#141 Oddfellows Arms (now Kiss), Stratford-upon-Avon, Warks : 1996 to 2013

For several years we were regular visitors to Stratford-upon-Avon as it was our regular Easter destination on our narrowboat Emma Jane from 1996 to 2011. There are lots of pubs in the town making it an ideal venue for a pub crawl.

The Oddfellows Arms was one of the first pub that we ever visited in Stratford as it was on the way from what became our regular mooring (above the locks, away from the centre) to the pubs in the centre.

This was on the evening of Friday 5th April 1996 (Good Friday) after a trying day's boating. Our day had started badly when Emma Jane refused to start. The nearest boatyard was a couple of miles away and as neither of us had a mobile phone in those days we walked there! The engineer gave us a lift back and got us going, but we'd only got time to get to the boatyard before lunch - fortunately there was also a pub there!

It was a long afternoon boating from Wooton Wawen to Stratford with us mooring up at 7:50 pm! I'm guessing that we were quite thirsty and went into the first pub we found - the Oddfellows Arms. As I recall it was a very cosy, pleasant pub.

It was another seven years before we revisited the Oddfellows Arms, this time on the evening of Saturday 19th April 2003.

As I recall, it was pretty much unchanged, but the signs indicate that food was now available. Also, the outside seating now had a very low retaining wall.

The next visit was on the evening of Saturday 7th April 2007.

The Oddfellows Arms had been refurbished inside and out, but not to our taste - it had become more modern and soul-less! That was the last time we actually stepped inside and, although we did walk by a few times, it wasn't sufficiently inviting to tempt us back in!

I popped back to Stratford last year to take a few photos of the town and this is the sight I came across.

It was the afternoon of Thursday 5th September 2013 and the Oddfellows Arms has been transformed into Kiss! I didn't go in.

Judging from the most recent review on Beer in the Evening it doesn't look as though this will be here for too much longer. This appears to be going the way of many pubs over the past few years; as the market contracts, the back street pubs seem to be the ones disappearing, especially when there are so many others nearby in a town like Stratford. Sad, but currently almost inevitable! 

#140 The Tontine, Stourport-on-Severn, Worcestershire : 1987 to 2013 (RIP)

As previously noted, Stourport-on-Severn has many pubs and, back in 1987 The Tontine was one of the outstanding pubs in the town.

This photo was taken on the evening of Monday 6th July 1987 after a slightly fraught journey up the River Severn from Worcester. This was our first boating trip up the Severn and, having left Worcester's Diglis Basin at 3pm, we'd not taken the flow of the river into account making the journey much longer than we'd expected! We almost didn't make it to Stourport for the evening because the last lock on the Severn, Lincomb Lock, was technically closed for the night. We were in luck, though, because one of the regular trip boats was due to pass through and after some negotiation, the lock keeper agreed to let us through!

We moored on the river at Stourport and The Tontine was just a short walk away up the carefully manicured bank side. I don't remember too much about the inside other than it was a large pub with lots of canal pictures and memorabilia.

It was another 10 years before we returned to The Tontine on the evening of Tuesday 27th May 1997.

As far as I recall there were no significant changes, but inside were signs of a general decline.

We were in Stourport again in 1999, but didn't visit The Tontine. However, I took this photo on the afternoon of Tuesday 1st June 1999 as we passed through the locks up from the Severn into Stourport Basin.

Since then we've passed through Storuport-on-Severn several times and The Tontine had been closed for most of them. According to Closed Pubs it has been closed since 2001.

Our most recent visit to the town was the premature end of our journey because the Severn was closed because it was running very fast and high from the heavy rain a few days earlier. This gave me some time to take photos of the town, including The Tontine.

These pictures were taken in the afternoon of Thursday 16th May 2013. From the outside The Tontine is largely unchanged, unsurprising as it is a listed building, but it has been split into flats for residential use.

The Tontine is an unusual name and I'm indebted to Andrew Denny and his Granny Buttons blog for this explanation: -

How did the Tontine Hotel come to be called?  A Tontine Will is defined here - it's effectively when a group of men pool their inheritances and the last man standing gets the lot.  But that's not the original name.  According to a Stourport Tourism Leaflet:

The Tontine Hotel was constructed as the Areley Inn in 1772 and gave accommodation to merchants and travellers. It was a grand place with a ballroom and several reception rooms.

Another history of The Tontine can be found here. 

#139 Ye Olde Talbot Hotel, Worcester : 1997 to 2013

As I was going through my photos I discovered another 'Ye Olde' pub, so I thought I'd run them all together! This week it's Ye Olde Talbot Hotel in Worcester which we first visited on the evening of Monday 26th May 1997.

We had navigated down the Worcester & Birmingham Canal and moored at Diglis Basin for the night. Normally, when in Worcester, we would take the opportunity to go for a bit of a pub crawl, but not this time! One of our regular crew, who likes his real ale, found the beer very much to his liking and was very reluctant to move on. Fortunately it was a welcoming, cosy place so it wasn't too much of a hardship to stay for most of the session.

In the intervening years we've been back to Worcester several times, but have not revisited Ye Olde Talbot Hotel. However, on our last visit we did walk by and I took this picture.

This was taken on the evening of Saturday 11th May 2013, shortly after witnessing Wigan's historic FA Cup triumph. We didn't go inside, but the place has obviously changed quite a bit in the past 16 years, as you would expect.

