The first Saturday 3pm kick off of the Baggies season that I can make, so I combine pleasures. The railways may be broken but the trams are still going. An AZ City walk is in order.
This is a simple route - 30 minutes on the Birmingham Canal to pick up Edgbaston Reservoir.
Along the Birmingham Canal
The reservoir was built in 1824 by Thomas Telford to supply the canal system. It's now home to the Birmingham Sailing club, with a 1.75m path around the perimeter. You can say hello to people working in the opposite direction. Twice, if your speeds are not in sync.
Looking over the city
A brief detour to take in Perrott's Folley - dating from 1758 and known as "The Monument", even if the true purpose is lost in time.
Probably just Perrott showing off
Onto pre-match booze.
Working my way through some rather fine Adventure Lab Caches, I am compelled to visit a couple of tap rooms.
Sommar is first up. You wouldn't think a tap room next to a Lego shop would work. And you'd be right. Its too isolated from the rest of town and I am not sure I want my drinking to be in a place where kids eat for free. I'm more a "kids can have some pop and crisps in the car" kind of dinosaur.
A Tap Room in front of a plastic giraffe
Sommer Waves - A Citra and Cascade Pale Ale
I'll give their extensive range of craft another try - but at their other location in town.... very close to my second and final bar today.
But first, some evidence contrary to the opinions of those at the other end of HS2 - the Old Oak Common philistines.
Birmingham is alright.
View from our library
And our council House
Which leads to the Thornbridge Colmore Tap..... a relatively new addition our drinking scene and possibly replacing the Old Joint Stock as my "go to" destination. Somehow, they have made a new build bar have a comfortable pubby feel, which appears lived in and authentic. The range of beers is always amazing. I am a patron of their monthly subscription box, which easily puts Thornbridge as my most checked in brewery on Untappd.
Yet faced with all this choice, its rare that I venture from Jaipur on cask. It nearly happened on my last visit but I failed to notice the redesigned pump clip for Kelham Islan Pale Rider - which remains only sampled in can.
Perfect pint in a perfect venue
Everything is going too well and it's time to make my way to the Hawthorns. Surely the baggies won't let me down today, will they?
Shoot four times, score four goals..... 4-2 winners against a sorry 'Boro
Walk Details
Distance - 3.5 Miles
Walk Inspiration - AZ - Hidden Walks in Birmingham Walk 4
The Curse of Pub Ticking: Another contender for my favourite London Pub
The Good Beer Guide takes me to an absolute delightful pub... bizarrely one never visited before. Pentonville's King Charles I is in the correct part of a town for a Northern based beer tourist. Yet, somehow, this gem has sailed under the radar. I won't be a stranger going forward.
Spilling out in London
Don't tell Soho's Coach and Horses (or Smithfields Hand and Shears) but I may have a new favourite.
In common with those pubs, The King Charles I feels like a locals pub. A selection of characters on a Saturday afternoon that provide perfect entertainment for those who can discreetly people watch.
A high stool at the bar, the best seat in the house.
Eyes Front - Southwark Brewery Vista - A Single Hopped American Pale Ale
The History (A rare feel good pub story)
The pub was rebuilt in the 1930s and was originally called the Craic House. It was a popular spot for locals and was known for its friendly atmosphere and its live music.
In 2015, the pub was put up for sale and faced the threat of being turned into flats. However, a group of local residents and pub enthusiasts banded together to raise money to buy the pub and keep it open. They formed a community benefit society called Ale Purveyors Limited and successfully purchased the leasehold in 2016.
In 2019, the pub was listed as an Asset of Community Value (ACV). This means that it is considered to be an important asset to the local community and that the community has the right to be consulted if the pub is ever put up for sale again.
How lovely to see a tragic story so often told having a happy ending. And I love the blurb from their website.
A vital part of the Kings Cross community, we also welcome visitors from further afield to our down-to earth boozer, which is mercifully still thriving in a rapidly gentrifying area.
