19/09/21 - The Lion, Clifton upon Teme

Distance - 6 miles

Geocaches - 3

Walk Inspiration - Country Walking Magazine, December 2020, Walk 9

Surprisingly, I have never been to Clifton Upon Teme - despite its proximity to the much walked from Martley.

Its a pretty little Worcestershire village, with all the things required.... village store, village green and not 1 but 2 village pubs.

A spare Sunday and a Country Walking Route fixes this gap, although again, I fail to read the small print.  Its says to check if the Shelsley Walsh Hill Climb is running.  Of course, I don't.  Of course, it is.  On the fly route changes required.

Hill racing events discovered half way through the walk

Not that I'd have any idea my walk would be interrupted by a motor racing event on leaving Clifton.  High up above the Teme Valley, there is only solitude, quiet and fine views to Woodbury, Abberley and Malvern Hills.

Woodbury Hill

Its only on reaching Top Barn that it becomes apparent that my intended route is in fact the finishing line in the sort of race that only Great Britain could produce.  Instead of racing each other, the classic cars start at the bottom of the hill and time trail solo to reach Top Barn, where they complete a hand brake turn in front of a bemused rambler, looking for an alternative path.  

Death by Hillman Imp is not on today's agenda.

A steep drop through the woodland near Witchery Hole, emerges at fields above Court Farm - where the race begins.  Witchery Hole?  Folklore says that Witches were burned there.  Court Farm - ancestral home of Thomas Walsh - Sheriff of Worcester - tasked with rounding up Gunpowder plot fugitives.

Petrol-heads camp - Abberley School Clock Tower in the distance

Once the event nonsense and disappearing paths are negotiated, I am at the Teme Valley floor for some easy walking along the river - adding Shelsley Beauchamp to Shelsley Walsh onto today's new hamlet discoveries.

Access to the Teme gained at New Mill Bridge

Looking down the Teme Valley at Ham Bridge

A stiff climb back to Clifton - with the Lion in the village and the New Inn slightly out.

The Lion's advertising suggesting it has newly re-opened.  The residents were certainly taking advantage - a packed small bar, with the front beer garden filling up as the last of the summer sun makes its presence felt.

The Butty Bach was as good as found in my local - a Wye Valley house.

A Village Local

18/09/21 - Brewing Experience, Oktoberfest and a Deya Pilgrimage

If you find yourself in Cheltenham's Brewhouse and Kitchen in early October, drinking their American IPA, you'll be surprised to know that it was my son and I that brewed it.

I'll be checking the untappd ratings with my fingers over my eyes.

With an August Birthday, Mrs M thought hard about what you can gift to a man that has everything.

Experience always counts for more than possessions.  

Arrival is at 10am for breakfast, a morning of pumping hot water over grain, lunch, pumping hot water between vessels, adding hops and yeast and then scooping out the leftovers for a good clean.  Troops kept motivated through a walk/talk through of all their beers by a knowledgeable chap called Alex, who will surely ace his upcoming beer exams. 

Opening Stage - Soaking the grain

Mid Stage - Operation Tidy Up

Final stage - adding the yeast in the fermenter

5pm and there's nothing left to do, other than leave the yeast to do its magic over the next couple of weeks.

Brewer Alex tells us that the Sandford Ale House - a much loved former Camra Pub of the Year - is starting Oktoberfest celebration today.  The 5l keg mementos of the day failed to slow us down, as we tramped across town to our next destination.

It's a top afternoon - a huge marquee in the garden, five Oktoberfest beers on and authentic food to complete the experience.  Possibly mistakenly (although not really), I confirmed that I would like our Spatens in steins.

The £23 bill instantly showing me that I had got the volumes all wrong.  

A student moaning about getting a 2 pint chalice was something I never expected to hear.

Some would say we have enough beer for a day

Of course the day's not over there.  Next to the railway station is the Deya Brewery.  Thanks to our towns recently opened craft beer bar, their beer had to be the find of lockdown(s).  Steady Rolling Man on draught when the craft bar was allowed to open, exotically named cans of high percentage IPAs when not.

And its quite a setup down on the out of town industrial estate - a huge outdoor area under a silo that may be for show, street food and an equally sized indoor area - next to where the magic happens.  

