Wellingborough - Pt.2

The Little R'Ale House

I've noticed a welcome, and frankly long-overdue revival of station taps and railway pubs of late. By which I mean pubs that were built to service the needs of travellers when rail not road was the principle mode of transport for just about everyone and everything.

All but the tiniest rural Halts and modern-day Parkways came with an accompanying pub, inn, or licensed hotel. Sometimes just a humble boozer built to refresh and accommodate the men who constructed and worked on the rail network, but also many that were purpose built for passengers, and with all the facilities and grandeur of a mainline station. Even after the massive contraction of the rail network in the 60's, practically every town and many of the larger villages still had an open railway pub, often surviving long after the associated station had closed.

Of those that are still associated with a working station, it's perhaps puzzling that so many had fallen so far from grace toward the end of the 20th century. Despite the fact that many of these station pubs continue to occupy a favoured position, with a steady stream of custom literally walking past the front door for much of the day, it became something of a rule of thumb for me that the pub closest to the rail station would invariably be one of the very worst in town! Run-down, slightly dodgy of clientele, and certainly not the best beer on offer. Quite why the pub and brewing sector so comprehensively neglected this part of their estate, pubs that we might regard as a banker for steady trade, remains something of a mystery to me. Complacency is probably the answer.

How things have changed though. Starting with the revival of a handful of historic Refreshment Rooms in the north of England, and more recently taken up by a few of the more enterprising small and regional brewers, the Station Hotel in Hucknall being a good example. Some of the latest entrants to the station pub market are micropubs, refreshment rooms in the old sense given that most are truly micro in size and therefore limited by necessity to offering just good beer and cider, and perhaps a few snacks.

The Little R'Ale House micropub couldn't be any more of a railway pub if it tried. Located adjacent to platform 1 of Wellingborough Station, it makes an ideal waiting room for northbound services on the Midland Mainline, which is how I tend to make use of its cosy single bar-room. Housed in what was once an ammunition store, it's a beerhouse specialising in locally brewed ales served direct from the barrel.

The principal custom of The Little R'Ale House is, perhaps unsurprisingly, travellers on the busy route to and from London St Pancras, including a loyal band of commuters who pop in at the end of the day for a pint and a natter. What's perhaps more surprising given its location out of town is that the pub also has a loyal band of Wellingborough locals, even to the point of including a team in the local Darts League.

If there's one thing you generally won't see in a micropub, it's a Dartboard (or a skittle alley for that matter!), the diminutive nature of this category of boozer usually making a Darts throw impractical. It's to the credit of the owners that they've found room in their little pub not only for a Dartboard, but a whole range of other pub games. Dominoes, Cards and Cribbage Boards are available, Shut The Box, a Pin Bagatelle, and most impressive of all, a mighty Sjoelbak Table. The photo above shows this sizeable game in its usual position in a corner of the room, but when the weather permits, it can be found in use in the small beer garden at the front of the pub. That's right! The Little R'Ale House even has an (appropriately micro) beer garden for the Summer months.

The Queens Head

I must have driven past The Queens Head literally dozens of times over the last few years without ever feeling the need to pop in. Not that it didn't appeal to me, more that the short walk out on the 'wrong' side of town (the opposite side to the rail station) meant I never quite got to it. The opening of the nearby Little Ale House micropub has changed all that, and I'm now a regular visitor to the 'wrong' side of town for it's diminutive charms and great local beer. It was a conversation in the aforementioned Little R'Ale House that finally spurred me to cross the road and try the Queens Head out for size. Apparently the pub had recently taken delivery of a Bar Billiards table...

