Walking. Gossip. Travel.

Category: UK

  • Cambridge – The Maypole

    Cambridge – The Maypole

    This was the third in our list of pubs to visit in Cambridge, the Maypole which is a freehouse that is listed in the Good Beer Guide. I have visited here before, but it was several years ago and I’d managed to forget most things about it. It was part of the Punch estate that was purchased from Pubmaster, but it’s now a free house and there’s a comprehensive history of the pub on their web-site from its opening in 1851 which is clearly laid out. The history of the pub is quite complex, as the site once had two separate pubs on, the Maypole and the Plume of Feathers.

    There’s a central bar area in this CAMRA award winning pub, which now has an Italian street food menu.

    Interesting decoration in the pub of a maypole scene and the interior was clean and comfortable. The service at the bar was friendly and helpful, with the environment being welcoming. The pub is well reviewed, although recently got a negative 1/5 comment saying:

    “If the pub happens to be playing a wonderful Luther vandross number, and you happen to sing along quietly, then it appears one might be more suited to wetherspoons and you will be asked to leave”.

    Ignoring the sneering about other pub chains, I quite approve of the policy the pub seems to have here. And from five years ago:

    “I got 31 chips for 3 pounds”.

    A 1/5 review which seems to have been a fore-runner of the JD Wetherspoon Paltry Chips group on Facebook…..

    There were beer options chalked up in a few places, this is the keg list which has some acceptable options, but feels a bit limited for a freehouse with no ties that is mentioning that it’s making a big effort in this area. Although we had just been to the nearby Thirsty, where the options were exceptional, so maybe an unfair comparison between the two. The cask list is better than the generic choices in some pubs in the city, I suspect they do more cask than keg sales here.

    We both went for half a pint of the Brazilian coffee from Colchester Brewery, as I couldn’t see anything at the bar that I hadn’t had before. This is though a perfectly acceptable beer, and one of my favourites from that brewery, and it was at the appropriate slightly chilled temperature.

    This feels like a well-run pub and I can see why it has been listed in the Good Beer Guide, with an effort made to have both cask and keg options, as well a wide range of other drinks. We didn’t try the food, but the choices looked interesting and the service was friendly and welcoming, so a very pleasant visit. As an aside, CAMRA note there’s no accessible toilet here.

  • Cambridge – Thirsty

    Cambridge – Thirsty

    [NB, I’ve visited again and it remains excellent]

    This was the second pub in the little expedition that my friend Nathan and I took ourselves on in Cambridge on Saturday (the first was JD Wetherspoon for a quick breakfast) and it was apparent quite quickly that this was going to be an early highlight of the day.

    That’s a very decadent and exciting selection of beers chalked up above the bar. The service was friendly, engaging and the staff member was knowledgeable and keen to help.

    Functional seating in a venue which seemed to have started with more of a wine emphasis and has shifted more towards craft beer, a move that I applaud. There were lots of power points around the bar as well which was handy. They’re partly a shop and partly a bar which is a nice combination, although we noticed them on Untappd, which shows that it’s perhaps worth venues like this paying for the premium service to get noticed…. It’s not the largest venue around, but there is a reasonable amount of seating and there are a few seats outside as well for when it’s warmer.

    The beer selection in the fridges, which cut across numerous styles and the choices here were no less decadent than the draft options.

    The Sweet Cherry Bakewell Sour from Vault City Brewing, nice flavours of cherries and almonds, although I probably didn’t need as much as half a pint of it.

    The Blueberry Pumpkin Spice Latte, again from the ever reliable Vault City Brewing. Smooth, full bodied with an initial hit of blueberries and then a rich aftertaste of cinnamon and more blueberries. Really very lovely. What was also nice was that the staff member came over and gave us each a Vault City Brewing glass, which was handy as I needed a new beer glass, although it meant that we had to navigate around Cambridge all day with a glass each [as a spoiler, Nathan and I did both get our glasses back to Norwich safely].

    I very much liked this venue and they had numerous customers coming in when we were there who purchased boxes full of different cans, and it’s fair to say that they weren’t priced like Morrison’s flog off their Stella. Some considerable effort has gone into sourcing beers that are actually very good, which isn’t the easiest thing to do and often isn’t done at all by pubs. There were some very tempting options in the fridges, particularly the sours and the stouts, but I managed to resist the temptation, not least as I already had a glass to traipse around all day, let alone beer.

