London, Limehouse. Formerly The Bunch of Grapes, the current building dates from the 1720s and is on the site of a pub built in 1583. it was formerly a working class tavern serving the dock workers of the Limehouse Basin. Sir Walter Raleigh set off for his third voyage to the new world from directly below the pub, and ferrymen at the time were known to drag inebriated patrons down the back stairs, drown them in the Thames, and sell their bodies for dissection. It has been tied to many writers and artists. In 1661 Samuel Pepsys wrote of this area in his diary (and Pepsys wasn't renowned for walking past pubs!). It appears (scarcely disguised) in Dickens' "Our Mutual Friend", and Limehouse is mentioned in Oscar Wilde's "A Picture of Dorian Gray", and by Arthur Conan Doyle, who sent Sherlock Holmes there in search of heroin provided by local Chinese immigrants. Francis Bacon and Edward Wolfe lived nearby and Whistler painted a nocturne of Limehouse. In 2011 Sir Ian McKellen took over the lease of the pub and in 2013 it was the venue for a meeting between Prime Minister David Cameron and TV personality Stephen Fry. Although it looks narrow from the outside it is very long and tall with 3 floors (like the TARDIS it is bigger on the inside!). There are bars on the first two floors with drinking areas along both, and an event room on the top floor. Sussex Best from Harvey's Brewery in Lewes (near Brighton) was my beer of choice.