Walking. Gossip. Travel.

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  • Chelmsford – The Ivory Peg

    Chelmsford – The Ivory Peg

    Before working around some Good Beer Guide pubs in Chelmsford, I thought I’d quickly pop to the only JD Wetherspoon outlet in the city, which is the Ivory Peg. Unlike many Wetherspoons, this one hasn’t managed to get into the Good Beer Guide, but has managed to pick up quite a lot of negative reviews.

    The welcome was fine, although I was sent to the ‘order by app’ area of the pub which was full, so then just went to the table service area. And then ordered by app, which hopefully didn’t irritate anyone. I’m sure that worse crimes have been committed in the Ivory Peg.

    The Old Growler from Nethergate brewery, which was better than I expected in terms of the richness of taste and it was well kept. I ordered the standard burger as well, which was perfectly well presented and cooked, although this JD Wetherspoon is the only one I’ve encountered recently which is still asking customers to meander around the pub to look for their own condiments.

    All desserts are £1.99 in JD Wetherspoons between Monday and Wednesday at the moment, so I went for this chocolate and salted caramel tart which is new to the menu. The ice cream was a bit littered with ice crystals, but the tart was flavoursome, albeit perhaps slightly gritty in texture. Hard to complain for the price though and the service was timely and friendly.

    I had a little look on TripAdvisor for reviews that might amuse me, even if no-one else. I liked this one from a couple of weeks ago….

    “Was having a drink with a mate this evening,it got very noisy as a big group came in shouting swearing no social distancing, 2 of the group spilled there drinks on the table so they thought they would lick the table bloody disgusting manager saw all of this but done nothing”

    It’s not ideal.

    “I asked the “red head” manageress TWICE to switch to ITV channel perfectly nicely so I could watch the rugby World Cup (it was showing a Sunday morning chat show that no one was watching), and was told “I don’t think I have that channel” – I’m off to The Fleece where the rugby is on all TVs.”

    I never quite understand why customers don’t just go to pubs that are showing sports rather than try and demand a pub change and then leave 1/5 reviews when they don’t…. But each to their own.

    “My girl friends and I like a good drink when we get together which not as often as we like. We spent over £100 and came out virtually sober. The drinks are thoroughly watered down. The way in which the bar staff sloshed it in the glasses said rather a lot. The service was so slow too. HEAD OFFICE YOU WILL BE HEARING FROM ME!!!!”

    I think the pub manager sounded as confused about this as anyone, but the chances of Wetherspoons watering down alcohol is IMO pretty much zero.

    Anyway, I doubt that this will be the best pub that I go to in Chelmsford, but it was cheap, cheerful and welcoming. All rather lovely.

  • Greater Anglia : Norwich to Chelmsford

    Greater Anglia : Norwich to Chelmsford

    And off again from Norwich railway station, to the exotic climes of Chelmsford and the shiny new (well, newish) train was sitting ready at platform 1.

    The train was packed in Norwich……

    There was a little confusion as the platform information screens were displaying conflicting information and then the train lights and power went out. The doors were locked shut for around ten minutes, although I did wonder whether they could be opened from the inside if required. The passengers on board looked suitably confused, but I remained hopeful that I was on the right train. Fortunately, about ten minutes before departure, the lights came back on and other customers could get on.

    The train did get busier on the way to Chelmsford and this is the busiest that I’ve seen the London train over recent months. It was still possible for customers to get a table to themselves, but only just. The refreshments trolley is back going up and down the train, although something strange has happened to the prices. A confused customer opposite was charged £1 for his coffee and when he queried it, the staff seemed equally confused as to why he was questioning this. £1 is way below the publicised price, but if there’s an offer on, perhaps that should be advertised. Anyway, the journey was all smooth and otherwise uneventful.

    And arriving at Chelmsford railway station on time, the first time that I’ve ever visited this city. I’ve also discovered today that it’s the only city in Essex and also the county town, which I would say is a fun fact, but I’m not sure how fun it actually is. The fare was £8 for a single which is very reasonable, especially since that’s cheaper than going from Norwich to much nearer destinations such as Great Yarmouth, Cambridge and Ely.

  • Three Hills Brewing – BPAVK Coconut Macaroon

    Three Hills Brewing – BPAVK Coconut Macaroon

    It would be remiss of me not to mention this beer that I had at the Artichoke in Norwich on Saturday. Brewed by Three Hills it’s one of their range of imperial stouts and it is quite beautiful. Flavours of coconut with a sweetness of taste, decadent and rich. I can’t recall a beer that I’ve had this year that’s better. It probably wasn’t the ideal beer in terms of it being 10% to have the day before walking 27 miles, but, then again, maybe it did me a world of good. Although maybe it might work better as a reward after finishing the walk. Anyway, I digress.