    Definitely one my my favourite pubs in Cambridge and one I’d happily recommend. Quirky, on trend and free from generic beers. As a controversial aside though, the beer range here is one of the best in the city, but I suspect that it will never get listed in the Good Beer Guide due to the lack of real ale…..

  • London – Islington (Borough of) – Mikkeller Bar (Exmouth Market)

    London – Islington (Borough of) – Mikkeller Bar (Exmouth Market)

    There are now two Mikkeller bars in London, there’s one in Shoreditch, and there’s now this one at Exmouth Market (named after the Exmouth Arms Pub) which isn’t too far from King’s Cross. This visit is from early November, when a few of us gathered here before we went to meet Scott at King’s Cross railway station, which was very kind of us to meet him off his train. Mikkeller was founded in 2006 and it now has something of a global reputation, once a cuckoo brewery which brewed wherever it could, but now with its own locations which include this bar.

    The beer selection is chalked up behind the bar, but they’ve also got it listed on Untappd as well which is handy. They do have beers from other breweries, but they inevitably have a focus on the beers that they’ve brewed themselves. It’s inevitably all very on-trend, not just the beer selection, but also the location and the service style. I had absolutely no complaints about the balance of the beer selection either, there was an excellent range of different styles available.

    The food options at the bar, and the company said when opening that:

    “This is not a restaurant with a brewery, it is a brewery with a restaurant”

    I liked the menu, which was quite simple, but had some interesting options on it, including the ‘Ndjua Scotch Egg and the Nordic Summer Salad, a very firm nod towards the origins of the brewery. Decent mix of vegetarian and meat options as well, it’s actually quite a tempting little selection.

    I had three one thirds here, with all the drinks being brewed by Mikkeller. I went for the Can’t Say No 2 U (a stout), the Heliosphere (an IPA) and the Parasol Paradiso (a fruited sour). That last drink, and the lighter coloured one in the photos above, was beautifully decadent, a nicely balanced sour with strong flavours of mango and passion-fruit. The drinks were all served perfectly, in smart little branded glasses and everything was at the appropriate slightly chilled temperature.

    The venue was relatively busy, but seemed clean and organised. The service was attentive and polite, with the bar staff being knowledgeable about the beer options. If I’m being overly critical, the noise volume was a little higher than ideal, but it’s a busy bar in London and so perhaps that’s not an entire surprise (although Goose Island have better acoustics as far as I’m concerned). The on-line reviews are nearly all positive and glowing, which isn’t unexpected, and I’d quite happily return here and recommend it to others. All really rather lovely.

  • Norwich – Brewdog Visa

    Norwich – Brewdog Visa

    I picked up my new Beer Visa from Brewdog in Norwich yesterday, which I thought I’d be interested in given my attempt to visit every Brewdog in the country. I have to say that I don’t really quite get what they’ve done here, I had hoped it was something like just getting it stamped at each Brewdog. Instead they’re introduced something really quite complex which seems to involve having certain drinks to get stickers and then also repeating the same process at different Brewdog venues. I can’t see whether they’re trying to promote visiting different bars or drinking their mainstream beers, so they’re got some hybrid thing going on.

    It’s actually so complex that I really don’t understand it despite reading the instructions on numerous occasions. Although, to be fair, I’m often easily confused by things. For anyone who wants to read the rules then they’re at https://www.brewdog.com/uk/beer-visa-2.

    Given that I don’t tend to drink Brewdog’s own beers when in their bars, as I’ve had them all, I’m not that interested in the whole process so I’m going to bin the visa. Not the loyalty scheme that I had expected, but apparently they’re relaunching it again in 2023. I’ll wait until then and hope they get something a little more exciting.

  • Norwich – Dhaba at Fifteen

    Norwich – Dhaba at Fifteen

    In an attempt to work through some of the restaurants in Norwich that I’ve neglected to visit over the last couple of years, my friend James and I popped to Dhaba at Fifteen last night. I wasn’t entirely surprised and delighted by Spice Valley last week, but this one came recommended. The welcome was immediate and helpful and we were asked to provide track and trace details. I’ve lost track now of what the actual rules are, but I thought the restaurant was being careful which is always good.

