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Saturday, 21 November 2020

#281 Blue Lias Inn, Stockton, Warwickshire : 1998 to 2020

The Blue Lias Inn has hardly changed over the years which seems to be fairly standard practice for canalside pubs. It is a pub that we've visited occasionally over the years and it is very dependent upon the timing of our journeys as the Two Boats at Long Itchington (#100) is only five minutes away.

My first ever visit to the Blue Lias was on the evening of Tuesday 17th August 1982, but there is no pictorial record as this was before I started taking a photo of every pub we visited.

For the purposes of this blog, we begin at lunchtime on Thursday 10th September 1998.

I don't remember too much about it apart from the fact that it seemed to have changed little over the years and was still a comfortable, slightly up market country pub that did good food.

Our next visit was at lunchtime on Thursday 6th September 2001 as we journeyed back from a trip to Aylesbury. (We'd stopped at the Two Boats on the way to Aylesbury!)

No real external differences and this time we moored Emma Jane outside the pub - don't really like walking too far!

Less than 12 months later and we were back for another lunchtime stop on Thursday 30th May 2002.
 

Again we moored in the garden and, again, the pub was unchanged from previous visits.

It would be quite a few years before we stopped at the Blue Lias Inn again, this photo is from the afternoon of Sunday 24th May 2009 as we sailed by having had lunch in the Two Boats.

This next image is from the afternoon of Sunday 29th May 2011 as we again passed by following lunch in the Two Boats!

 

To continue the theme, the next photo is from the early afternoon of Saturday 27th September 2014, this time just before we stopped for lunch at the Two Boats!
 

It is the same story for the next image also, this time on the early afternoon of Wednesday 5th June 2019, again just before stopping at the Two Boats!


As you can see, the pub has remained largely unchanged over the 21 years apart from being repainted a few times (I assume!)
 
And so, we come to lunchtime on Friday 17th July 2020; this time we did stop at the Blue Lias for lunch.
The lockdown was over and this was our first pub visit of the trip with all the new social distancing rules! There was a long one-way system in operation and all food was served in polystyrene containers, but it worked very well and we were encouraged that the holiday would pass quite successfully...as it did...see here!
 
So, it only took a worldwide pandemic (and the temporary closure of the Two Boats) to encourage us back into the Blue Lias after just 18 years of passing by!
 
One final note, the standing sign by the canal had finally been changed, albeit very subtly!

6 comments:

  1. Blue Lias is an odd (unique) name; something to do with clay I read.

    It has that typical south Midlands beer range that food pubs live - Landlord, Tribute, Hooky. Nice.
    https://whatpub.com/pubs/HOW/2254/blue-lias-stockton

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    1. I'm fairly sure it had plenty of Carling on our last visit!

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  2. Ron Jenkins and Sue28 December 2023 at 04:04

    The Blue Lias used to be one of our favourite pubs in the 1960s. Sue lived as a child nearby in Hill so knew the pub from a very early age.In the '60s it was owned by an ex RAF pilot who had also been a test pilot after the war. There were heaps of both aviation and motoring photos on the walls. Outside on the car park was an ex RAF Meteor aircraft and often there were motorcycle grass track races in an adjacent field. A far cry from the gastro pub it became.

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  3. I believe his name was Sandy Powell. I visited a few times just before he retired and was fortunate enough to be invited to the leaving party. For a few weeks my life seemed to be centred on the pub. I met his daughter, I discoved a friend of mine who was a bit older than me had played double bass in a band who played there in the 70's and a customer of mine turned out to be the water bailiff for the fishing lake... Very happy memories of the end of an era and the aeroplane dissappeared soon after.

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    1. Hi there. His daughter is either my mother or one of my 2 aunties. Would love to hear any stories you have on my family. Thanks

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  4. Sandy Powell is my late grandfather. Would love to hear any memories or history of my family and the pub. Thank You.
    Danny

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