We were then left with the dilemma of how to get cross the River Thames. I initially thought of heading toward Tower Bridge, when Eileen suggested the Rotherhithe Tunnel. Despite many years of visiting the capital and traveling in a north – south direction, this was a crossing I'd never used, and with good reason. Although the Rotherhithe opened a decade after the Blackwall, it remains a single-bore tunnel that was designed for the traffic at the time – horse-drawn carriages, and rudimentary automobiles, rather than modern vehicles. Its narrow bore, plus a number of bends, mean the tunnel is restricted to private cars, and given that the latter have increased in size over the past few decades, the crossing leaves little room for drive error.
It took the best part of an hour to reach the tunnel entrance, thanks to road works affecting the A13, East India Dock Road. The traffic was scarcely moving in fact it took us an hour to travel to a distance of just a few miles hello somewhat delightedly we came up on the entrance to the Rotherhithe almost by accident. The tunnel lived up to its reputation of being narrow with just the one lane in either direction and several twists and turns, so it was a relief when we surfaced on the Surrey side of the Thames. and continued to navigate our way down to pick up the road that would take us back to Kent. We ended up driving along the A200, through Deptford and Greenwich, although looking at the map afterwards, we’d have been better picking up the A2 to the south of it. Not only would that road have been more familiar, it would probably have been carrying less traffic. I can't remember the last time I'd driven in London although it must be about 40 years ago. The standard of driving certainly hadn't improved but far worse than the four-wheel vehicles were the scooters employed by fast food companies such as Deliveroo, Uber or Just Eat. With scant regard for their own safety, they were weaving in and out of the traffic until it reached the stage of, "if you're stupid enough to cut in front of me, you can suffer the consequences if I accidentally knock you off." Fortunately, nothing of that nature occurred, but as with the other side of the Thames, we crawled our way towards our destination and before long a comfort stop was needed for the driver. We were also getting low on fuel, even though there would have been ample for the clear run home I’d originally envisaged. Fortunately, just the other side of Greenwich I found a BP filling station, with a well-stocked shop and, most importantly, some nice clean toilets! The petrol was considerably cheaper than back home so after filling one tank and draining another, we continued on our way and eventually found our way out of the metropolis and onto the A2. From there it was onto the M25 and back into Kent. We made a quick diversion into Tesco's at Riverhead, to pick up essentials such as bread and milk, eventually arriving home just after 4 pm. After that battle through the London traffic, I knew we’d definitely made the right decision by breaking the journey at the Premier Inn in Huntington. It was straight back to work the following morning, just as it was after our cruise, back in June, and I haven’t really stopped since.I appreciate this post doesn’t have much to do with pubs and beer, although it does involve a fair amount of descriptive writing about state of our overcrowded road system, the number of cars on the road and the occasional lunatic driver. Normal service though, will be resumed soon.