Wellingborough - Pt.1

The Northamptonshire town of Wellingborough is, for many, just one of several glimpsed at high speed on the train up-country from St Pancras. A sizeable town for sure, but the trajectory of the rail line which skirts its eastern edge means you see precious little of the busy market town centre, less still its pubs. It's always been something of an occasional visit for me, Kettering being closer, Bedford that bit bigger for a day out. But recent pub openings, including Hart Family Brewer brewpub The Old House, and a couple of very good micropubs, one of which is practically on the station platform, have made the stop a much more attractive proposition of late.

Of course another part of the attraction is that Wellingborough lies at the very heart of the Northamptonshire Table Skittles tradition, or it certainly should be! Whilst I've little doubt that almost every pub and club in the town would have had a skittles table at one time, sadly very few remain now, in fact I know of only one table at The Locomotive, a pub which has already featured on this blog. Which is not to say that Wellingborough has turned its back on pub games, far from it in fact.

The Wellingborough Pool League is well established in the town, as is league Darts with even the tiny Little R'Ale House micropub fielding a team. The other pub game played in Wellingborough is the slightly rarer 4-pin version of Bar Billiards, an example of which can be seen here in the lounge bar of the Ranelagh Arms.

The Ranelagh is a true backstreet locals pub, tidy and well-run, and an entirely new one to me, located as it is in an area that I'd never had call to pass through. In fact it's one of the closest traditional pubs to the rail station, and well worth the short diversion down Ranelagh Road off Midland Road from the station, if that's the way you arrive into the town centre.

It's a true hotbed of sport and games, from supporting local football and amateur boxing, to the traditional pub staples of Darts and Pool. Two teams play Bar Billiards at the pub in the Summer and Winter leagues of the Wellingborough & District Bar Billiards Association, a small but well-established league.

Venues for Bar Billiards in the town have come and gone over the years, the most recent loss being the Rising Sun which is now permanently closed. One of the beauties of Bar Billiards as a pub game is the limited space required to house a table, with play from just one end rather than the all-round cueing of Pool that usually requires a dedicated games area. So new venues have proved relatively easy to find, and the league has remained stable at eight teams playing from five pubs and clubs in and around the town.

One of the latest to introduce a table is the Old England II, sister pub of the Old England in Northampton, and part of a small chain of speciality ale and cider houses. The Old England II has fully embraced the game, with two teams now playing from the pub in the Wellingborough league. The pub is a fairly sizeable open-plan affair with plenty of room for this and Darts. The licensee is also looking out for a skittles table, which would be a great addition to the pub, and go some way to helping this most traditional of Northamptonshire games survive in the town.

Erewash Hotel, Ilkeston, Derbyshire (Closed)

The Derbyshire town of Ilkeston was, until quite recently, famous for being the largest in the country with a passenger line running through it, and yet no rail station to call its own. On the 2nd of March 2017 this anomaly was finally put right with the opening of a shiny new station on the Midland Mainline, bringing the town within 10 minutes of central Nottingham, and suddenly a whole lot easier to get to for pub-goers like myself who tend to avoid using buses wherever possible. Great news because Ilkeston is blessed with a fair few pubs, many of which I've found are well-worth travelling for.

From the perspective of this blog, Ilkeston has also achieved some measure of fame by giving its name to one of the two local skittles leagues. The whole area immediately north of Derby and Nottingham maintains a strong skittling tradition, a version of Long Alley Skittles the game of choice for generations of pub and club-going men, and to a lesser extent the women of the area. The popularity of Long Alley in this part of the East Midlands is undoubtedly connected with the heavy industries that once dominated the working landscape, the game remaining particularly strong in former colliery areas like Ilkeston, Ripley, and Clay Cross. In fact it's likely that the tall skittle pins which are such a distinctive feature of the game would often have been turned-up from the abundance of discarded pit-props found locally, a service which is still offered today by at least one local skittles maker I'm aware of.

The Erewash Hotel lies on the eastern side of the town, conveniently located just a short walk from the new rail station. The pub takes its name from the nearby river valley, which itself defines the course of the Erewash Valley railway line. I don't think it operates as a hotel these days though. Don't be fooled by the striking Banks's Brewery livery on the corner of the pub, the Erewash is now free of tie and all the better for it in my opinion. I certainly enjoyed my pint of Nottingham brewed Shipstone's Bitter, and aim to look-in at the pub next time I'm passing in the hope the excellent dark Mild is available from this recently revived local brewing name.

The interior of the pub has been opened out over the years to form one large traditionally furnished room that's split into two distinctive areas by the original entrance hallway. It's a beautifully maintained pub that's clearly well-loved by it's locals.

To left of the entrance is bench seating and one of two Pool Tables at the pub, traditional games being at the very heart of the Erewash Hotel's appeal. To the right is a Dartboard, also one of two, and a satisfyingly busy trophy cabinet, the contents of which include the shield shown here which is for Long Alley Skittles.

Competitive skittles is played at the pub in the Ilkeston & District Long Alley Skittles League, a Sunday league of two divisions made up of around 16 teams playing from pubs and clubs in and around the eponymous town.