Today's Visit
This is one of those pubs that I felt instantly at home. Could have been the wood panelling. Might have been the walls mounted with nick nacks - from the intricate to the stuffed animal heads. The juke box definitely played a part. The beer quality and choice was taken for granted with its bible recommendation.
I'm not a fan of signs banning things in pubs but a single placard proclaiming "No Racists, No Sexists and No Fascists" should replace "Live, Laugh, Love" in home furnishing departments.
View from a High Stool
What the chaps in the first photo would have seen if I was the invisible man
But is the people that make pubs. In the space of an hour, I was included in three conversations. One about beer - expected. One about football - standard. One containing details that I would not have told a priest in the confines of a latticed confessional.
I left with a warm feeling of having been entertained and worthy of trust with another's problems.
But there was work to be done.
You can't be classed a pub ticker until you've had Fullers ESB in a busy railway station.
There is no way this is a walk for the purist. Inner London at its most brutal.
Yet it starts with a rural feel - Epping Forest stretching its fingers down to Wanstead, Hollow Pond - providing some greenery.
The last reaches of Epping Forest
Hollow Pond providing boating
We then hit Walthamstow and I'm forced to take my pleasures where I can find them. An impressive town hall and a lovely adventure lab cache in Lloyd Park, buzzing with activity with a food festival. Too early for lunch, which saved me from a difficult choice of which nationality of street food would have received the Mappiman dollar.
Walthamstow Street Art
And the Town Hall
The walk dissects Banbury and Lockwood reservoirs and rather nicely, allows me to complete the Pymmes Brook Trail. This signposted path follows the watercourse from the source in High Barnet to where it empties into the Lea. For transportation reasons, I stopped the walk at Silver Street but the London Spiral allows me to mark the path complete.
Sunshine on Lea
A pathway through industrial estate London
Then it the unappealing North Circular from North Edmonton to Arnos Grove. Its a tough walk, with things to ponder. How did a four lane near motorway get squeezed into a housing estate? How can people have their windows open? Is it safe to walk the underpasses?
One thing is for sure, there is a paucity of pubs available. 10 miles in London and I pass two. The Bell at Walthamstow announcing itself on the London AZ Map. I was too early for that one, and rather snootily, I turned my nose up a Dicey Reillys in Silver Street. I'd made my mind up that the day was not going to be improved by a faux Irish theme bar and my fellow PubsGalore reviewers concur.
So it’s true to say that the Upper and Lower Edmonton area covered by the N9 and N18 post codes in this area has suffered significant pub losses over the years and is now a bit of a pub desert and desperately cries out for a decent go to pub. Unfortunately this is not it.
To say I was pleased to see the umbrellas along the side of the Arnos Arms was an understatement. I thought I was going to have to wait until getting back to Kings Cross for a post walk pint, but there, next to the tube station is a pub adorned with Bass lanterns and signage promising Craft Beers.
Anticipating the damage of Craft on the Mappiman Wallet
Looks like i had a bit of touch. Old reviews stating it had no real ale and it looks like it used to be a Harvester. I'd have had to console myself at the salad bar.
It's now independently owned and offering a fine selection of casks and keg. On most other days, it would have been Timothy Taylor Landlord. With the sun shining, it made sense for me to give the much heralded Lost and Grounded Helles another go.
A rare chance to use the "Bread" Descriptor on Untappd.
A quick look at where Stage 12 takes me. Wembley.
As a Baggies Fan, I'll need to ask for directions.
Where to go when you've ticked the Good Beer Guide Pubs?
The quarterly trip to Manchester. The classic pubs have been blogged, visited and in many cases, revisited. My Google Maps is still full of "Want to Go" recommendations, satisfying my need for new experience, in a perpetual quest for life's vibrant tapestry.
The 37 bus from Swinton drops us off adjacent to one of Google's Green Icons. Mulligan's, a little bit of Ireland in Manchester.
Mulligans of Deansgate
12:10pm, so its only been open for 10 minutes, yet the Guinness is lined in rows on the bar, ready for the final stage of "The Build". Small tables, so tightly packed that conversation can only be encouraged. Piped in Fiddley-de-dee music. Flags from Irish counties nailed to the ceiling. A framed Roy Keane number 16 Man Utd shirt.