And we are newly trained to know exactly how it all works.

Surely for show

Deya People

Shiny Happy Vessels 

14/09/21 - 21 Hours in Carlisle

Distance - 5 Miles

Pubs - 5 (Good Beer Guide Ticks #588 to #591)

Walk Inspiration - County Walking Magazine Jan 20 - Walk 17

A whistle stop tour of Carlisle - arriving at 13:00 and leaving at 10:07 the following day.

How I've missed long distance train travel - two episodes each of Nine Perfect Strangers and Anthony Bourdains Parts Unknown.  25% of Dom Wimslow's The Cartel tome.  Being upsold meal deals following the Preston staff change over.

I thought having a walk/Adventure Lab Cache, four good beer guide entries to tick off and the Baggies being on Red Button would have been entertainment enough but note to future self - do your research.  Reading Retired Martins blog whilst having coffee waiting for  the return train was entertaining but ultimately futile.  Leaving a town with regret is no way to travel.

The Walk

 

A simple town trail and along the river Eden to take in the sights.  More or less followed the route of the only Adventure Lab Cache available.

The Castle

The River Eden

The Start (or End) of Hadrian's Wall concludes the walk.  Either a train had just come in, or this trail is exceedingly popular.  A constant stream of overburden ramblers - including a lady with 70l rucksacks both front and rear - making me wonder just how many people have seen Reese Witherspoon in "Wild".

No time to ask, I have other Wetherspoons on my mind.

The Pubs

Not sure how to complete this blog without coming across as overly negative.

The Kings Head and Beehive are Good Beer Guide Pubs that are simply functional.  Traditional pubs that are missing any sort of factor, wow or otherwise.  I could just see through the bar hangers (thought to have been made extinct from the great plague) to see a decent Cumbrian Ales Esthwaite Bitter at the Kings Head.  No such problem at the Beehive - an estate sports pub - where Kirkby Lonsdale Tiffin Gold was in better supply than food menu items.

Would you like to read the Sign?

Of course you do

Horse Racing in the day, Champions League by night

Don't mention Brexit if you are Hangry 

I then break a solemn promise to Mrs M and venture in a JDW.  I felt as dirty as the tables, spending no more than 10 minutes in the most JDW of all JDWs. I could have got a full house on JDW bingo.

• Huge Shop Conversion
• Toilets requiring more steps than I completed on the town trail
• High Tables and Stools.  Both sticky.
• A row of populated puggies being spoon fed pounds by Las Vegas style zombies (without the buckets)
• Every table packed but strangely, with no-one at the bar
• I suspect the App.  Or Smuggling.
• £1.99 bargain Corby Ale correcting all perceived wrongs

In a spot of on the fly research, I was reminded of the State Management System introduced in the Carlise in WWI to control the town's drinking.  Excellent information at the link and the Cumberland Inn next door is a prime example and one of the few CAMRA Heritage pubs in Cumbria.

The karaoke should have warned me that this wasn't going to be a sedate, count down your life to the chimes of a grandfather clock's minute hand experience you usually get in CAMRA Heritage Pubs.  I sulked through "Show me the Road to Amarillo" but belted out Johnny Cash "Cat's in the Cradle", more or less solo.

State Management - Discos on Thursdays

Portaits above dart boards?  Asking for it

No real ales and there was an Internet based promise of Thai food from the "very interesting" rooms upstairs that no longer holds true.  The Royal Outpost Thai restaurant over the road satisfactorily plugging that particular hole.

With Baggies Kick off fast approaching, I decided to seek Internet and the Red Button on the App - with the Griffin providing the network.  

Stella in a Greene King.  And a goalless home draw.

This left the intriguingly named Fat Gadgie as the final Good Beer Guide Tick in town.  Google Maps had warned me, but (and this may surprise you), I am ever the optimist.

Closed since the first lock down

I should have taken Martin's advice and and made for the Howard Arms.  

It looked like a proper pub.  With beautiful green tiling.

I can visit when I complete the Hadrian's Wall Path.

11/09/21 - Digbeth Street Art, Ruin Bars and a Biergarten

Distance - 2 Miles

Pubs - 3

A Saturday Morning in Birmingham, looking for pre-Baggies entertainment.  It's fair to say there was little entertainment at the Baggies but that's a different story.