    Decadent is a word I like using, so I applaud it when breweries use it, especially when it’s actually true.

    And my rating, a 5/5…… I had a similar beer from them last week, the chocolate doughnut edition, which was tremendously good and also had the richness of flavours. I felt it just very slightly thin, but that one wasn’t far off perfection. Their cherry imperial stout impressed me, although I got more flavours of liquorice and so it wasn’t quite what I was expecting. But, I’m rather excited to see what they’ll come up with next, this is very much my kind of brewery. And they toast my check-ins on Untappd and since I’m easily pleased, I like them more for that.

  • Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue – Day 194

    Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue – Day 194

    The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue was first published at the end of the eighteenth century, and given that the current health crisis is giving too much time to read books, I thought I’d pick a daily word from it until I got bored….

    Lollipop

    Grose excelled himself with this definition, as it’s the earliest that is known for the word (although the OED might be in with a shout here, although they had a different spelling), noting the word meant “sweet lozenges purchased by children”. As Grose noted elsewhere in his dictionary, the word ‘loll’ relates to the tongue, and ‘pop’ is probably just from the sound that eating such a sweet would make.

    Until around the Second World War, the words lollypop and lollipop were usually about the same amount, with lollipop only becoming the preferred spelling in the last few decades.

  • LDWA 100 – Training Walk 7 (Flower of Suffolk Anytime Challenge)

    LDWA 100 – Training Walk 7 (Flower of Suffolk Anytime Challenge)

    This was our seventh walk in preparation for the 2021 LDWA 100.

    WALK NUMBER: 7 (Flower of Suffolk)

    DISTANCE COVERED: 27.8 miles

    NUMBER OF NATHAN’S FRIENDS WE “ACCIDENTALLY” BUMP INTO: 0 (but we weren’t in Norfolk)

    SUFFICIENT BEER CONSUMED: Yes (enough on Saturday to last us into Sunday)

    PUBS VISITED: 1

    WEATHER CONDITIONS: Sun, rain, sun, rain, sun, rain

    ATTACKED BY ANIMALS: No

    NUMBER OF SNAKES SEEN: 0 (although we did try)

    And so for some background…. This was the seventh training walk for the LDWA 100 walk that Nathan and I are planning, although we had Liam with us as well on this one. It’s the Flower of Suffolk anytime challenge, an LDWA event that takes place in normal times on the first Sunday in October every year. I enjoy this as I sit with my feet up thinking about how far everyone else is walking, whilst I’m eating chocolate and jelly babies. It’s because some of us can’t take part in the event itself because we have to marshal, it’s a sacrifice that I just have to make.

    But, since this bloody health situation means that we can’t hold the actual event, we have instead put on the walk as an anytime challenge. Thanks to the wonderful Peter, Chelle, Hilary and others involved in ensuring that this could take place. I will also complain at this point about Nathan, who promised me a quick drink on Saturday lunch-time, which ended up being about nine hours of drinking. Which reminds me, I must post about a certain beer I liked at the Artichoke, but more on that another time.

    So, Liam drives us to Dunwich, ready to take part in the walk. We stopped en route so Nathan could have a little walk about the road to prepare himself for the day. The walk itself starts by the ruins of Greyfriars Monastery, which is in the photo above. I admit to being a history geek (I know, I need to get out more) and Dunwich has no shortage of that.

    I went overboard with photos and took 180 of them. This was, I admit, bloody ridiculous. But they’re in time order (no jumping about the day, I have been very careful with that) in this post, showing the variety of landscapes and terrains we meandered through. We chose the 26 mile route rather than the 18 mile route, as, to be honest, we’re brave. Nathan was also in charge of navigation, since this is his first challenge event and we couldn’t be bothered. Annoyingly, he was actually quite good at that. I say we couldn’t be bothered, Liam probably wanted to, so what I mean here is that I couldn’t be bothered.

    I had the brightness on my phone turned low to save the battery, meaning I forgot about my shadow being in some photos.

    Dipping down to the sea.

    The beach.

    The beady eyed readers from LDWA N&S might notice here that we weren’t meant to be on the beach at this point. It was a minor navigational blunder of no-one’s fault and it was nice to have a meander by the beach.

