Walking. Gossip. Travel.

Category: UK

Banbury – The Exchange (JD Wetherspoon)

The first pub stop en route to Cardiff was The Exchange pub in Banbury, operated by JD Wetherspoon. Using the chain’s text to explain the pub name and history:

“For almost 50 years, countless letters and parcels were brought in and out of this building. Banbury’s former head post office was built in 1936, on the site of an earlier 1877 post office. The new building, and the telephone exchange giving this building its name, was designed by Henry Seccombe of HM Office of Works. It was opened on 15 December 1936, by Colonel A Heenage, MP, Parliamentary Secretary to the Postmaster-General.”

As usual, I have to applaud the chain’s efforts to explain the history of the local area, there are tens of these boards across the pub. There’s a photo of when this venue was a telephone exchange at https://telephone-exchanges.org.uk/exchanges/banbury-exchanges/.

My now obligatory photo of the unique carpet.

The entrance and lower area of the pub, the main bar is on the raised area to the right.

And another photo looking towards the bar. There were around six real ales available, all at the usual low prices. For anyone staying late and wanting to go to a club at the weekend, the nightclub Fever is located literally behind the venue.

The pub is on the chain’s lowest price band, so this meal and drink were a grand total of £7. The steak pudding is OK, it’s not packed with the finest quality steak, but that Hazy Jane is a pint bottle and so that seems like excellent value to me. Ross went for the Christmas wrap as he loves this time of year and Liam I think went for the all day brunch or similar. The drinks and food all arrived promptly and were at the appropriate temperature, so everyone was happy.

This leads me seamlessly onto my having a look at the online reviews of the venue, which are about average for the chain.

“The “chef” kept coming out to the eating area in her grubby uniform and dancing all over the place.”

I’m with the customer, there’s no need for frivolity, it’s bad for the soul.

“My daughter, 18 today, tried to enter this establishment 30 minutes ago, with her approved photographic I.d. And was turned away for being underage, because she had to be 18 years old and one day, this is in contravention of the current licensing laws.”

That does seem a bit harsh, the excitement of turning 18 and being told that you should wait another day. Although it isn’t a contravention of the current licensing laws.

However, this is back in the day when venues were allowed to respond and they did.

“Your daughters ID showed her as turning 18 on 10/08/2019, so until 00:00:01 on 10/08/2019, she would not have been able to enter the premises. We are open until 01:00 on Fridays and Saturdays, which technically is the next day, so if she had come in between midnight and 01:00 she would have been allowed entry.”

A rather different story and I like that they would have let her in for one hour after midnight, that’s quite a classy response.

“Very disappointing experience where the rude staff member wouldn’t even consider looking at my son’s valid electronic Australian drivers licence as ID. We had already been served once? I was rudely told when the staff member was talking over me that it was company policy to see a physical document. We had no issue is Bristol. I guess Banbury isn’t used to seeing many international visitors”

As it stands, despite the Government planning a change to this, a pub can’t accept a digital ID. So that’s a 1 star review as the venue refused to break the law to serve someone…..

“Very disappointed,got to be the worst Wetherspoons I’ve ever been in.No fish and the Wiltshire ham was almost see-through with chips I could almost count on two hands. Usually I would have made a big fuss for being ripped off but it was my birthday and my wife talked me down. Safe to say I’ll never frequent this branch again OR RECOMMEND IT.”

Complaining should be allowed on your birthday…..

“Dreadfull , ordered a starter , main all arrived at once starter was cold and clearly not cooked , main pizza arrived 2 small pizzas as they had run out of large bases , just poor service , nasty nasty”

That feels sub-optimal, sending two pizzas to make up for not having a larger base. However, I felt the need to think about this and JD Wetherspoon offers 8 inch and 11 inch pizzas. I went to https://www.omnicalculator.com/food/pizza-comparison and it seems that the customer got a better deal here in terms of the area of pizza…. I think I should probably get out more….

“I think your staff need to brush up on the laws of photography within a public place.”

Goodness knows what the back story is here but the interior of a pub is not a public place. If the chain wants they could be as ridiculous as Sam Smiths and ban all photos.

“Widely regarded as being one of the worst in the chain.”

Not judging by Google Reviews.

Anyway, I digress and I rather liked this venue. In an ideal world they might have been clearing tables a little faster, but it was clean, comfortable and seemed to be decent value for money. The team members were friendly, the prices were cheap and that’s another outlet in the chain visited.

November 16, 2025
St. Neots – Weeping Ash (JD Wetherspoon)

Richard and I stopped off at the Weeping Ash in St Neots following the LDWA Local Groups’ weekend. It had been a successful few days, although it was fair to say that I was now getting quite tired.