My first visit to the Queens Head was on a typically slow weekday afternoon, which is the perfect time to get to know a pub without the distraction of a crowd of locals. I must say, I felt slightly embarrassed that it had taken me this long to visit the pub, as traditional community locals go it's comfortably one of the best in town, even the beer range is better than most. I think I'd always imagined the pub as a modernised, opened out single-room affair, but this couldn't be further from the truth. In fact I doubt there's another pub in Wellingborough with such a rambling multi-room interior. The main bar area is carpeted and built for comfort, a more basic public bar area is where the Bar Billiards Table can be found, and there's an adjoining area for the pubs well-used Dartboard and televised sport, as well as a separate Pool Room to the rear of the pub.

The Wellingborough & District Bar Billiards League remains reassuringly static at around eight teams playing on five tables in the town, but in common with most pub games leagues, venues have come and gone over the years. The latest to fall by the wayside is the Rising Sun, a pub I'd singularly failed to gain access to on a couple of occasions recently, and which I now know I'll never achieve given that the pub has closed for good. A great shame as it was one of the last in the town centre with a Northamptonshire Skittles Table. It's the Bar Billiards table from the Rising Sun that now resides in the bar of the Queens Head.

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.

Sawley, Derbyshire

As a reasonably frequent traveller by rail to Derby (the self-styled Capital of Real Ale!), Long Eaton is, more often than not, merely a handy alarm-call for imminent arrival into Derby. Occasionally I do break my journey at Long Eaton though, and whenever I have, I've found some very good pubs with plenty of gaming interest in the town.

Strictly speaking the station might be better named 'Long Eaton & Sawley', the latter named village being much the smaller of the two, but if anything it's probably closer to the station than the centre of Long Eaton itself. There are well over half a dozen pubs in Sawley, including a few which serve the boating and leisure trade from the nearby marina on the River Trent. Almost side-by-side in the very centre of the village are the Nags Head and White Lion, both of which are attractive destinations, and well worth the short walk from the station if you too decide to alight at Long Eaton.

Nags Head

The Nags Head is a classic two-room village locals pub with a very good reputation for beer (note the 'Pride in Pedigree' certificate behind the bar). The public bar (left) is the larger of the two rooms, and the social hub of the pub. Warmed in the winter by a wood-burning stove, it's home to a local golf association, and the venue for Darts matches in the Long Eaton & District Darts Association League.

The pub is also home to a team in the Long Eaton & District Long Alley Skittles League, a hardy bunch by all accounts given that their home alley is located outdoors, as indeed a great many still are in the Notts and Derby area. It was raining persistently when I visited, conditions that players must be well used to given that rain doesn't usually stop play in the Notts/Derby version of Long Alley Skittles. Many of these alleys are now being covered over or relocated indoors, but it would be difficult to cover the Nags Head alley given its current position in the middle of the pubs car park!

The Bell

The Bell Inn is the closest of Sawleys pubs to the rail station. Presumably a fairly traditional multi-room pub at one time, the Bell has been smartly modernised and opened out to one large room with a number of distinctive areas. This includes one for Pool and Darts, both of which are played in local leagues. Note the beautiful old Bass in Bottle mirror adjacent to the Darts throw.

In a small garden to the side of the pub, and overlooked by housing on most sides, can be found the pubs original Skittle Alley. The scoreboard, floodlight, and tin sheet for determining a foul throw are all still in situ, though the structure which would have originally caught balls and pins behind the frame has been removed. Whilst Darts, Dominoes, and Pool are all played at the Bell, sadly the alley has not seen a match for several years.

White Lion

The principal attraction of the White Lion to many pub-goers is likely to be the brewery which operates from the pub. The Old Sawley Brewing Company was established in 2013, with brewing on a small plant located within the pub itself, but a new brewery is now up and running in premises to the rear of the pub. So beer is obviously a very important part of the White Lion's offering, but it would be wrong to assume that was the only attraction. This is another traditional and attractive two-room village local, delivering everything a local should. Bar Billiards and a Shove Ha'penny are available, as is a good outdoor Skittle Alley.