    Liam looking for snakes. I was ready to take a photo of one of the area’s 60-feet long adders jumping out. We saw one mouse despite looking under several, that was the limit of the excitement.

    Moist.

    We had a little bit of a problem here, although this photo doesn’t do justice to the issue. The water came up to around Liam’s knees in the section before and for those who can see my Facebook page I posted the video of Nathan and Liam crossing a treacherous bit. It was like the mud run again, which we should have actually been on today if it hadn’t of been cancelled. Anyway, Nathan made that video adult rated by swearing as he went across……

    The rain stopped and started, but this did mean that we saw a fair few rainbows. We had a lunch stop here as it was after 12:00 and Nathan had to tip all of the water out of his shoe caused by the aforementioned issue.

    This is near Sizewell power station.

    Stormy skies.

    A field.

    A rather lovely cow. It’s amazing how close I’m prepared to get to a cow when there’s a fence between it and me. I’m scared of these huge animals usually, they always seem ready to charge whenever I look at them.

    Different terrain….

    Can anyone see the flaw with the pub’s QR code? It could have been worse, they could have used a Good Pub Guide flyer I suppose.

    This is usually where the LDWA checkpoint is, at the Eel’s Foot Inn. Unfortunately, Liam had forgotten his mask and it was pouring down with rain, so we decided against stopping here. Nathan wasn’t thrilled, but Liam’s incompetence was fortunate as we probably didn’t really have time to stop here. This is around nine miles into the walk as well, so it’s a bit early on to get too settled. Although given half a chance, we probably would have got settled here quite quickly.

    Rainbow and farm machinery.

    Boardwalk and I’m pleased to say that none of us went sliding off them.

    An annoyingly placed tree. Nathan was the only one wearing shorts, but he mostly got away with that with only a few minor nettle issues throughout the day. And he hardly complained.

    Mud. No-one fell in the mud, it was quite an elegant performance from all of us to be honest.

    More mud, but this time surrounded by some nice trees.

    Reeds.

    Some kind of mushroom thing. It looked delicious, but I have a rule of not eating anything from foliage or shrubs on a walk, with the exception of blackberries. I can eat several bushes full of those. I did get a few blackberries on this walk, but just a small number and I suspect they’ll be the last that I encounter this year.

    We battle on. Incidentally, Nathan isn’t bored and looking at his phone to entertain himself, he was navigating.

    The open skies of East Anglia….

    Water.

    I very much liked this photo (I’m good at self-congratulation) and it’s my new header photo.

    Water.

    Sea. This time it was on the GPX route we were meant to be on.

    This was quite a sad sight. It’s Walberswick Village Hall and this is usually where the Flower of Suffolk starts and ends. The anytime challenge starts at Dunwich (well, it starts anywhere really, but that’s where we recommend), but for most people on the actual event, reaching here in the afternoon (or evening) means you get a lovely hot meal, chocolate, cake, biscuits, jelly babies and maybe a banana if I haven’t managed to get them sent off to checkpoints away from me.

    We popped to the Anchor next door, but it was only open to those who had pre-booked. This was moderately confusing, as we would have sat outside, so it was unclear why we couldn’t go in, but I don’t know the layout and perhaps that was impossible. The pub claims to have a world class beer menu and I initially dismissed that, but looking at their on-line menu, it’s much better than I expected (not sure on world class, but it’s well above average). Anyway, if a pub is doing brilliantly and is packed to capacity in these troubled times, that’s marvellous, although it gave us a dilemma as we wanted a drink.

    Luckily, the Bell Inn was open and ready to seat us. This resolved the drink problem.

    The beer was Nathan’s, Liam had a coffee (we didn’t comment) and I limited myself to a Coke which I hoped was sufficiently sugary. And the bacon fries and scampi fries were mine. Well, obviously.

    The observant will note that it was starting to get dark by the time we left the pub. This wasn’t ideal.

    The final few miles of the walk….

    Looking back towards Southwold.

    And looking forwards to the car, only about three miles left at this point.

    Just what I didn’t want to see. I made sure to stay as far away from the heather as possible and we sent Liam to the front, in case a group of snakes teamed up to launch a joint assault. I know there’s limited scientific evidence for this, but I’m very aware of how sneaky snakes can be.

    We didn’t see any snakes….

    I didn’t have a head torch. I don’t really plan ahead. But we all had mobile phones with torches on which don’t exactly light the area up, but they cast sufficient light on the ground to ensure we didn’t stand on a snake.

    A tree. In the nearly dark Suffolk countryside.