Here he is enjoying his coffee. The pub was relatively quiet, but everything felt clean and organised.

I went for a pint of the Moose River from Hop Union Brewery, a hoppy, light, fluffy and bouncy beer. Eagle eyed viewers will note that Richard hid his ginger biscuits when he went to explore the pub, he was nervous that someone would scoop them up when they were walking past.

As for the pub itself, for the rest of this post, I’m going to copy and paste some text from a previous visit, which Liam and I made after I was brave going zip-lining in Wales.

The pub’s own text about the venue’s history:

“This former post office stands on part of what was once a much-admired Victorian garden belonging to the house across the road – the home of William Medland, an important man in St Neots. Bank manager and town commissioner, Medland died in 1872 in his late 60s. His widow lived in the house until the 1890s, when it was bought for the Conservative Club, which is still there. Medland’s garden was well known for its many fine trees and shrubs, particularly for its ‘magnificent weeping ash’.”

I have no complaints about the pub, it was clean, well managed and sizeable. The reviews on-line are a little less impressive, with the usual sneering type:

“It’s full of lads in white trainers and white socks that are really excited but have no idea what their excited about and badly dressed girls”

Fortunately, we didn’t have white trainers or white socks to avoid clearly offending this customer.

“They gave me a empty coffee cup without saying I needed to go and fill it up myself like I’m supposed to know this”

I do see this occasionally, often when the empty coffee cup is traipsed half way across the pub by a staff member, and then the confused customer has to traipse the same distance back to get their drink.

I find simple things entertaining, so was very excited to see a new type of coffee machine at a JD Wetherspoons. Now, I accept that I should get out more rather than spend time writing drivel like this, but it pleased me. For £1.20 for unlimited hot drinks, a complete bargain as far as I’m concerned. [I’d add that it’s now £1.81 since I wrote this with the coffee machine no longer being new]

It was a little early, but I did get a quick half with my hot drink, just so I could comment on the beer quality. I’m very dedicated to ensuring beer quality, but I do it for very selfless reasons of course. I went for the Jemima’s Pitchfork from the Glamorgan Brewing Co, a not particularly interesting beer, but at least well-kept.

The very keenly priced avocado muffin, my new go to breakfast option since the recent price hikes on the traditional breakfast. [I wrote that a couple of years ago As an aside, this menu item isn’t available in many JD Wetherspoons which is sub-optimal from my perspective.]

Anyway, I’ve visited here a few times, not least my latest visit with Richard this week, along with the food visit with Liam a couple of years ago. It’s towards the lower end of the online reviews for JD Wetherpoon outlets, but it’s always felt well managed when I’ve been before.

November 13, 2025
London – Southwark (Borough of) – Sun Wharf (New JD Wetherspoon)

A new JD Wetherspoon has opened at London Bridge station in what was formerly the London Dungeons. The entrance here is the former way into the London Dungeons, which was here between 1974 and 2013. This venue is a considerable project for the pub chain and it’s open for long hours, between 06:30 and 00:30 every day of the week.

As usual, I’ll take the pub’s history from their own website:

“Next to London Bridge station’s entrance, 48–50 Tooley Street are distinctive brick arches. Until 2013 (almost 40 years), this had been The London Dungeon. The arches were occupied by importers and provision agents, whose livelihoods depended on the warehouses opposite. Many have survived (Hay’s Wharf, now Hay’s Galleria). Fenning’s Wharf and Sun Wharf were replaced (in 1984/85) by the huge No.1 London Bridge complex. During that site’s redevelopment, a Bronze Age burial mound was unearthed.”

The bar which is bright and open.

Some of the brick arches and I can see why this was a suitable place for the London Dungeons. The rooms flow into each other, I like this sort of quirky thing.

The new coffee machine and there’s only hot milk, with no jugs for the cold milk.

There’s a bank of three coffee machines.

The unique carpet.

There’s a display about the carpet and why they’ve designed this one in this manner.

The menu.

Part of the support elements that I assume stop the building from falling down. The trains are evident running above both by noise and also because things vibrate a little.

This feels like a really well designed building, there is a choice of seating styles including low and higher tables. There are quieter areas, open-plan areas and plenty of power points. The team members seemed engaged, helpful and I saw numerous positive customer service interactions. As a conversion into a pub, this is one of the best that I’ve seen.

Although the venue has only been open for a few weeks, I thought I’d see what the few online reviews posted are like so far.

