In intermittent showers I aimed for Crosby, getting rather wet on the way from Lime Street to Central. Once at Crosby I headed first to the "Barbie" which I expected to find closed and it is, with a For Sale board on the front:
Next, on to the Royal Oak:
A well maintained interior with multiple rooms partially knocked through to create a comfortable pub, pretty much unchanged since my previous call in 2004.
Last time I had real Boddingtons, this time no real ale and the lone hand pump looks like it hasn't been touched for some time.
Only one other customer at half three, he was concentrating on the golf on the telly, so I wandered to a different part of the pub to drink my lager. Shortly after, another customer came in, making three.
The Beatles were replaced by the Stones, perhaps a little loud for an empty place. About half way down my pint, the music gave up and I was treated to that rarest of pub soundtracks; total silence.
I sank my lager at a leisurely pace since my next target opens at four (I hope).
I arrived at the Corner Post at 16:03 but I wasn't the first in.
A rather fine shop conversion this, and clearly popular; another two customers came in before I'd consumed more than an inch of my Liverpool Brewing Cascade, and then another a couple of minutes later. All were regulars who chatted to each other and the landlord.
I checked the weather radar and there were some nasty cells around, would I get soaked later? It's a long walk to the next pub!
The Cascade ran out as I finished my pint, the last but one pulled was excellent which I think indicates skilful cellarmanship and a good turnover.
The rain continued so I had to deploy the umby[1] on the longish walk to the Liverpool Pigeon:
This hasn't changed much since my last visit in 2014. My guide entry from then is rather telling: "Branded as a "Micro Pub" this place is a former shop in a parade." Of course, the micro pub was a new concept back then and this was the first one in Liverpool, so it was all a bit new to me.
Anyway, here in 2021 it was ticking over nicely and my lovely pint of White Rat (It gets everywhere!) was in an oversized glass, so that plus hasn't changed either.
I considered heading for home, using the weather as an excuse for curtailing my researches, but as the time to move approached the rain eased off, so I headed on to Stamps:
This quirky place doesn't seem to have changed since I was last here. "Only" four real ales this time, I resisted the White Rat, and chose one I'd possibly never had before, Abbeydale Deception, which was lovely.
Quite a few customers in at six in the evening, but plenty of room for more. The background music was mainly drowned by chatter.
My grumbles about the weather were put to shame by the discovery that Wirral train services were disrupted due to flooding! Lucky I didn't do Rock Ferry this week!
There's one more pub around here last visited in 2014, so it would be daft to miss the George:
Unwisely, perhaps, I requested the only cask, it took two staff and a visit to the back to decide whether it was actually available, and I was asked to taste it to check because neither of them knew whether it was on or not. To be fair, it was a spot on traditional bitter so 10/10 for ale, 0/10 for bar staff knowledge! One decent cask ale is enough, but your people need to know!
This classic interwar pub (I guess) has retained some original features, which are somewhat marred by bunting and other brewery publicity.
It was surprisingly empty for a Thursday evening, I was expecting to find more people here. I get the feeling that some big company is losing money, there were more staff than customers.
Across the road is the former Exchange, last ticked in 2002, which according to the signs is soon to reopen as Suburb 24, I'll have to come back and tick it in due course:
By the way, some of today's ticks were last done on one of my early blog entries in 2014, why don't you boost my stats and read that next?
[1] For non-locals, umby is Scouse for umbrella.
Maybe coming soon: St Helens
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