Authenticity running to the prices, where a pint of the Black Stuff is an eye-watering £6.70. At least down Dublin's Temple Bar, these high digits are in Euros.
Stop starting, I know a Temple Bar Pint is more than 7 Euros
Best part of a tenner for a pint and a coke stung a little. Maybe this is what happens when you let accountants buy pubs.
The quest for value moves on to The Old Nag's Head. An exterior that belies a fine interior, with walls adorned by a million framed photographs and a ceiling that celebrates Manchester's musical heritage, in all its glory. The great and good sharing space with the New Fast Automatic Daffodils. A band that could be classed with the great and good, if more people remembered them.
Once drinks are ordered, we settle down at the far end of the ground floor to take in the vista. It's so distinctive, I am sure my North West Twitter followers will be able to respond to a rare game of "Guess the Pub", even for one that is beyond the reach of my usual GBG ticking.
Three correct answers and two comments making the fully valid observation of "when is a pint not a pint?".
We've not got time to ask if they could fit a whisky in there, as we are booked for alternative spirits. A tour of the Spirit of Manchester - a gin distillery, where you have six (and I stress very small) snifters of Gin, Vodka, Rum and Absinthe - whilst a young fella tells you all he knows about copper vats. In and out in 45 minutes, with a warm internal glow and the feeling that Absinthe needs to be protected in the same way as Stilton and Melton Mowbray pork pies. Surely "Protected Geographical Indication" plays a part. When I think of the green loopy juice, I think of Swiss mountains and lakes - not railway arches in a former Industrial powerhouse.
Disorderis the next bar - a lengthy walk to the edge of the Northern Quarter. Note to future self - never take the Arndale Centre as a short cut. Don't tell Mrs M, but we were further away from our destination on the eventual exit.
In a rare example of planning - I actually put notes into the "Want to Go" flag in Google. Its not much but an "Ian Curtis Mural" is enough reason for me to frog march Mrs M for a mile through the rain.
Disorder
It's a comfy enough bar - with two Vacation cask and multiple kegs, including the Doom Bar of the Craft Beer Scene - Deya's Steady Rolling Man. I'll take away two fond memories - wonderful red Chesterfields (the king of pub seating, even in edgy craft bars) and a sound track that made me suspect where my stolen iPod eventually ended up.
The kids turn up - Millennials - who have recommendations for tea. Where as we Gen X'ers would choose a restaurant, they pick a place with a runway. The Firehouse hosts fashion raves on a Wednesday and "Werk" on a Friday. Werk - Ghetto fabulous, resident dance full force. I'm reading from their website but for an authentic Mappiman restaurant review - you can have any meat you want as long as its chicken and the potatoes (not chips) are a tenner.
But we dined amongst "influencers". Someone from Love Island, live instragramming so we could look on our phones at what we were experiencing. They may have had a sausage dog, but then again, I had been on the absinthe, so don't take this as gospel.
New experiences - summer truffle mayonnaise and my first negroni.
The blog may take a subtle future change of direction next week.... the clever money is on a review of the new katsu curry at 'Spoons.
One thing invariably leads to another thing. A podcast brought Peter Underwood, a paranormal investigator, to my attention. A web site has digitised some of his works and includes a map of where his investigations took place. Only natural to look at what's closest and there's an entry for Walsall - where there remains much pub ticking work to do.
On possibly the wettest day of 2023, I make the 90 minute train journey, covering all of 23 miles, to go in search of spooks and pints.
After such an public transport odyssey, a breakfast is required. And who wouldn't want to breakfast in a doric arched former civic building, with the added bonus of drinking a Camra Champion Beer of Britain award winning beer?
Found on Flickr - Too wet for me to stop for photos
Abbot Ale - there's not a bandwagon I wont jump on - especially sub £3
St Matthews Hallticks all the JDW Boxes. A trek upstairs to find the loos. Cheap beer. Quickly served breakfast. Architecturally stunning, both inside and out. It isn't every day you can drink in a library. It isn't every day you can drink in a Grade II listed building.