“Had had a lovely evening here but sadly the dessert menu isn’t clear enough – says “vanilla ice cream” as if it’s plain but it actually comes with sauce and the staff member wouldn’t switch it for plain despite asking. It’s a scoop of ice cream! Don’t argue the toss just switch it hahahah. Sauce was horrible by the way”

The printed menu and the online menu both mention toffee sauce and Belgian chocolate sauce. And then to give the venue 1/5 after a lovely evening….

“Told off for bringing in a fully wrapped Greggs Muffin.”

Probably best not to bring in a Greggs…..

No-one has complained yet that they can’t bring their dog in, but I imagine that’ll be coming soon. Anyway, this is a large venue that has lots of little smaller areas, something forced upon the chain by the historic nature of the building. It all felt well managed to me, spotlessly clean and evidently already popular with local office workers. All rather lovely.

November 12, 2025
Wizz Air (Budapest to London Luton)

After a long-distance rail journey from Warsaw to Budapest the day before, I had a few hours of sleep before getting up at 02:30 to get to the airport for a 06:00 flight. Here’s the Ibis Budapest City, a rather lovely hotel from what I saw of it.

There’s an airport bus every ten minutes so I wasn’t entirely broken hearted when I just missed this one by just seconds.

The 100E airport bus is a well managed operation with staff always available by the bus stop, even throughout the night. I got a seat on the bus, which filled up at the next stop, and within thirty minutes I was at the airport. In terms of efficiency, it’s one of the best airport buses and there are numerous ways to pay, including just using a contactless card on the bus.

Mine was the 06:00 flight to London Luton, visible about halfway down the left-hand column.

It all felt busy in the airport, but the signage was clear and the security process took under ten minutes. A lot of bags were caught for manual check and there were some annoyed people that their liquids and pastes were removed. My bag, unusually, was included for manual check but the security officer by the second machine looked at the x-ray and just handed me my bag back without checking anything inside.

There were lots of sleeping people in the airport and also lots of quiet places to sit.

To kill some time I popped to the external observation deck, which was of limited excitement in the dark. It also doubles up as the smoking deck, not something that I have much use for, although I liked the temperature out here.

My flight was at 06:00, the gate closed at 05:30 and so I pondered whether I should go into the lounge at 05:00 when it opened.

I did and I was the only person in there (other than the staff obviously).

Breakfast for champions…. Chips with a spicy sauce, jalapenos, tomatoes, chicken wraps, a dessert and an espresso.

It was a lot busier last time I was in this lounge. I charged my already nearly full devices a little, had a final coffee and then left for the gate.

I got to the gate just after 05:20, which is cutting it fine for me. I was pleased with my breakfast, it was quick, but helpful for giving me energy. It will surprise no-one when I say that the boarding process was efficient and well managed.

After a wait of five minutes standing on the airport bus waiting to be let out, we were allowed to board. The aircraft is HA-LZM, one that I haven’t been on before.

The seating Gods had allocated me an aisle seat, but a crew member came over during boarding and asked if I spoke English. This is something that is within my skill-set and I was ushered to guard the emergency exit door. The helpful crew member told me that I could have all three seats if I wanted to lie down to sleep after take-off.

The extra space was very useful in terms of having a nap and I spent most of the flight asleep. The flight was yet another well managed arrangement from Wiz Air, the aircraft was clean, the crew were friendly, the operations were smooth and nothing annoying happened.

Here we are in sunny Luton, the beating heart of Bedfordshire.

Just under thirty minutes waiting for border control, but the queue moved constantly which helps in feeling that progress was being made. It had been quite an expedition to go from Genoa to Warsaw to Budapest to Luton, but I was pleased to be safely back in the UK. And so was Madeleine, the very talented national chair of the LDWA, as I had to get to Leamington Spa for the Local Groups’ Weekend…..

November 12, 2025
Wizz Air (Luton Airport to Warsaw)

After an uneventful rail journey to Luton Airport, I popped in Big Smoke where I get £18 to spend with my Priority Pass card. There has been another price rise, which is the fourth of the year to my knowledge, which makes menu ordering slightly more difficult each time.

I opted for the dirty fries with beef brisket, the latter of which is just about hidden in the photo but there was a big lump of it at the bottom. It was entirely adequate, with the service being friendly and helpful.

And a quick visit to My Lounge to see their collection of dirty crockery and to try their Heineken 0%. They’re really nailed the flavour of it, it tastes just as bad as Heineken so that’s a win for the brewery. The Mexican chicken and spicy rice is actually decent, the food standards do seem to have improved here over the last few months. Or my standards have dropped, either is possible.

