I took an uncomfortably hot bus under the river and on to Prenton. Excitement was mounting as I walked along the row of shops and here it is, Bar 361:
A very pleasant shop conversion with bench seats and an attractive traditionally styled counter complete with gantry. Really well done.
No real ale so I had my usual Carling, which became my tenth one on untappd.
Anyway, this is the fifteen hundredth Merseyside pub I have drunk in. Twenty years ago number 1,000 was MacKenzie in Birkenhead which I passed on the bus today, it is still going. Will I ever get to two thousand? I doubt it very much. Sitting here enjoying my lager, I wondered what the total number of pub visits I have made would be. I try to revisit every five years, so clearly it is going to be a lot more than 1,500. I think maybe when I get home I'll do some database analysis, which will tell me how many visits I've logged, although before 2004 many will be missing because then I only retained records of the most recent visit. Update: The answer is 3,623. Of course the figure is fairly meaningless anyway because a typical week for me will include drinking with pals in three or more pubs which I don't record in the database. (If you look at the merseypub.com website or in the book you can see pubs recorded as "Visited" without a date - These are the ones I drink in regularly.)
Sorry, that's a lot of waffle that's nothing to do with this pub; let's get back to work! One other customer at one on a Friday is not very good; I hope it is busier this evening.
Next, just along the road is the Halfway House:
The Cask Marque plaque raised my hopes but there was no real ale available, so it was another Carling for me.
The bar side was closed, I sat with two or three others in the very nicely done out lounge. Nothing spectacular in the decor, it's just very well cared for.
I was pleased to see the cricket on the big screen, they were showing golf in 361. After lunch England seem to be doing well despite the conditions favouring batting. I must say the Sky Sports commentary is not a patch on Test Match Special, where Aggers and Tuffers and all the rest provide lots of entertainment.
Gradually more customers appeared, keeping the place ticking over. Most of them seemed to be older than I.
Next, on to the Mersey Clipper:
A Greene King house, this one, with Flaming Grill branding.
On a hot Friday I nervously eyed up the handpumps, only one of the three has a sparkler fitted, and decided discretion is the better part of valour so I had a lager. They'd run out of Carling, you don't hear that very often! Madri was my second choice.
In my database this was called the Birch Tree, it seems to have reverted to its previous name some time since my last visit back in 2018. Nothing else has changed, it is still an above average dining pub. I'm not sure why but this place seems to have more character than many of the chain pubs. At half two it was pretty quiet but not completely deserted.
Golf was on the tellies that I could see here, there's only two things more boring than watching golf on the TV, one is watching it in person, and the other is actually playing. Oooh, controversial! On further reflection I take that back: On the telly you only see the exciting shots so it can be quite entertaining. The other two are still boring, though.
Just the width of the footie ground down the road is the Prenton Park:
I had forgotten, or not noticed previously, what a magnificent building this is, I'm going to guess 1920s, with a bit of brewers' Tudor, large castellated bay windows at the rear, tall chimneys and so on. Inside there has been a lot of knocking through so while it is pleasant it's not very historic.
No real ale so I had another Carling.
For the first time on this survey, the main sound in the pub was conversation as the customers discussed various topics, most of which seemed to be football related. When does the season begin, it can't be long now?
Suddenly a gaggle of women appeared, increasing the sound level significantly. I was going to write "old" there but they were all younger than I, one or two of them much younger.
I checked the cricket on my phone, England not doing so well this afternoon.
By the time I'd finished my pint the place was buzzing, the music completely drowned by cheerful chatter.
Where next? I could head down to the Sportsman's and then on to the Beehive, but there's one outlier in the other direction, so I think that is the way to go. When I blogged a visit to Oxton a few weeks ago someone anonymous commented that I'd got the Cock and Pullet as closed but in fact it has reopened. So let's try that one now, reverted to its former name, the Royal:
What an excellent end to today's researches, two handpumps and one was White Rat so I had a wonderful pint thereof. Last time I was in here, eleven years ago, I noted seven handpumps. Sadly the "Cock and" chain didn't survive, but at least in this case the pub and the fine real ale have.
Pleasantly decorated with some bare brick walls and comfortable bench seating all round the room.
Like the last pub, plenty of customers were keeping the chatter level high.
In summary, a great survey which started with a new one and a big number, and ended with a favourite ale. One can't ask for more than that! Let's go home.
Beer of the day: Ossett White Rat
Miles walked: 1.6
Maybe coming soon: Cantril Farm, Birkenhead, Southport
1,500 ! Blimey. Impressive stuff.
ReplyDeleteNot as good as your score, must be at least 5,000 by now.
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