Sunday, 30 September 2018

NO NOT IVOR ALLCHURCH


No Not Ivor Allchurch.
The PRATS are back on the road. Pharp has returned from his fishing trip somewhere north of Scotland, either the Orkneys or the Shetlands. I suspect we’ll get the full unabridged story, Pharp is not known for his brevity, even his farts go on for ages, they even change note halfway through, several times.
Today we are off to a new ground, Alvechurch, the Lye Meadow, but not new pubs, we’ve supped many an ale around these parts over the years. It was around 10:15am when Parker and the PRATS mobile arrived at Chez Fuggles. It was a lovely day, full sunshine although the slightest nip in the wind, it was woolly jumper attire today. Citra was already in the back seat thumbing his Iphone8. The obligatory “how are you doing my old ducks” ensued before we fell silent, punctuated by the occasional ‘bing’ from Citra’s phone. We were en route to the house of Pharp in god’s chosen cesspit; Rushden. Pharp lives there because his anal emissions blend in with the local ambience.
Pharp insisted we go via the A45 instead of the A14, he goes that way 3 days a week. It seemed strange going south when we were supposed to be going west. Nobody told Pharp it was 8 miles further. Nevertheless, it turned out to be an inspired decision as the A14 was at a standstill, it could have cost us 2 pints drinking time. We needn’t have worried about Pharp going on endlessly about his fishing trip, it was worse. Pharp is going for a PL. Now I know I’ve already said Pharp doesn’t do brevity, but he does do acronym’s and all that stuff then proceeds to explain to us what the acronym is, PL = Personal Licence. Pharp does legal stuff, it’s his job, so as you can imagine the detail, detail after detail after detail. Citra was comatose sitting in the back seat next to Pharp, even the perpetual ‘bings’ from his phone didn’t snap him out of his state of comatosity, Is that a word? Who knows what an EMRO is? Was one question. For those interested it’s stands for ‘Early Morning Restriction Order’, we then spent the next 40 miles debating when is morning, day or effing night. Thankfully, we were about to arrive at Alvechurch marina and the wonderful Weighbridge Inn. It took about 5 minutes to wake Citra up. He had those spiralling circles in his eyes, you see them in Tom and Jerry cartoons when Tom has had the frying pan whacked on his head. His bottom jaw was all floppy, dangling on his chest, just a hint of slather fobbing in the corner of his gaping mouth. The words ‘Blue Monkey BG Sips’ hollered in his general direction did the trick. He was out the car and into the bar quicker than the entire underpants department can run out of M&S when they see Pharp enter the store.

The Weighbridge is a real pub, http://www.the-weighbridge.co.uk/ compact with 4 square rooms, one of them is the kitchen. It has a bar area, a sort of lounge for diners and another snug type bar with a serving hatch. The walls are covered with all sorts of breweriana and canal barge memorabilia. There is a sort of smoking tent cum loggia outside, with the toilets further down the alley. There is a beer garden to the side. The Weighbridge is beside the Worcester – Birmingham canal with a vast marina full of colourful barges. The pub has 7 handpumps, always ales available from Kinver and Weatheroak breweries. Pharp kicked off with Kinver Bargee a regular ale here, quite pale for Pharp, he prefers a more chestnut type ale. Bargee comes in at 4.0% abv, late hoppyness with a dry finish, very refreshing. Citra and Fuggles went for BG Sips whilst Parker had a coffee. BG Sips is a lovely pale ale, very refreshing ale and easy drinking at 4.0% abv, always popular at beer festivals and very often the first one to be sold out. Winner of numerous Gold awards. Pharp and Citra went for some solids, it was inevitable they’d go for the Black Country faggots, thankfully they didn’t come with mushy peas, otherwise Pharp would be walking home.