#138 Ye Olde Seven Stars, Kidderminster, Worcestershire : 2008 to 2013

As reported previously, we've only ever stopped in Kidderminster twice despite passing through on the canal on many occasions.

Our first stop was on the evening of Monday 26th May 2008 and Ye Olde Seven Stars was one of the pubs we visited on out pub crawl around the town.

As usual, I don't remember too much about the inside as we only had one pint there.

On our second visit to Kidderminster, at lunchtime on Thursday 16th May 2013, we only went in one pub, but we did stroll around the town centre so I could get pictures of how the pubs had changed.

Externally Ye Olde Seven Stars has had a complete makeover. 

In doing the background research for this post I've discovered that this is the oldest pub in Kidderminster and that I made a mistake in my blog entry about The Red Man (#127).

It was Ye Olde Seven Stars that allowed (in fact encouraged) people to eat their takeaway meals inside whilst enjoying their pint and, judging by the signage, they still do. The pub has its own website, but I'm not sure when it was last updated.

#137 Ye Olde No.3, Little Bollington, Cheshire : 1991 to 2013

Being based in the Midlands means that we didn't often get to navigate the canals 'oop north', but since we've been hiring boats we can now explore further afield.

Back in 1991 we embarked on a journey to take our boat Emma Jane from Adlington (near Wigan) to her ultimate destination of Cowley Peachey (near Uxbridge).

One of the pubs we stopped at was Ye Olde No. 3 at Little Bollington on the Bridgewater Canal.

This was the view from our mooring on the evening of Sunday 21st July 1991. I don't recall anything about that visit, but we did spend the whole evening there so food must have been available.

We have been past the pub in the intervening years on trips that took us to Manchester (and back to Lapworth) in 2000 and 2010. Both times we stopped at Lymm as it offers more pubs to choose from.

Our Easter trip in 2013 was from Preston Brook to Manchester (and back) which gave us the opportunity to revisit Ye Olde No. 3.

This was the view from our mooring at lunchtime on Saturday 30th March 2013. Fewer changes than you might expect in 22 years, but the electricity pylons are all still in place!

This is the view from the front of the pub. As we walked into the pub, suddenly it all came back and I recognised the place! It didn't seem to have changed in 22 years. It has a cosy interior with lots of canal memorabilia. The food was good and I was left wondering why we'd not stopped here in previous years!

#136 Hope & Anchor, Stourport-on-Severn, Worcestershire - 1987 to 2013

The Hope & Anchor can be found slightly off the beaten track in Stourport. This is a great little document to help find this and many of the other pubs in the town. 

My first visit to Stourport was on the evening of Monday 6th July 1987 as documented elsewhere in this blog. We did quite a pub crawl around the town and this picture demonstrates the whole raison d'etre for taking these photos.

I have no recollection of what the pub was like and the only reason I know I went there is this photo!

We were back again on the evening of Tuesday 1st June 1999 and we did another pub crawl around the town.

From the outside there doesn't look to have been many changes and inside...? I still don't have any recollection from this visit, either!

So, we move onto the most recent visit.

This was on the evening of Thursday 16th May 2013 when our journey had come to a premature conclusion because the River Severn was closed to navigation. This left us with plenty of time for another pub crawl around Stourport. From the outside, it looks to be well decorated, but inside it wasn't good. The 'For Sale' sign should have been a clue and explains why the inside was in a state of general neglect.

I wouldn't be surprised, next time we're in Stourport, to find that the Hope & Anchor is no more, especially as the town has so many more appealing pubs in better locations. It is always sad (to me anyway!) when a pub closes down, but as neither me nor my travelling companion could remember whether we'd ever been there, it probably won't be a great loss.

#135 Red Lion, Crick, Northamptonshire : 1986 to 2013

Crick is a small village in Northamptonshire, but in the 'canal' world it is a significant place, being the site of the annual Crick Boat Show. I've reported on the village before in post #126.

The first time I visited the Red Lion was on the evening of Monday 21st July 1986.

This is the most upmarket of the pubs in Crick and, at this time was the only one that did food. The crew on that trip (all pictured here) were Matt, Martin, Andrew and William (plus me taking the photo!). Considering that Emma Jane was only 35ft long I'm always amazed that we managed to accommodate five of us in such a small space (and cook on most days as well!). However, looking at the photo offers some explanation...namely we were all somewhat smaller in those days (well, most of us!).

Next time we visited Crick was a lunchtime stop on Thursday 27th August 1997.

At first glance, it looks exactly the same as eleven years earlier, but in fact all of the signage has been renewed and, most significantly, the Red Lion has acquired a thatched roof! Also, and some may think this is more significant, it was no longer a Mann's pub!

We returned on the evening of Monday 18th August 2003.

In the intervening six years, very little had changed apart from a new sign by the entrance to what probably used to be the stables.

Our next visit was on the evening of Wednesday 9th September 2009.

The signage had completely changed, but everything else remained the same. This visit was somewhat of a disaster and I vowed never to visit again unless the management changed. I reviewed my experience on Qype which you can see here. That review details my complaint and represents one of the worst examples of customer service that I've ever experienced!

I still haven't returned as a customer, but as I was in Crick for the Boat Show I took this picture on Monday 27th May 2013.

It would appear that there have been no changes in the four years since my last visit and judging from the reviews on Yelp (was Qype when I submitted mine) it would appear that management hasn't changed and they still offer a 'wonderful' brand of customer service - review here from four months AFTER this photo was taken! Looks like I won't be returning anytime soon!