Google Digbeth and you are likely to find references to the Graffiti Art trail - which is a 2ish mile walk underneath the railway arches.  Walls and buildings have been spruced up with daubings to take the rambler's mind off the rubbish and the distinct lack of people.  It's eerily quiet for just a five minute walk out of a major city centre.

Meriden Street

Urban Space Man

Also an Adventure Lab Cache Location

All this culture can make a man thirsty.  From a previous visit, I've visited the pubs on the opposite side of Deritrend High Street.  It's 11am but Google allows you to search for pubs that are open now.  The Old Crown - Birmingham's oldest building does not fall into that category.  The Kerryman is reported open but isn't - giving the air that it may be closed until at least the major roadworks are finished.

This leaves the Big Bulls Head - which has "Opening Hours Unknown".

When you see a pub with all the curtains pulled to but the doors open, you do wonder what will be revealed.  Whatever it is, its probably safer than hanging around outside Digbeth Coach Station.  I venture in and am delightfully surprised by it's classic interior.

There's a mirror to google

Mysteries to be solved, even by this veteran pub goer.  There is one other punter, who is drinking Carling from a can, even when they have it on draught.  I watch him order his second, where he asks for a glass with a dash of lemonade.  Personally, I'd have had to have crawled across a desert for three days to order Carling (although there was that day at the Hawthorns when they stopped selling the Bathams) but surely its better on draught than out of a can?

My staropramen was fine and at least 30% cheaper than the next destination.

It would appear that Birmingham has its own Little Budapest, complete with a Ruin Bar.

The Ruin

It follows the ruin bar template to a tee - all mismatched furniture and ancient technology nailed to the walls.  Lovely staff, who if were not interested in my ramble, did a great job of pretending to be.

More Staropramen

But that's not it for the European adventure - saving Birdies for another day - I found the Zumhof Bier Garten - Birmingham's attempt at Munich, with a Millennial edge

Deck chairs and Decks

As if I wasn't spoiled by the street food options, they have a Pilsner Urquell Tankovna.

Unpasteurised beer delivered fresh within 48 hours of manufacture, to be consumed within 5 days.

Like the location, it was a delight.

Tankovnas

Match days aren't going to be the same again.

08/09/21 - The 5 Best Boozers in the Black Country

Adventure Lab Caching is a modern day treasure hunt.  Armed with an app on a mobile phone, you are guided to locations to answer questions.  Each answer adding to your geocaching tally.

What's this got to do with the Best Boozers in the Black Country, you may ask?

Well, a cacher called Signyred (thank you, my friend) has created an ALC that takes you to 5 pubs that they consider the best in an area that is blessed with some crackers.

Will I agree?

Will you agree?

There's only one way to find out.  I masked up for public transport and bought myself a return to Cradley Heath, importantly with a PlusBus Ticket.  In terms of distance travelled, this represented the best £3.40 ever spent.

The Crooked House, Himley Road, Staropramen

Might as well get the toughest destination out the way first.  This required two buses and a 1m walk, the last half a mile down a dreadful track.  Litter strewn, next to the Severn Trent shiteworks and through a lorry park.  Motivation to keep plodding provided the amusing signs.

Prepare Yourself

It's a Marstons House.  So we are not here for the beer.  In fact, they had no cask on at all but after 2 hours on public transport, quality Euro lout from Burton went down a treat.

So, what are we here for?  Well, you wouldn't want to miss this curio.

The Crooked House is falling down

It was built as farmhouse in 1765, becoming a pub called Siden House in 1830.  In black country dialect, Siden means crooked.

Subsidence has caused the left side of the building to be 4ft lower than the right and the whole thing is saved from collapse by the massive buttress, propping it up.  Marbles will run along picture rails uphill, and the curtains hang away from the window frame.

The Lounge.... Note the reversed hand pulls.  And the window frame.

£5 minimum card charge and I can confirm that a Staropramen, with Roast Ox chaser, comes in at £5.05.

Taken in the sunshine, but I couldn't hang around.  The next one is an afternoon closer.

Inappropriate glassware and the first part of my lunch. 

