Our trip to London from New Romney began with a 5 am wake up call and a swift departure with Markku under a still dark sky. We decided to ride with him to work and take the train from there to be able to get a full day in London and to save a few £ in train fare. His commute is 90 minutes or longer, depending on traffic, 4 days a week (poor b******; I know!) but we made the 7:10 train north into the city from Chessington and before long had fueled up on coffee, breakfast and had rendezvoused with Adriana, our lovely London Hostess. Our day from there was a HUGE one; clocking in an estimated 13-14 miles walking as we wandered the city and took in some of the tourist sites. First stop Hyde park where we saw Buckingham Palace, Parliament House, Westminster Abbey, went up the Jewel Tower (less impressive then it sounds), Big Ben, along the River Walk to the Tower Bridge, across into the City, and around and around and around...That evening we met with Adriana and Rory for a delicious Indian dinner in Leicester square before retiring, exhausted, to her place. Next day we headed back to Hyde Park and visited the Apsley house and took an audio tour of this impressive, former home of the original Duke of Wellington. Beautiful artwork and classic, fancy adornment decorated the whole house; and as far as these things go, we enjoyed it alot. Next we attempted to tackle the British National Gallery where we saw even more art; yes we DO do things aside from visit breweries when we travel; thank you very much! A few hours of old paintings including some Van Gogh, Renoir, Monet and many other famous impressionists did leave us a bit tired, hungry and thirsty so we retreated to Trafalgar square to take in some Sun (!! Yes, in London) and grab a snack and a drink. About this time we realized that it was time to take advantage of an event so monumentous and awesome that I'm very surprised we didn't know about it earlier and thus plan our trip around it. Turns out one of the old London breweries, Young's, was turning 180 years old today and to celebrate they were handing out coupons for free pints in the (free) evening paper that they give out at Tube stops. Of course, we rolled past and grabbed a stack of papers and clipped ourselves a half dozen coupons (hey, we're traveling...you'd do the same!!) and proceeded to the nearest Young's pub to cash in 4 of them. Awesome!!! For dinner we went to the Shipyard Tavern for a good quality pub feed with Adriana and Rory. I had a pie of the day (chicken and asparagus) and Gina got the mussel special; a little warm up for our next stop: Brussels. They were actually pretty good, you know, for a British pub, that is! Another night, another bus ride back to Camden; this time however, the trip home deviated via the corner pub. Not surprising; I know...but, what makes this pub unique is that it is named after Gina's favorite mythological and magical creature; the Unicorn, and therefore, according to her logic, and contrary to Rory's opinion (he has been there before), it must also be a Magical establishment. Uh... not sure I'd say magical so much as rough, seedy or gutter. In any case, as we do, we made friends with the barman and negotiated ourselves a few cheap drinks... 3 for 2 beers. And, we were pretty happy with that too, til we tasted the beer, that is. Desperado is perhaps the most vile swill that has ever graced my pallet, and, let me tell you that is saying something. Imagine a Luke warm Corona: now pour out 1/3 of the beer and replace with a mixture of Mickey's Malt liquor, 1/2 a shot of the worst Tequila known to man, lime juice from a rotten lime, a shot of pure corn syrup and a splash of urine. Now; leave this concoction out and open for 45 minutes so it goes flat and looses the last hint of coldness. You now have a close semblance to Desperado beer...found only, to my knowledge, in the dodgiest of London watering holes. Desperado aside, we managed an OK time and so charmed the barman that we walked away adorned with several pieces of Jack Daniels memorabilia and even a Unicorn barman shirt. Not a bad day out!! HUGE thanks to Adriana and Rory for being such gracious hosts, insanely helpful friends and awesome tour guides!