    The menu which I thought was well laid out. There are the traditional Anglo-Indian dishes shoved at the bottom, so they’re there as a choice but the restaurant isn’t going to shout about them. There were numerous really quite innovative dishes there that I haven’t experienced before as well as plenty of vegetarian options.

    The restaurant is perhaps a little plain its decoration, but it was clean and comfortable. It got much busier during the evening, with a number of smaller groups coming in. The restaurant also seemed to be doing a decent amount of takeaways and deliveries, so it seems a popular location.

    I’m always disappointed at any Indian restaurant that doesn’t offer my drink of choice, namely mango lassi. They had it here and it was thick, slightly sweet and very delicious. I approved.

    This is much better from the chutneys and the staff member explained what they were. There was a minced carrot almost like coleslaw (I clearly wasn’t listening when they told me exactly what it was called) and a mint raita which both had a depth of flavour and some care put into them. I’m going to have to e-mail the restaurant so they can tell me exactly what these were.

    [I have e-mailed them and they promptly replied saying that, from left to right, they were a sweet carrot & onion chutney, mint raita and spicy mango chutney.]

    I went for the Kolkatta Kasundi Chicken which is a mustard based curry, something that I’ve never had before. I was suitably surprised and delighted by the arrangement, the chicken was tender and moist with flavour from the sauce, the curry itself had a strong mustard taste without being over-powering and it was served as a generous portion. James had gone for the Peshwari Chicken Pasanda which he thought was equally good, with a similar flavour of almond running through the curry. The rice was fluffy and as expected, with everything being at the appropriate hot temperature.

    The service was always polite and engaging, but without being overbearing or fake. The staff seemed keen to help, which was evident in the way they were offering other customers the option to change dishes to suit their tastes or to make starters into mains. Although the restaurant was getting busy, we were never rushed or hurried, so the environment was comfortable. The prices were perhaps a little towards the higher end of the scale, although the quality justified that.

    The reviews for the restaurant are generally very positive, although I’m bemused by the negative review that complained about the large pieces of chicken. I’m not entirely sure that this is a negative for a restaurant, but there we go….. I’d say that this is one of the best Indian restaurants that I’ve been to in Norfolk, suitably decadent and I think I’ll likely come back here. All very lovely.

  • Morley St. Botolph – St. Botolph’s Church (Stanhope William Howard Sholto Douglas-Willan Memorial)

    Morley St. Botolph – St. Botolph’s Church (Stanhope William Howard Sholto Douglas-Willan Memorial)

    Inside St. Botolph’s Church in Morley St. Botolph is a memorial to Captain Stanhope William Howard Sholto Douglas-Willan, a name which suggests some substantial aristocratic pedigree.

    Sholto, which appears to be the name that he went with, was born in December 1897 was living with Ferdinand Howard and Agnes Hilda Louise Douglas-Willan, residing in Bexhill at the time of the 1901 census, although he was born in Dover. The family had three servants at the time of the census, so there certainly seems to have been some money, with numerous members having served in the armed forces during the nineteenth century. He was though the son of Reverend John Alfred Douglas-Willan, Rector of Morley.

    He was a leader in the 4th Battalion of the South Staffordshire Regiment and as the plaque notes, he was mentioned in Despatches, although his medal card doesn’t give an exact date for that or what he did, but it appears to have been awarded posthumously.

    His photo appeared in the Daily Mirror on 6 March 1917 as a missing soldier, with anyone with information encouraged to write to his father at Morley Rectory, although the press reported the week later that details of his death had been confirmed. Sadly, he had been killed in action on 17 February 1917 and his name is commemorated at the Thiepval Memorial.

  • Morley St. Botolph – St. Botolph’s Church

    Morley St. Botolph – St. Botolph’s Church

    This was our final church visit of the afternoon and Morley St. Botolph is certainly very different to the church at Morley St. Peter.

    There is some evidence of a Norman church on this site and it’s possible that they constructed on a pre-conquest building. The church that stands today is mostly from the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries, although there was an extensive Victorian restoration. And a more recent disaster that I’ll come to a moment.

    This illustration is from the middle of the nineteenth century, before the church was restored.

    The chancel window, likely put in here quite early, perhaps in the thirteenth century.