Adjacent to the brewery building is the pubs Skittle Alley, which was out of action when I first visited a few years ago pending construction of the brew house. I'm pleased to say that with the brewery now completed, the alley has been tidied up nicely with a set of skittles and balls available for play.

Albion Brewery Tap, Northampton

The renaissance of beer and brewing in the UK has brought with it a welcome revival of many 'gone but not forgotten' ales from the past. For the most part these are simply recreations from original brewhouse recipes, sometimes perfected with the help of former brewers, often with the help of an enthusiastic tasting panel of old-timers who can still remember how these beers used to taste.

The chance to recreate a beer in its original home is more often than not an impossible dream. Many of the breweries which were closed in the latter half of the 20th century have now been demolished to make way for commercial or municipal development, and where brewery buildings do remain, they have often been irrevocably converted to residential or retail use.

Phipps NBC of Northampton effectively ceased as a brewing concern in the early 70's following the takeover of the business by Watney Mann of London. Both the Phipps and Northampton Brewery Co premises were soon demolished, the sites redeveloped to include the huge Carlsberg Brewery which continues to dominate the south of the town to this day. So when the current team hatched plans to revive the Phipps name in Northampton, a return to the original brewing site was simply not on the cards.

Following several years contract brewing Phipps and NBC ales at a brewery in Rutland, a chance to return production to Northampton presented itself when the former Albion Brewery on Kingswell Street became available. The Albion Brewery is barely a stones-throw from the original site of brewing, and shares the same water supply which helped give their beers such a distinctive local taste. This was as close to an authentic revival of the Phipps NBC brewing heritage as anyone could have reasonably hoped for. Brewing re-commenced in Northampton in 2014, and Phipps NBC beers are now widely available throughout the county and beyond.

At the peak of their success following merger, Phipps and the Northampton Brewing Co had well over 1,000 pubs, as evidenced by the fact their logos (and the latter-day Mann's livery) can still be found on pubs throughout the county. It has always been the intention to open a pub at the Albion Brewery site, and much reclaimed Phipps and NBC memorabilia has been incorporated into the Tap at the front of the brewhouse. It's a fabulous achievement, and regarded by many as one of the most successful revivals of our British brewing heritage. You can learn much more about the history and current plans for Phipps NBC on their excellent website: http://www.phipps-nbc.co.uk/

Don't be confused by the image above, this view into the Albion Brewery Tap from the entrance lobby has been flipped to 'correct' the writing. Through the windows can be seen the Bar Billiards Table and Northamptonshire Skittles Table. At one point, there was some uncertainty as to whether there would be space in the bar for these classic bar-room games, but I'm pleased to say that tradition has won out again, and both games are proving to be popular with customers.

The small orange label on the left-hand leg identifies this Skittles Table as having been made by G J Pepper of Wellingborough. Pepper's tables have straighter side cushions than the more common W T Black & Son models, and can usually be identified by their upright square netted 'hood' as opposed to the sloping style of a Blacks table. They are also considered by many to be the best quality tables.

White Lion, Bridgnorth, Shropshire

If like me, you choose to stay in Bridgnorth Low Town, you'll certainly want to explore the adjacent higher version, if only because there's a fair bit more up there than below. There are a number of different routes up the hill, some a good deal easier to traverse than others, but all interesting in their own way. I'd recommend the steep but attractive Cartway, resembling a vintage Hovis advert in places, which just happens to pass recently re-opened specialist beer pub the Black Boy, which I'd also recommend. Or the longer though no less attractive Bridgnorth Park route, which passes the famous Severn Valley Railway terminus with its own highly regarded beer emporium the Railwayman's Arms.

Of course no trip to Bridgnorth would be complete without a ride up the Cliff Railway, a fully working relic of a bygone age, and a very reasonably priced alternative to the many admittedly healthier alternatives.

