Indiana Backpain and the Coffee of Hope

Following on from my epic Friday tale... on Saturday morning I was supposed to go for a cycle ride to Epping Forest. It was going to be lovely and the weather was pretty good, however due to my back pain I decided it wouldn't be a very good idea to risk further pain. I did however, feel the need to move. So my friend and I went for our usual bike ride around an 18 mile canal route. This time I did it with a twist though. Convinced that my back pain was caused by riding my own bicycle last Wednesday, I opted to do it on a Boris Bike. This consisted of taking a bike, and swapping it every 25 minutes or so. I did this by using my friend's key and alternating it with my own, negating the need to wait for 5 minutes in between bikes. It also meant I could keep the same bike every time. Fantastic :)

Usually we stop somewhere for a drink or coffee, and Saturday was no different. We'd been meaning to stop at a place that looked rather delightful and it turns out it was. It was called the Towpath Cafe and they served the best coffee I've had in a long time. My review on Qype says it all really. I can't wait to go back there, but alas I fear it's getting too cold, as they don't have any indoor seating. D'oh!

Later that evening, I met up with my friend again, as he was having a birthday gathering and it was our intention to visit Pizza East in Shoreditch. The place is rather lovely. Nicely decorated and has a fantastic atmosphere. In fact it was heaving, so busy that we had to wait 45 minutes for our table. I was full of anticipation, but slightly suspicious of the people in there. Turns out I was right to be suspicious.

I'm not saying Pizza East is bad. In fact it's very good. It's just not my kind of place. It was trying too hard to be Shoreditch-cool. The pizza was made from fresh ingredients and you could taste the quality. The wine list was twice as long as the pizza list, but I would have preferred it to be the other way around. My biggest problem was that the standard pizza offerings all had weird toppings, like it was trying to be some modern pizza fusion restaurant. This didn't really work and the Italian waitress agreed with me that the pizza wasn't really like a real Italian pizza should be. It was also pretty expensive compared to the likes of Da Mario and Piccolino, who do rather good Italian style pizza.

Wheeeee :D

To be continued...