The skittle alley is accessed through a small games area at the rear of the pub, home to Pool and Darts. Most alleys in the Ilkeston League are now either indoor or covered, though there are plenty in the Notts and Derby area that are still entirely open to the elements. Hence the game is predominantly a Summer pastime, though the Ilkeston League has Summer and Winter competitions, and the Notts/Derby Border League operates a Winter competition for venues with an indoor alley.

Indoor skittle alleys like the one at the Erewash Hotel can present problems for spectating the play, many only viewable from one side, or to a limited number of players. At the Erewash they've aimed to get around this by installing a large angled mirror at the 'throwing' end of the alley (above). As you can hopefully see in this photograph, the mirror makes viewing the game possible even from the adjacent indoor games area, located around the corner from the alley and with no direct view of the skittles frame. I've seen a similar solution at a pub in the Cotswolds, where the totally enclosed skittle alley is fitted with a small CCTV camera overlooking the frame, and a small television in the seating area which serves to relay the action to players and spectators (the New Inn at Heanor is in the process of installing a similar televised system).

With the Summer skittles league due to kick-off within the next few weeks, I can see myself returning to Ilkeston and surrounding villages more than once through the Summer, and it would certainly be nice to catch a game at some point. For those of us travelling by train, it's worth knowing that the excellent Dewdrop holds the title as unofficial waiting room, being just a stones-throw from the new station. A great traditional 'Beer and Cheese & Onion Cob' pub, though sadly the outdoor skittle alley remains out of action.

UPDATE: Since this post was published, the owners of the Erwash Hotel have retired and closed the pub.

Ship Inn, Porlock, Somerset

The Ship Inn is the kind of old, attractive, and genuinely characterful Somerset village pubs that tourists like myself dream of finding on Summer holidays. All whitewashed stone and floral displays, it's certainly picture-postcard pretty on the outside, but it's the rambling unspoilt interior that's really special. The diminutive bar (below) is particularly appealing, and regarded as something of a rare heritage survivor by those that know about these things. Even those of us that don't can't help but be charmed by its unspoilt and unfussy cosiness, a welcome legacy of successful and sympathetic ownership over many years. I was there with my partner, and she can perhaps be forgiven for not fully understanding the wash of warm nostalgia I felt in the bar of the Ship, because a pub like this represents something of my own personal pub-going past.

In my youth, newly enabled by driving license and a cheap set of wheels, the West Country became our favourite Summer playground. Minehead and the cheap chalet accommodation of Butlins Holiday Park was something of a favourite, but every quaint former fishing village along the north coast enjoyed our noisy patronage. And whilst I've no doubt that my recollections of the time are heavily clouded by the fog of youthful, sunburnt nostalgia (as well as unhealthy quantities of West Country ale and cider), it seems that every pub we spent time in was as unspoilt and 'West Country Smuggler-ish' as the Ship Inn. Memories that are all the more fondly recalled because so few of these pubs seem to have survived without recourse to bland modernisation, or worse still, permanent closure in the intervening years.

Which is not to say that the Ship Inn is some kind of heritage time warp, untouched by the passing of time. As the excellent 'Short History' page on the pubs website makes clear, the Ship Inn has seen its fair share of change over the years. Of course change is a given in the pub trade, in fact it's essential that pubs adapt to reflect customer demand, yet so few manage to do it in a way that respects the all-important 'social' history of the pub in the way it's been achieved at the Ship.

This Ship Inn is not to be confused with its namesake at nearby Porlock Weir. Not that the locals would make that mistake. This Ship lies at the bottom of the notoriously steep Porlock Hill, and is known locally as the 'Top Ship'!... Bare with me. The other Ship is a little way up the coast, close to the harbour and overlooking the Bristol Channel, and hence is known by all as the 'Bottom Ship'. If, like us you're new to the area, it's probably best to try both just to be sure...

The principal attraction of the Ship to many may not be the lovely heritage bar, but the wide range of local ales and ciders crammed onto the attractive wood-panelled bar-counter. I won't deny that this was a major draw for me, but we could equally have enjoyed the terraced garden, the restaurant, or of course a 'hand' or two in the pubs excellent skittle alley.

The Skittle Alley is located in an outbuilding to the rear of the pub, and to all the world appears as old and original as the inn itself. In truth, whilst the building itself is certainly old, it's conversion to a skittle alley occurred more recently. Again, I refer you to the history page of the website, which locates the original alley as being adjacent to the pubs stabling to the right of the arched entrance.



In common with most parts of the West Country, skittles remains popular with both sexes in this part of Somerset. Competitive ladies skittles is covered by the Minehead & Porlock League, whilst the men compete in the Dunster League. You won't find much in the way of competition in the Summer months though, the game being predominantly a Winter pastime due to work and holiday commitments.

I know from playing Northamptonshire Table Skittles for my local pub team, that one of the attractions of league play is the opportunity to visit pubs and clubs that perhaps wouldn't normally be on your radar. The downside of this is playing at venues which may fall short of your own personal pub standards, particularly when it comes to the lottery of beer choice! Some venues are certainly more popular with visiting teams than others, but I'd imagine that most teams would relish the opportunity to play, win or lose, at the Ship Inn, such is the all-round appeal of the pub.