If it's October it must be Mornington Crescent

[MarkWithaC]

@LlynTegid

@TragicMuse
@DuckonaBike
@Youngersis1
@ComeIntoTheGardenMaud
@VixenMortar
@GaudeteGaudete
@EmmaOvary
@thankyouforthedayz
@HazelBite
@Itisallgoingtobeok
@Useyourname

Although of course MC is a game for all seasons, I do have especially fond memories of an October championships in Wales and extracurricular… fun amid the greenery of a National Trust garden.

If I've missed anyone I do apologise; do round up any players you happen to see or hear of.

And I'll start with a lovely little move that the Reverend taught me.
Finsbury Park

It just goes to show that like alcohol, prohibition just makes MC flourish. Goodness I remember the days. Waiting at Newport Pagnell service station tuned to a transistor radio when a code came through that meant a game was starting in an hour in a field off the M1.

Glorious days!

St James's Park

Exactly. There was something about prohibition which sharpened the collective mind, hence the Danvers and other great innovations. I shall try another of my favourites from that era, an obverse glide to

Liverpool Street

Ooh, I remember that field off the M1!

Willesden Green

Ah yes , the infamous "The sparrow has a chestnut head, and calls to it's babies" call, told us all we need to know.
I certainly got muddy that afternoon.

Cockfosters

Wasn't it your Rolls Royce which whisked a load of us away before the special constables arrived? There were twelve of us in the back, and Jenkins wasn't best pleased. My silks were a lost cause, of course, after the celebratory champagne started being quaffed.

Since Canada Water has been played without any intervening cross-hatches, I'll play Canary Wharf, invoking the alphabet rule.

I've always had a penchant for the alphabet rule and was disappointed at how quickly it was abandoned when last invoked. I'm glad to have the opportunity now, like Sam, to play it again.

Debden

A Hawkins shuffle to Ealing Broadway

I’m quite partial to the alphabet rule myself on occasion.

Finchley Road & Frognal

This is an excellent direction of travel.

Goldhawk Road

A chance to land at one of my favourite stations (and you will note that I have avoided all discussion of precisely how YellowPolkaDotBikini1980's silks were damaged or by whom). Such fun!

Hainault

Steady @GertrudeJekyllAndHyde - I played Hainault a while back. We're in danger of doubling back to knockings...

Ickenham should get us free. Using the Metropolitan protocol.

Well in that case the Metropolitan protocol allows a diversion to Knightsbridge.

Hainault, Hainault, so good we visited it twice? But onwards we must go, to beautiful downtown

Lambeth North

Goodness, one early Christmas shopping trip to Bruges with the curate and his young man and I come back to this!
I feel rather out of my depth amid some of the dazzling play here, but I'll try my best.

A Lopez Turn to Ruislip

Oh if you're using a Lopez the only way I can go is Watford

Ah, the untimely demise of the alphabet rule. How I will miss it. In its place, I'm invoking the international concordat:

Berlin Hauptbahnhof

Smart move in retaliation to the abandonment of the alphabet rule but I'm bringing it back to Blighty via the International terminal at St Pancras to Euston.

I involve the walking interchange rule to Euston Square.

Retaliation? I wouldn't quite call it that, although the MC Gazette (northern hemisphere edition) did once dub me the Boadicea of the game of games. So, in that spirit:

Neasden

Big move!

So we're off to Wembley.

After much thought and considering the recent move by @GertrudeJekyllAndHyde I'm going for Temple

Gertrude, were you at the All-German Exhibition Tournament in 2017? I have some excellent (if slightly hazy) memories of that one. Don't worry, what happens in Berlin stays in Berlin.

Kennington, under the Chang Protocol.

I think you'll find that's an out of station interchange. Permitted nonetheless.

Whitechapel, seeing as it's November.

The incomplete station name rule takes us back to Neasden. So I can move to Preston Road.

You'll understand, Mark, that I prefer to maintain a little mystery about who I might be and where I might have visited, so I can neither confirm nor deny whether I was at that tournament. I will admit, though, that I'm partial to a schooner or two of schnapps.

Putney Bridge