The Beacon Hotel, Bilston Street, Sedgley - Sarah Hughes Surprise and Ruby Mild

The only one of the five that I have not previously visited - so I am grateful to get Good Beer Guide Tick #587.

From this point on, our guide has selected boozers that brew on-site (well, maybe) and the brewery tower here acts as a reference point to know when to ding the diamond bus bell.

Plus its at an altitude of 777ft

A Beacon

Its the inside where the beauty is - a classic pub interior virtually unchanged since creation in 1852.  The front snug is separated from the larger rear "smoking" room by a tiny serving hatch where you have to bend down, asking whats on to a lady's midriff and have the beer passed through.   Always an optimist, I went for a Sarah Hughes Surprise.

2nd Part of my lunch - and the serving hatch.

My Untapped check-in receives the following response.

The 'surprise' is that it's not Dark Ruby Mild 😉

— deltrems (@deltrems) September 8, 2021

Well, I couldn't turn down a challenge - even if I thought Milds usually come in around the 3% mark.

 A dangerously drinkable 6% enjoyed in the "Smoke Room"

2:25pm and the bell wrung for last orders.  Proper old school.  A few more photos on the way out.

Hatch Close Up

The snug mirror, curse of pub bloggers

Mad O'Rourke's Pie Factory, Hurst Lane, Tipton, Lumphammer Gold

In all the excitement, I forgot to take my own external photo - lifted from their web-site

In the eighties, My Dad used to love the Little Pub Company.  Colm O'Rourke would take over a back street pub and ramp up the quirk factor.  Amongst the pubs I remember, there was a canal side pub with the bar made from a 30ft barge (the dry dock).  There was one called the Little Tumbling Sailor that had a lighthouse... at least 100 miles from the sea.  The one nearest to us - the Little Pack Horse - sold Desperate Dan Pies with horns - a tradition they continue here.

All the pubs were similar but unique and certainly conversation starters.  The chain was sold in 1998 to Ushers, in a move that was a disaster for the pubs.  Some I know have gone - others have returned to a more sedate/traditional pub experience.

The Pie Factory was bought back from Ushers 2 years after the buy out by Colm's former business partner.  It keeps the blueprint for what made them successful.  I know from experience, its impossible to get in during the evenings, without a booking.

Pub with a bath

Dangling Pots and Pans.

Factory Fresh Pies exported to the Civilised World (and Wales)

My Lumphammer Checkin elicits the response that the beer is no longer brewed on site - a fact that is endorsed by the chalk runner under the handpulls, proudly proclaiming "we now brew all our beer at Dig Brew".

Somewhere else to visit, in the future.  I am assuming Digbeth..... but research is required.

Ma Pardoes, Halesowen Road, Netherton, Bumblehole

Pure Home Brewed Ales

Moving on from 1980s kitsch, we move back at least 100 years for an absolute stone cold classic.

The Old Swan was one of only 4 brew-pubs left in the UK when CAMRA formed in 1971... and the advertising claims that they are the purest ales in the borough.

Not going to disagree - note the guess your weight m/c

This is the third time I have been and each experience is different.  I always seem to choose a different door and this is the first time I have been in the main front bar - complete with a rare enamel panel ceiling featuring a white swan.

Bumblehole - named after a local canal

Ma Pardoe?  The landlady from 1931 till her death in 1984, aged 84.

The Bull and Bladder, Delph Road, Bathams Best Bitter

I was never going to trust a Top 5 Black Country Boozer list if it didn't include this.... home of one of the greatest pints in the land.

And the source is where to drink it.

Talk about saving the best till last.

What a Beauty!

Its rumoured if you run a pub and want to sell Bathams, you have to come and fetch the casks yourself.

I feel sorry for the rest of the country.

Four rooms to discover and a nice little patio to enjoy the last of the summer heatwave, reflecting on all that I have learned on my beery adventure.

The larger room - all punters sunbathing

Bathams Best Bitter

So what have I learned?

• PlusBus Passes are great value
• but how did you know where to go without Google Maps?
• (Ruby) Mild needs to be treated with care
• You can survive the day on Cheese and Onion Cobs
• Black Country beers stand comparison with any in the land
• Drinking them at source is best