    The three stage tower, likely from the later part of the fifteenth century.

    The blocked up priest’s door.

    The vestry was a medieval addition, although it was in ruins by the nineteenth century and subsequently needed rebuilding by the Victorians.

    The porch, probably thirteenth century, but heavily restored.

    It was getting dark and as part of their festive celebrations, the church turned the lights on.

    And another photo of after we had left the church’s interior, I thought that this was rather lovely.

    The interior of the church was accessible as there’s a Christmas tree competition going on and the community had been invited to come and visit.

    The interior of the church is mostly modern as there was a devastating fire in 1959 which destroyed most of the nave. The building was left derelict for a few years, but it was needed by the community and so a reconstruction project was started. The architect was James Fletcher Watson and he has ensured that the church has retained its medieval feel, with some quite attractive new wooden pews. I haven’t yet found any photos of the church in ruins, but the chancel section survived, albeit heavily fire damaged.

    Nicely decorated and there’s the selection of raffle prizes to one side. As an aside, Richard paid £1 to enter and he’s hoping to win the slime.

    Some of the Christmas trees from the competition, all from local community organisations.

    A friendly volunteer turned on the main lighting after we said that we were looking around and he gave us a brief history to the history of the building. The lighting before this though was minimal, but the glow from the heating gave it a strangely warm feel. There was a warm welcome offered by the volunteers, with free hot drinks available which Richard partook in. Members of the community had come to look at the Christmas trees and I liked the enthusiasm of the volunteer at the little desk near to the door who was encouraging people to join in some fund raising projects next year.

    It appears that this church is something of a hub for a number of local congregations and it has a welcoming feel to the whole arrangement. If it hadn’t of been that important cluster church then it might never have been rebuilt in the early 1960s and it could have been left to fall into ruins.

  • Deopham – St. Andrew’s Church

    Deopham – St. Andrew’s Church

    Deopham is a Norfolk village with just over 500 people and it’s fair to say that it has a church which speaks more to past wealth and prosperity.

    St. Andrew’s is a Grade I listed church, but it’s not in the best of condition following thefts and attacks on the building over recent decades. It was constructed between the late fourteenth century and the early sixteenth century, with the four stage tower literally towering over the area. There was though a church here before that date, of which nothing visibly remains.

    This explained why some of the churchyard was taped off like it was a crime scene, bits of the masonry are falling off.

    It’s a grand building, but it felt damp everywhere. The chancel used to be thatched until the Victorian modernisation, although the main nave had long since been roofed with lead.

    Unfortunately there have been some relatively recent lead thefts from the roof and it is some need of general repair.

    The boarding-up clerestory windows, clearly not ideal.

    However, going back to a book written in 1858, the church has been in this position before, although it’s not entirely evident from the illustration in the publication. The author Raphael Brandon noted:

    “The noble tower of this church is perhaps not excelled by any in Norfolk. Both within and without, this church is in a sad state of decay: most of the windows in the tower are blocked up, also those in the porch, and the east window of the Chancel, a fine piece of Perpendicular tracery”.

    The chancel window issue is fixed now, although it’s been visibly altered. There was a major restoration by the Victorians about twenty-five years after the book was written which restored the church to its former glory. That was a hard fought battle though, it took until 1882 and by then “a sadly dilapidated church” before finance was found to fix the issues. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners had fixed the chancel and opened the window in the 1860s, but they weren’t responsible for fixing the nave. Some of the windows are still filled in, but the church was given a comprehensive makeover and a new hammerhead roof during these changes. One slight disgrace to the process was that they discovered numerous murals and medieval wall paintings during the renovation, but they decided that they wouldn’t bother keeping them.

    The porch, which was open, although the church itself wasn’t. There was though keyholder information for those who wanted to access the building.

    The once grand porch which now just feels damp.

    Oh well, what’s classy, let’s go and scratch some initials into the church’s stone….. Grrrr.

    It’s not a perfect repair on the porch.

    The churchyard is sizeable and it’s still generally well maintained and cared for.

    And rather an attractive grave, with the church in the background.

    This was clearly once a magnificent church and it still is something special, but it’s in desperate need of funding to fix the problems. Having windows boarded up in the clerestory is hopefully a relatively short-term issue, a church of this stature deserves the decadence of at least being intact. But, at least the windows weren’t mostly bricked up as they had been in the eighteenth century, the current situation is relatively easy to reverse.