I was moderately amused as the customer in front of me asked for two Birra Moretti beers. They’re quite tight here, so every customer gets 2/3rds of a bottle, unless you have the 0% Heineken where they just give you the whole thing as I don’t think many people want that. This whole thing just makes matters more faffy and the bar server ended up with one glass of Birra Moretti full and the other 90% full. The customer complained he wanted 100% in each and the barman actually just tutted in response. The customer looked annoyed and the glass was topped up begrudgingly. Lounge entry here is nearly £40 (unless you have a lounge card or similar) so this tightness does them no favours. But, since I get free entry with Priority Pass, I won’t complain about anything else in here…..

They started boarding twenty minutes earlier than advertised, but Wizz Air are efficient and everything here was under control during the boarding process. One customer got charged £70 for having a large bag, he had got confused which bag sizer he was meant to use and I thought he was very gracious about it all. We were on the aircraft at the time that the gate was meant to have closed, something that British Airways always struggles to manage as customers faff about with their bags.

Boarding the aircraft which was HA-LGO which I don’t think I’ve been on before. The seating Gods gave me a window seat and it also transpired that there was no-one in the middle seat despite the flight being around 90% full.

The flight was, yet again, peaceful and uneventful. The crew were efficient and polite, sweeping down the aisle selling things without waking everyone up. The aircraft was clean, I had plenty of space and I was rather pleased with my £8.99 flight cost.

We were put on a bus to get the 75 metres to the airport terminal and they really struggled to get everyone on two buses, I think they’d usually use three. It felt slightly sub-optimal, but it was hardly a long bus journey so I was only briefly annoyed.

My shiny new passport, which doesn’t have around 120 stamps in the bloody thing, is allowing me to sweep through border control so I was able to get one of the last trains of the evening into Warsaw. I don’t have much leeway here, although there are plenty of night buses which serve the airport if required.

It’s always good to be back on public transport in Warsaw, peaceful and efficient.

Arriving into Warszawa Zachodnia (Warsaw West) railway station, which is currently being upgraded. However, it feels at times that Warsaw is constantly being upgraded, such as the fast rate of change here.

And there’s the Ibis Budget, hidden behind road works. This was only a ten minute walk from the railway site, and I’ve stayed at the adjoining Ibis several times, and fortunately I found a gap in the road works to actually gain access to the hotel.

All in all, I was once again pleased and content with the whole airport and flight experience.

November 3, 2025
London – City of London – Sir John Oldcastle Pub

As I had a couple of hours spare in London before my train from Farringdon, I thought I’d pop into the JD Wetherspoon operated Sir John Oldcastle which is at the end of the street. It’s not been one of my favourite pubs as it’s often very busy, but matters are more sedate on a Sunday early afternoon.

As usual, I’ll use the pub chain’s own history of the pub name:

“Named after The Sir John Oldcastle Tavern, which stood in the former grounds of Sir John’s nearby mansion, this was already long established by 1680. Oldcastle is thought to have been the model for Shakespeare’s character ‘Falstaff’.”

Not a vast amount has changed with the street layout here in the last 150 years, the pub is located just above the “EET” of Charles Street. The ward of Saffron Hill has now gone, which originally took its name as saffron grew around here. It’s also where Fagin’s den was located in Oliver Twist.

The bar area and coffee machines and today it was the £1.81 unlimited hot drinks that tempted me in here rather than beer. It all seems functional enough and it felt well managed.

Carpets in every JD Wetherspoon venue are unique, although this one isn’t necessarily the most decadent in terms of its styling.

The online reviews are pretty decent for a JD Wetherspoon venue, despite the challenges they must have here with having a small site and limited space in terms of facilities.

“I was so surprised when the staff said to me I can not paid by 50 in cash. No explanation why. The answer was “not because not”. This is absolutely disgusting and ridiculous. I asked about manager to explanation me this situation. He didn’t show up to speak with me. I will never back to this place. Higley not recommended.”

Disgusting that a venue won’t accept a £50 note? Hmmmm. Seems quite reasonable to me given the number of forgeries.

“I’ve just been kicked out of here, because I had the audacity to bring a Costa Coffee in; even though I’d just ordered and paid for breakfast. They’d rather refund my breakfast purchase; than let me have a Costa with it. If their machine coffee was better; I wouldn’t have had to in the first place.”

Why not just bring in your own food as well?

“Good interior. Ordered porridge. I went to the toilet and when I came back some waiter had taken it away. I hadn’t eaten any of it. I found it was thrown away! Another diner’s beer was also taken away by the same waiter undrunk.”

Very efficient service, it’s good to keep the tables clean.

