Boozin' and Cruisin' through the East Midlands (Part 2)

 Day 3 - Monday

Usually, at the start of the week, it can be difficult to find pubs that are open, never mind serving food, at lunchtimes. Today was not one of those days!

We were travelling along the summit level of the Leicester Section of the Grand Union Canal which meant that we had to negotiate Foxton Locks. Ten locks arranged in to two staircases of five locks each; a magnificent setting and a magnet for gongoozlers of all ages! There was a bit of a wait at the top and we were the fourth boat in the queue - it could have been much worse! This is the view from the first lock of the second five.

With help from the volunteer lockkeepers we were soon down at the bottom where we turned left (heading for Leicester) and moored up for lunch in the imaginatively named Foxton Locks Inn.

For a Monday it was pleasantly busy, but table service was the order of the day. The food was good as was the beer and so we returned to Peggy Ellen for the next stage of our journey.

At the bottom of Foxton, you can turn left towards Leicester (leading to the River Soar) or right towards the terminus at Market Harborough. Most boats took the latter option whilst we headed towards Leicester.

As it was early August and the canal had been very busy up to this point, we were hopeful that we'd have plenty of company to share the many wide locks en route to Leicester. Sadly, this was not the case and we saw only a handful of boats all the way to Leicester.

Our first stop along this route was at Fleckney which isn't exactly a canalside village!

This was the walk into the village, which boasts two pubs...neither of which was serving food on a Monday night! (and the chippy was closed!)

We've visited the Old Crown in the past and it is a perfectly decent local village pub. Ordinarily, it would have been a one pint and we're moving on pub...except...although they weren't doing food themselves, parked out front was a pizza van making freshly made pizzas that could be consumed in the pub. What a result! They have different vans/trucks on different nights...a fantastic idea!

We still decided to move on for a couple in the more upmarket Golden Shield; Fleckney's other pub.

Last time we'd been to Fleckney, this is where we'd eaten, but the restaurant wasn't open on a Monday. It seemed to be little changed from the time the late Alan Winfield visited it ten years earlier and reviewed it on Pubs Galore.

Day 4 - Tuesday

From Fleckney it is a long journey to Leicester through 20+ wide locks (with no one to share the joy work!) and the next pub was a long way away ay Kilby Bridge. We moored up at about 2pm!

The Navigation is a lovely old, proper canalside pub and we were happy to see that it was open. Unfortunately, they weren't doing food and when I asked about cobs/rolls I was given a quite brusque, "No, we don't do them they only get left uneaten!" Oh well, a lunch of crisps, nuts and scratchings wasn't the end of the world!

Then, about 15 minutes later, the other barman (possibly landlord) appeared with large trays of freshly made sandwiches, mini scotch eggs and sausage rolls which were offered to us and the other half dozen people in the pub...for free! Fantastic customer service!

So, after a great lunchtime session, we set off again for Leicester. Still very little traffic and some quite shallow sections, but we made it to Leicester without too much hassle.

The Globe was our first port of call and, whist it is a great old pub, it was disappointing to see it so empty! Unfortunately, we only had the one pint before we set off in search of food. We found a lovely curry at a place called Tandem and then went for more beer at the High Cross...the local Wetherspoon's...which was considerably busier than The Globe had been (as were many of the other bars in that vicinity)!

And that was it for our night out in Leicester, but in our defence, we didn't moor up until after 8pm and the canal/river is a bit of a walk from the city centre.
 
(To be Continued)

Sunny Selly Oak under Shutdown

Since the 'lockdown' started, I've grasped the opportunity to take pictures during my permitted daily exercise. 

Selly Oak is probably my next nearest suburb with pubs (Bournville is nearer, but publess!). I've also recently updated the previous Selly Oak pub entries on this blog.

So here we go with a wider view of Studentville Selly Oak.

Bristol Road, Selly Oak - April 2020

This is the classic picture postcard view of Selly Oak from the middle of the Bristol Road outside Selly Oak Station. It was about 2pm and you can see how little traffic there was, enabling me to get exactly the view I wanted (without much chance of getting run over!). Sadly, in reality, the bridge is sporting lots of grafitti that I've 'painted over' to give the view as it should be.

As I'm not a regular visitor, pretty much all of what I know about Selly Oak is the pubs, three of which I've reported on earlier.

Bristol Pear, Selly Oak - April 2020

This is the view from under Selly Oak Railway Bridge and shows the last pub I had a pint in before the lockdown. The Bristol Pear is a pub we pop into on the odd occasions when we're having a few drinks in Selly Oak, but it was on our last visit when I noticed this, directly opposite the pub, for the very first time!

Selly Oak Library - April 2020

Selly Oak Library (currently closed) is a replica of Stirchley Library (operational before the lockdown) and was built in 1909 (four years after Stirchley's). It is a Carnegie Library, has it's own Wikipedia entry and is Grade II listed.

Moving further down the Bristol Road towards town, we come across a 'new' pub that we had the chance on our most recent visit of going into for a pint, but we decided against!

The S'oak, Bristol Road - April 2020

Back in the late 70's when I was a student this was a row of shops, one of which was a very good secondhand bookshop. When The S'oak first opened (and I don't remember exactly when that was!) it only really occupied the corner part of the building, but has expanded over the years to occupy the whole ground floor.

As I was searching for details about the history of the pub, I came across this review on Pubs Galore by the late, pubman extraordinaire, Alan Winfield: -

"The S'oak looks like a modern pub that is housed in an old building,this was one of my Sons locals when he was at Birmingham University a few years back.
Once inside there is a very large single room with the bar in the middle area,the floor is bare boarded,the seating is tall tables and chairs and normal tables and chairs,there is a pool table to the rear right,the TVs were showing the FA Cup Final.
There were two real ales on the bar,i had a drink of Daleside G&P which went down well,the other real ale was GK Radio X Amplified.
I thought this was a decent enough pub to have a drink in."

Next door is the third of the 'student' pubs on the main drag of the Bristol Road.

Goose at the OVT, Selly Oak - April 2020

In the years that I've known this pub it has had four names (Bournbrook Hotel, Farce & Firkin, Old Varsity Tavern, Goose at the OVT) and been transformed, from a quite rambling multiroom pub, into something of a 'beer barn', originally, as M&B's answer to Wetherspoon's.

There is just one more pub on the Bristol Road and it is in the other direction. The Bear & Staff has an interesting back story!

Bear & Staff, Selly Oak - April 2020

Back in the day, near the junction of Bristol Road and Oak Tree Lane stood The Oak pub which was demolished in 1983 to make way for road widening. It was replaced by the Great Oak in 1985. A shiny new pub which I visited on the opening night. Less than 10 years later it was demolished to make way for Sainsbury's to expand their carpark in 1994! (see details here on this and the rest of Selly Oak's lost pubs!)

This was when the Bear & Staff came into existence, about 100 yards from where the Great Oak stood. It wasn't a new build. Much to our frustration this was, apparently, one of the best Italian restaurants in Birmingham (according to a taxi driver we met who regularly ferried people from BBC Pebble Mill to the restaurant!). Right on our doorstep and we never knew!

It is now a fairly bog-standard Marston's pub which was recently refurbished.

Finally, we come to the one Selly Oak entry not on the Bristol Road...and no prizes for guessing which pub it is...I give you the Country Girl!

Country Girl, Raddlebarn Road - April 2020

I've written plenty about what is, essentially, my local. So, I'll leave you with an image of it on a bright, sunny, early Spring day during the lockdown of 2020.