    Protecting the church from crime is also clearly going to be a challenge as it’s relatively remote and it has been targeted before. The last twenty years might not have been favourable for the church, but with some good fortune and positive input from the authorities, maybe I’ll return here in a few years to a very different building. There remains the challenge though, which was evident in the mid-nineteenth century as well as today, that the church is a very substantial building for such a small congregation and village.

  • Morley St. Peter – St. Peter’s Church (William Henry Beaumont)

    Morley St. Peter – St. Peter’s Church (William Henry Beaumont)

    The graveyard at St. Peter’s Church in Morley St. Peter.

    Richard noticed this, which was of interest as it named William Henry Beaumont was killed in action in 1916. However, there was no record on the CWGC web-site of a war grave at the church and no-one from a local regiment of that name. Fanny (nee Burrows) had been born on 1 August 1891 and she died on 9 April 1985, just under 70 years after her husband.

    William was the son of Kate Beaumont of 21 Huntsworth Terrace in Marylebone in London, located near to Baker Street. William was in the 8th Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers and his service number was 18864. He died on Friday 7 July 1916 at the age of 25 and his name is recorded on the Thiepval Memorial, although his military records seem to have been amongst those which have been lost. He died in the Mash Valley area during the bloody battle to capture Ovillers.

    The neighbouring grave gave something of a clue, what appears to be the son of Fanny and William, namely William Henry James Beaumont, who was born in Marylebone on 16 January 1917 after his father’s death. By the time of the 1939 register, mother and son were still living at 30 Caithness Road in Mitcham, which was where William and Fanny had been living before he went to war. Of relevance primarily only to me, I’m fairly sure that I haven’t walked down that road at any point in the past, although I’ve been very near to it.

    The younger William lived until 30 November 2003. Which doesn’t really solve why any of the three have gravestones in this church, but I assume that the younger William moved up to Norfolk at some stage after the end of the Second World War (or the decades after it). Fanny’s death records are from near to Morley, so I assume she moved with her son and settled in this area.

    It’s hard to imagine what it must have been like having a husband die nearly 70 years before in such tragic circumstances, although it’s a shame that I can’t find William’s military records.

  • Morley St. Peter – St. Peter’s Church

    Morley St. Peter – St. Peter’s Church

    St. Peter’s Church in Morley St. Peter (it’s by the Y of Morley in the above map from 1900) stands pretty much alone at the corner of a field, with no evidence of the village that perhaps once stood nearby. The wooded areas in the above map have mostly been ripped out over the last century, so it’s a relatively barren landscape.

    St. Peter’s has historically been the chapel of ease to St. Botolph’s Church which is situated nearby and it’s substantially smaller. The stone has been rendered over to protect it and it’s not in the best of condition.

    The tower is medieval and has lost at least one section, likely due to collapse than anything intentional although that event seems to have been lost to history. It now has a pyramid roof over the top, although the steps inside remain. There is apparently a traditionally held view that the church is pre-conquest, dating from around the late tenth century, although all of the current structure is medieval or later. The local church seem less convinced judging from their web-site and they believe that the church was constructed as a chapel at ease in the thirteenth century.

    The east window of the chancel, which was all reconstructed during the Victorian period.

    The porch is from the early sixteenth century and has seen better days.

    The dilapidation of the porch is more visible from the side.

    The church was locked, but to be fair, the keyholder details were provided on the noticeboard.

    An extension to the side chancel, likely from the nineteenth century. I suspect the Victorian renovators hoped for something of a religious revival to boost the attendance in the church, but the congregation size around here is highly limited.

    The repairs aren’t what I would call invisible.

    The churchyard is relatively substantial and there is a small section of recent burials.

    This path ploughs through the middle of the cemetery and then stops dead, but old maps suggest that it connected into an old path which has long since gone.

    The church is clearly in a bit of a state, but also seems well loved and peering in it seemed reasonably well maintained internally. It dips down quite a bit though, which means that the ground outside and the chancel are a little higher. The nave is aisleless and other than for the Victorians renovations, the church seems relatively untouched since it was built in the medieval period. All really quite charming.