“If you want to sit and read a paper or a book, this is the place for you. If however, you want to have a laugh and giggle with friends, go to the castle pub instead.”

I’m with the pub, this group sounds needlessly frivolous.

“Leffe. £3.49 a pint in most Wetherspoons. John Oldcastle £5.49 some might say different location BUT McDonalds do not have this issue.”

It feels inevitable to me that a pub in central London will be more expensive than one in Swindon.

“Asked to leave when we were causing no trouble…”

I suspect another side to this story….

Anyway, once again I digress. I thought the pub looked relatively clean, although the toilets probably need more rebuilding than cleaning, with the team members seeming friendly enough. And the coffees and other assorted hot drinks tasted as expected, so a rather peaceful couple of hours.

November 2, 2025
Christchurch – Christchurch Railway Station

The current railway station in Christchurch was opened on 30 May 1886, replacing one a little further down the line which had opened on 13 November 1862.

This dual map shows how the railway station has switched to the other side of the main road, with the railway line looking like it has been rerouted. It hasn’t, the bit shooting off to the right is the South West Main Line which was extended in the 1870s and 1880s to allow for an extension to Bournemouth that allowed tourists from London to access it. The line which goes up to the north on the old map was the branch line to Ringwood which was closed in 1935 as rail traffic had fallen away since the construction of the South West Main Line.

There’s our South Western Railways (SWR) train from Bournemouth departing the station.

The current station is functional and near to the town centre, with all services operated by SWR.

November 2, 2025
Norwich Beer Festival (Part 3 – Castle Social Saturday)

After the bravery that Liam and I showed at the mud run, I partially limped to the beer festival as I’m brave like that.

Ivan, once again, demanded to be in a photo. But, he’s the Social Secretary of the local CAMRA group, he loves the publicity. And I can remind my loyal blog readers that he leads coach trips for members (and non members) to see pubs around Norfolk and not just those in Norwich.

It had been a busy Saturday and they’d taken the decision to stay open throughout the day, rather than having two separate sessions. There was also the surprise and delight to the glasses team that the credit card machines stopped working. I picked an opportune moment not to be there….

And thank you to the lovely Paula for sorting out food for me.

Thanks Paula! The turkey Yorkshire pudding wrap with gravy on the side, very nice. And paired marvellously with the Electric Currant from Mikkeller, a gentle, blackcurrant and smooth little sour.

There’s the cider bar set-up, although I didn’t manage to actually have a single cider during any of the beer festival. Next year I hope to do better in that regard.

Ivan, making farmyard animals out of blu-tac, with the wonderful and formidable arm of Jen to the right hand side.

And really is the end of Norwich Beer Festival 2025 now, unless there are some fringe events still lingering on that I don’t know about. It was a marvellous volunteering experience, I enjoyed it all and it was wonderful to meet some new people as well as old friends (literally old in some cases). Hopefully we’ll be back at the Halls next year as I hear that there will be some exciting changes, so I must actually get to some of the planning meetings.

November 2, 2025
Norwich Beer Festival (Part 3 – Castle Social Friday)

After my volunteering efforts at Redwell and the Waterfront, I wasn’t going to go down to the third part of the beer festival at Castle Social. However, when I was sent a photo of Roy’s badge, I couldn’t not go down and visit…..

And there is the lovely Roy and Sue.

All looked well organised and calm, but glasses & token is a very well run area.

This is usually the only bar at Castle Social, but for three days only, there were tens of cask and keg beers available from Norwich Beer Festival. I heard several people mention that they didn’t know that this floor was here, so hopefully the whole event boosted Castle Social a little.

I thought that I’d pop to the Curiosity Bar to see what delicious keg beers were available.

And Ivan rushed over as it’s always lovely for him to see me.

Cheers!

I only stayed for around 45 minutes, but it was suggested that I might pop back the following evening. Which I did, so that means another post is coming shortly…. Oh the anticipation! And once again, a marvellous effort from all the volunteers who had to have this venue all ready the day after Waterfront closed. It’s all been quite a logistical challenge, but all the months of planning paid off.

November 2, 2025
Christchurch – Red House Museum and Gardens (Olympic Torch Sculpture)

Located at the Red House Museum and Gardens in Christchurch is this Olympic Torch sculpture. A sign by the sculpture notes that this was designed by local artist Chris Davies and it was sculpted to mark the 70 day Olympic torch relay which took place in 2012 and which reached Christchurch on 14 July 2012.

It’s easy to forget how important events like this would have been for the community, even if it was just for one day. Judging from this video, the turnout on the main street in the town was sizeable.

October 31, 2025