Not that that stops them getting torched in this part of the world.
— Once Upon A Time In The Black Country (@once_country) August 6, 2023
As to the award winning qualities of Greene King - not getting involved. Too much to discuss in the blog.
Despite the rain, a walk around Walsall Arboretum and then through light industrial estates that make me think I have plotted Pretty Bricks incorrectly into the GPS. But there, opposite a "Hot Foil Stamping and Pod Printing" factory, it stands.
Have you ever seen prettier bricks?
Listening to another podcast - Birmingham food critic Simon Carlo's Meat and One Veg - he claims his three favourite Brum pubs are the Jewellers Arms, the Wellington and the Craven Arms. The common denominator? They are all Black Country Ales tied houses. And so is the Pretty Bricks. Simon, like myself, is obviously a fan of the traditional pub experience.
Just add punters and you have the traditional pub experience
Zero other punters. I suppose Walsallians cannot be bothered to walk through industrial estates in the rain.
The only change from the BCA blueprint I noticed was a traditional beer board, rather than a PPT on a TV Screen. Just the 7 real ales for me to chose from, with Fixed Wheel No Brakes Pale Ale my pint of the day.
I was going to save the Fountain Inn until the end, but as it is at this end of town, I head there next. I've heard good things about this from one of the hosts of the Beer O'Clock Show podcast. Not that I was likely to miss a GBG nominated brewery tap.
Another solid looking traditional
The front door presents a choice of "Snug" and "Bar", with both rooms separated by a central bar. Handpulls on either side with differing options and I was pointed to a chalk board list of offerings. The funny thing is, I did not notice any from Backyard Brewery, for which this is the tap room.
Maybe I panicked too early under the pressure of making a selection. Not that there was anything wrong with my chosen Abbeydale Explore the River Aire ESB. Which I assume was meant to look like that. Only 9 other Untapped checkins, leaving me unable to prove the haze one way or the other.
Three other punters at 1pm on a Saturday
Onto the reason for being in Walsall but don't drop off, pub fans. Unexpectedly, amongst the many chicken shops of Caldmore Green, is a Tudor Manor House. Since 1817 and until very recently, it was the White Hart Pub.
Chicken Shops not captured by another Flickr user
Now flats, but the signage remains to show "what you could have won"
During renovations in 1870, a Cromwellian sword held by a dissected child's arm was found in the attic. Local legend had this down as a "Hand of Glory". This medieval folklore tale claims that the hand of a hanged criminal, fashioned into a candle holder can be used by burglars to avoid detection from the occupants of the house they were robbing. The fumes knock them cold and the only way the flame can be extinguished is via milk. Admittedly, for spooky content, the last part of the myth needs some work.
Tests showed that this limb was actually pickled and most likely used by medical practitioners who had bought a cadaver from the local grave robbers - known in these parts as "Digg-em-uppers".
Got half an hour spare? This amateur youtube video is much better than you would expect and gives you the complete story, including that of the ghost of a woman, impregnated by a member of the royal family.
Still leaves Andrew as the biggest wrong 'un.
And what did the Council do with these artifacts? In classic West Midlands style, they lost the sword and put the arm on display in the town library. Pandering to modern sensibilities, it was removed from public view but until recently, was available on request.
But if you want to see one - go to Whitby Museum, where they have a bone fide Hand of Glory in a glass cabinet. You've got to love this country!
Back to the pubs and one last Good Beer Guide Tick at the Walsall Arms. A proper blogger would link a joke linking back to the White Hart.
Down the Back Streets of Walsall
At last pub life - split into thirds. One third watching a Man Utd friendly. One third watching the racing from Newbury. One third on their phones, into pork scratchings or both at the same time.
Pub with punters
Five real ales on - and a decent St Austell Proper Job, stuffed into a Wye Valley glass.
Will I back in Walsall? You bet your bottom dollar.
I forgot to go to the Victoria. And the Butts Tavern. Hell, they might even let me into the Cricket Club, if I bring the bible with me.
