Company Days Out - Pub Tour 2003

A crew of dubious provenance left Glasfryn on Saturday 13th July intent on visiting every one of our pubs in a day, within opening hours. That’s eleven pubs in twelve hours, with 650 miles separating first and last. We left Glasfryn at 6.40am in our luxury coach after a hearty breakfast of coffee and a nip of restoratif, feeling foolishly optimistic.

We hit the M25 by 10.00, right on time, got half way round, and stopped dead. The motorway was completely closed in both directions, and Kent was gridlocked. It was impossible to get through to either the Hare or the Black Jug, so we unanimously voted the Red Barn in Lingfield an honorary B & P pub for the day, and duly visited it.

We had to completely change our route plan, and tried to devise a new route to get us back up north, going through London. Luckily we are not all heavily opinionated, truculent individuals who know best.

After a few hours of stop-starting through the blazing heat, we came across the Marquis of Granby pub. Blair offered to negotiate buying the pub for B & P, thereby making it an legitimate venue, so we duly visited it. Shortly after, we hit the open motorway again, everyone cheered up, and we enjoyed an excellent in-flight picnic with some particularly good Fleurie.

We pitched up at the Armoury, our first Brunning and Price pub, at 6.00pm, a mere 11.5 hours after leaving Glasfryn. The welcome was warm, the beer was excellent and the company jovial. We were two hours behind schedule, which meant we would have to cut the Corn Mill and Pen y Bryn from the itinerary, but sod it – we still had a decent fist of pubs to visit over the next five hours, and we were raring to go.

Gaz had been driving all day, so Simon drove between the Armoury and the Dysart, and on to Harkers. If you want to save the £30-odd admission fee to Alton Towers, there is a white-knuckle ride that makes Nemesis look like a knitting session in a church hall. It is called the White Van Ride, and it is truly terrifying. Liz was very hospitable at the Dysart, and set us up for the endless 15 minute sprint into Chester.

Si Roberts, Fairground Ride proprietor

We got hooked up with the post-race crowd at Harkers who were in good form. We also met up with Gaz’s father who had undertaken to be our driver for the rest of the evening.

Ian. Also partial to a hat

There were more race-goers at the Grosvenor, which gave Pete Minshull the chance to get his own hat out, which we all admired greatly.

Over to the Pant for a quickie. Met lots of old friends in the garden, many of whom were in a worse state of repair than we ourselves. James’s girlfriend Jo was there with a bunch of her cronies from uni, but they resisted our charms and declined to join the tour to the Cross Foxes.

The last port of call before returning to base camp at Glasfryn. Things getting a bit wobbly in the leg department.

The photo taken on arrival at Glasfryn didn’t come out as the lens cap was still on the camera at the time.