In a sense, all routes lead to the excellent White Lion, located as it is at the southern end of the High Street, and a mere stones-throw from the Cliff Railway top 'station'. Over the course of a long weekend, I managed to poke my nose into almost all of Bridgnorth's pubs, and I can safely say this was one of the very best, if not 'the' best in the town. In fact I almost had an Orwellian 'Moon Under Water' moment when I walked into the bar, such was the friendly welcome and all-round excellence of the pub.

The White Lion is a traditional two-roomer, immaculately maintained throughout, and with the sweetest little beer garden at the rear for sunny Shropshire days and Summer evenings. A pub that just feels 'right' as soon as you step over the threshold. A well judged range of beers, including at least one from the pubs own Hop & Stagger Brewery, and bar snacks appropriate to the business of social drinking rather than a full sit-down meal. There are games too, the rear bar featuring a red-baize'd Bar Billiards Table which is free to play on Mondays.

Propped up on a window ledge you'll also find a good old Shove Ha'penny, on loan to the pub by a regular. In my view Shove Ha'penny is one of the finest accompaniment to social drinking there is, and the cause of many afternoons that got away from me! Not a problem at the White Lion though, there is after all the ever-reliable Cliff Railway to take you home.

A Miscellany of Bar Billiards Pubs

A recent informal Poll on a well known social-media platform asked what kind of things people would like to see in their ideal pub. Needless to say the top answer was a wide range of high quality beers and/or ciders, in fact for some the beer seemed to be the only thing worthy of consideration! Perhaps not too surprising given that most respondents were either CAMRA members or other non-affiliated beer geeks.

I was pleased to see that pub games featured in some of the replies, with Bar Billiards more often than not the game of choice. I did find this slightly surprising given that a Bar Billiards Table is a rare sight in a pub now, though it wasn't so long ago that the game was relatively common. I certainly recall playing it throughout the 80's, and CAMRA pub guides of the time seem to indicate that the game was much more widespread than it is now.

Perhaps it's this fond memory of a pub game from our youth that explains why Bar Billiards featured so highly in the poll, or perhaps I'm simply underestimating the popularity of the game now. Certainly there are a few areas of the country where leagues exist for the game, and tables, though not exactly common, can be found relatively easily by those in the know. In other parts of the country a Bar Billards table is a rare sight indeed. The East Midlands counties of Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire & Rutland have to my knowledge barely a dozen pub venues for the game between them.

Not all of the tables shown below are played in league competition, but wherever a Bar Billiards table does exist in a pub, it seems to attract a great deal of attention from both curious newcomers, and those of us who remember the game from our misspent youth.

The table shown above was recently restored to the Grainstore Brewery Tap in Rutland. Fully refurbished, and a welcome sight in the hop-strewn bar of a pub which is handily placed adjacent to Oakham rail station. This is one of only two tables I'm aware of in Rutland, the other being at the Old Pheasant, Glaston.

 

The Bar Billiards table shown above is in the lounge of the Rose Inn, Nuneaton, a town I've struggled to find really good pubs in on recent visits. The Rose is perhaps the pick of the bunch at the moment, a good honest two-room Marston's house on the edge of the town centre, and famously the venue for the first AGM of the nascent Campaign For Real Ale (CAMRA). Games are a major feature of the Rose's success, with Darts and Pool available for play in the front bar (left), and league Dominoes a feature of the plusher lounge bar.

There are several venues in Norwich with Bar Billiards tables, and a thriving league has developed for the game in recent years. League play is one of the surest way to ensure the survival of traditional pub games like Bar Billiard, and a city the size of Norwich, endowed as it is with such a healthy number of well-supported pubs, lends itself well to the development of a small league like the Norwich Bar Billiards League.

A visit to the Golden Star in Norwich is recommended if only to admire the largely unspoilt front bar of the pub which retains many heritage features, details of which can be found on CAMRA's inventory of Heritage Pubs. Tucked into the corner of the adjoining back bar is the vintage Alfred Sam's & Sons Bar Billiards table, a fine piece of gaming heritage which is in regular use at the pub.