Bloody hell, guess who has just walked into the pub with his entourage? Only JC, no not him, Jeremy Corbyn, Jezzer or Jerry to his mates. He had what looked like the local Labour head honcho with him. A little round chap with a snug fitting suit he bought yesterday, with a permanent Cheshire cat grin across his physog. Another bloke looked like he was looking for a baby to kiss, he must be an MP, he looked like a ponce, smiling at everybody, sincerity personified. You could hear the locals almost silent utterings, under their breathes, “ferck off you ponce” drifting around the small bar. We thought about inviting Jezzer to become a member of the PRATS, but after due consideration we determined that he was over qualified. One of the locals piped up, “can you sort the water shortage problem JC”. His spokesperson replied, if anyone can, Jerry can. A silent snigger tittered around the small bar.
In strode the food waitress person, she hollered “two faggots, chips and peas”. Fuggles chirped up “I’m chips, he’s peas” pointing to Parker “and these two are the faggots”. The bar echoed with a chortle all round. Joking apart the faggots looked lovely, as Dick Emery’s Mandy would put it, “ooh you are offal, but I like you!”.
It wasn’t long before more Poppies supporters started to drift in, The Weebles included Marshall, Petit Chemise, Wort and Betweenthesticks. Marshall was wetting himself about Jezzer in the lounge, so excited he shook his hand when JC left the pub. Marshall said he wouldn’t wash it his hand for two weeks. We suggested he wouldn’t need to use any toilet paper for two weeks either.
Time for more beer, Fuggles and Citra went for Weatheroak Keystone Hops, coming in at 5.0% abv it’s a bit early for the strong stuff. A lovely pale ale and quite hoppy, Fuggles used to drink this at the Coach and Horses at Weatheroak Hill where it was once brewed. A bit of a tiff, split the brewery from the pub with the brewery now down in Studley, we’ll be in there when we go to Redditch.
The Ellis’s, then the Mitchells, plus a few more Poppies traveling band arrived, the pub was getting busy now with around 18 supporters in and around the pub. Another round of ales, this time is was Green Duck breweries Sitting Duck pale ale brewed with Amarillo hops. Very citrussy although more orange peel than grapefruit. A delicious, moreish, refreshing pint. We could have sat all afternoon thrashing this one down but the footy beckoned.
We finally arrived at Lea Meadow, nestled amongst the rolling verdant vista, on the edge of the Lickey hills. A lovely setting, but this pitch has to be one of the steepest slopes, I half expected to see some kid pushing a bike up the hill flogging Hovis bread accompanied by a brass band. The slope measures a 2.8 metre drop from one corner diagonally to the other, in fact it’s a 2metres from the top corner to the centre spot. (Ref: Ordnance Survey website).  Nevertheless, the pitch is in good condition, lots of grass all over and appears quite lush. The clubhouse bar serves fizzy wazz in most flavours.
The match.
Well, it took just 2 minutes for the ‘Church’ to fall into the almost weekly trap, their defender sent Rhys Hoenes sprawling arse over tit, the man in black pointed to the spot, one up. The new boy and the returning from suspension lad looked a tad match unfit. It wasn’t long before the almost weekly defensive ‘balls up’ led to an equaliser, one each. An unmarked Towers nodded in on half-time, two – one up. The whistle invited the swirling and wielding of handbags, with a couple of names going into the ref’s book. We pretty much dominated the second half. An almighty ‘Church’ balls up saw Rhys Hoenes tap into an empty net, Three – one final score. Three more points in the bag.
Time for more ale, just a very short 10minute journey to the aforementioned Coach and Horses at Weatheroak Hill, marvellous.
A big pub with loads of rooms, the top end near the car park is mostly restaurant, the middle is the lounge and snug, the bottom end of the building is the bar area. A large, very busy beer garden and a nice little brewery shed, home of Weatheroak Hill brewery. https://www.coachandhorsesinn.co.uk/real-ale
A great pub with up to 10 ales to chose from, usually 4 of their own, Icknield Pale ale, a lovely light, hoppy refreshing ale, 3.8% abv. Gold, a light 3.5% hoppy session ale, Copton Common a robust 4.9%, based on a Vienna German lager recipe, and finally Impossible Pale Ale, 4,2% brewed with New Zealand hops so you can expect loads of grapefruit. Regular ales include Holdens Golden Glow, Hobson’s Best, Hook Norton’s Old Hooky and Proper Job from St Austell. Two other guest ales also available, including Green Pear from the Malvern Hills brewery.
Fuggles and Citra kicked off with Icknield Pale Ale, very nice, easy quaffing, a good session ale. Pharp went for Old Hooky, a typical ale for their palate, although 4.6% puts it in the premium ale category. Rich and fruity, reddish tawny colour and malty. Parker settled for Hobson's Best, a 3.8% typical English ale.
The bar was filling up, a group of cyclists arrived. Usual shape, scrawny legs, pot belly wearing very tight clothes. It’s that padding at the back of their pants between the buttock cleft that always makes me wonder if they’ve taken a dump whilst in the saddle.
A small group arrives at the next table, the bloke goes to the bar, the wife goes to the toilet whilst Granny tries to sit down. Whoops, she missed the seat completely, in fact there wasn’t one there. She crashed to the floor with a thump. Parker was up like Spiderman to help her back to her feet and get her seated. Granny bent down to pick something up from the floor, Parker shouted “mind your head”. Bang another clout on the back of the head. She looked remarkably unscathed and joked away as if nothing had happened. The bloke arrived from the bar, wife arrived from the toilet oblivious to all the excitement Granny had gone through. Really exciting times down at the Coach.
Another round of ales, this time it’s Impossible for Fuggles, whilst Citra stayed on Icknield and Pharp stayed on Old Hooky. As expected the New Zealand hops bring out loads of citrus grapefruit. Fuggles always enjoys hops from the land of kiwis. Very refreshing.
Nearly time for home, but not before Fuggles thrashes down a Proper Job and Citra goes for the Malvern Hills brewery Green Pear. This is Black Pear with green hops so it is a seasonal ale, very hoppy with loads of aroma, 4.4% abv golden ale. Sounds nice.
Time for home, a good day out, decent pubs, decent ales, 3 points, sorted.


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