natasha, both she and Gemma joined me in a pint of the good stuff. Well I say joined, I had 2 and ½ pints whilst they grimaced and moaned about the ¼ pint they managed to keep down.

(L-R Heavenly Blonde, Heavenly Moustache, Devil Woman)

And then before you could say “time Gentlemen please” the night was over as the majority of the male contingent ran off the rest of the kitty to McDonalds and Phil and I had to console ourselves with a pizza in the company of the Three Degrees. But there was still time for a final beer, a bottle of Greens Gluten Free Pilsner, which was only chosen because it was the only thing I’d never had from the menu before.
So it was back to Liverpool Street for Natasha and Gemma, off jogging somewhere in the night for Lucie in her day-glo trainers and me to save Phil from falling on the tracks at Barbican. So just a normal night
really………….