    A mill. Although apparently it’s not a mill and is something to do with drainage. It’s not something that worries me either way, but it’s important to be accurate and the route description has been very careful with that.

    I had hoped that this photo would turn out better than it did, but it’s of St. James’s church in Dunwich.

    And there we are, all done!

    I made Liam stop at McDonald’s at the way home. I needed a decadent treat. The others were getting their evening meals of meatballs (for Nathan) and roast something or other (for Liam) and I pretended to be jealous. Secretly, I was quite happy with this and 12 hours of sleep when arriving home.

    Anyway, that’s another 27.8 miles (we walked a bit further than the actual distance of the Flower of Suffolk) out of the way and it was a most lovely day. Towards the end of the walk we decided not to do any more long distance walks as they were too tiring, but we had changed our minds by the end of the drive back to Norwich. I just never learn.

  • Spike Brewing – Brave Advertising

    Spike Brewing – Brave Advertising

    Quite brave and punch advertising this, “your liver will fail before our equipment does”. I’m not sure that advertising like this would be allowed in the UK, but it doesn’t much matter, as this is a US company from Milwaukee who produce stainless steel home brew equipment. Memorable advertising though, I quite like it.

  • Kent – Hawkhurst – St. Laurence’s Church (John Exeter)

    Kent – Hawkhurst – St. Laurence’s Church (John Exeter)

    I was moderately fascinated by this section of the graveyard at St. Laurence’s Church near Hawkhurst as it had graves in situ from the early eighteenth century. This one commemorates John Exeter, of a birth date I can’t be sure, but he was married at this church to Elisabeth Stace on 12 February 1714.

    The marriage record survives (clicking on the image will make it bigger) and it’s perhaps just a little magical to be able to see the handwriting of the vicar who performed that service over 300 years ago. Both John and Elisabeth lived in the parish, so this was very much a local affair.

    John Exeter died on 28 January 1744 and was buried on 2 February 1744. Unfortunately, I can’t find out anything more about John, it’s so far back to be able to work much out, but at least his gravestone has survived and remains in decent condition.

  • British Airways – Last Day of the 747

    British Airways – Last Day of the 747

    Tomorrow (Thursday 8 October 2020) is the last time that BA’s 747s will take-off from Heathrow Airport in London. Aircraft G-CIVB and G-CIVY will depart the airport and mark the end of this glorious fleet of aircraft, which I was delighted to be able to fly in numerous times over the last decade.

    I like BA’s attention to detail here, they’ve published the statistics of the two aircraft.

    British Airways 747 G-CIVB

    Date it entered service : February 15, 1994

    Retirement date : September 08, 2020

    Last passenger flight was April 6, 2020 from Miami to Heathrow

    Current livery: Negus

    Previous livery: Landor and was named ‘City of Litchfield’

    Operated 13,398 flights, flown for 118,445 hours and flown 59 million miles

    British Airways 747 G-CIVY

    Date it entered service : September 29, 1998

    Retirement date : September 08, 2020

    March 20, 2020 last passenger flight from Chicago to Heathrow

    April 5, 2020 last freighter flight from Dallas to Heathrow

    Current livery : Chatham Dockyard

    Operated 11,034 flights, flown for 90,161 hours and flown 45 million miles

     

    The luxury cabin as was, although it reminds me somewhat of a funeral arrangement, but there we go.

    And the delights of economy back in the day, although they would have allowed smoking then which would have annoyed me greatly. BA are going to live stream the departure of the aircraft and I like how they’re making an effort at a time where there are many other things that are competing for attention.

  • Kent – Hawkhurst – St. Laurence’s Church (Thomas Exeter)

    Kent – Hawkhurst – St. Laurence’s Church (Thomas Exeter)

    I’m slightly puzzled how this grave has remained in such good condition, or at least the top section of it, give that it’s nearly 300 years old. It marks the burial of Thomas Exeter of the town, who died on 12 April 1727 at the age of 43. The burial records survive and note that he was buried on Monday 17 April 1727.

    Thomas was married to Elizabeth, who is also marked on the same gravestone and she died on 10 January 1734 and was buried on 16 January 1734. It’s so far in the past that I can’t find anything else, but this is a remarkable survival.

  • Kent – Hawkhurst – St. Laurence’s Church (Grave and Tree)

    Kent – Hawkhurst – St. Laurence’s Church (Grave and Tree)

    Located in St. Laurence’s Church in The Moor, Hawkhurst, is what I considered to be this rather intriguing grave which was starting to be consumed slowly, but surely, by a tree.