One of the joys of visiting Banbury on the Oxford Canal is getting the chance to revisit Ye Olde Reine Deer Inn.
Our first visit was at lunchtime on Tuesday 8th September 1998 as part of our return journey from Oxford.
Not my best composed picture, but it shows off the pub quite nicely. I remember it being a proper pub that served food and somewhere that was worth revisiting.
We duly returned four years later at lunchtime on Tuesday 28th May 2002.
At first glance it looks to be unchanged (apart from the window boxes), but the sign has been replaced with a subtle change of name to Ye Olde Reindeer Inn and the removal of the supporting beam.
It wasn't too long before our next return on the evening of Monday 23rd August 2004.
Still the same pub sign and still the same old unspoilt pub!
It was to be a good number of years before we returned to Banbury, this time en route to the River Thames at lunchtime on Saturday 27th July 2019.
Not surprisingly, the signage had changed in the intervening 15 years and the pub had reverted back to being Ye Olde Reine Deer Inn. With the added bonus that the sign is now parallel with the (now pedestrianised) street below! Inside, the pub was largely as we remembered it.
It was only a couple of years later that we returned (twice, both lunchtimes) on Wednesday 19th May 2021 and Monday 24th May 2021.
Our first visit included my first drink inside a pub for many months! It was very quiet inside on both occasions, but it is still a wonderful pub.
My one and only visit came in June 2019, a nice enough pub though I noted at the time that my beer was not in the best of shape, maybe just unlucky catching the back end of a barrel.
ReplyDeleteMy lager has always been fine there! Although, they probably suffer from having too many cask ales available when they're running normally.
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