Wordsley, Sedgley and Dudley

The day's beer highlights would be The Beacon Hotel, Sedgley (Sarah Hughes), The Britannia Inn, Upper Gornal (Batham's) and the Dudley Winter Ales Fayre.

On Thursday 28 November, after breakfast at the Talbot Hotel, Stourbridge, our first bus of the day took us north towards Wordsley. Our famous five (Mark, Bod, Graham, Trevor and Tim) alighted just after the bus crossed the Stourbridge Canal via Glasshouse Bridge. We recrossed the arching bridge on foot and crossed the road to visit the Red House Glass Cone and Stourbridge Crystal Glass Centre.

Dudley Council now manage the Red House Glass Cone as a free tourist attaction.

Inside, remnants of the once thriving glass industry include the Lehr (annealing oven) where glass items could gradually cool as trays were slowly moved away from the hottest area. It is the only remaining example in the world.

Travelling by bus to The Beacon Hotel involved changes in Dudley and Sedgley (near the Clifton). The Clifton originally opened as a cinema in 1937 and became a Wetherspoon pub in 1998.

The Beacon Hotel, Sedgley

We arrived later than planned, more than an hour after the noon opening time.

On arrival at The Beacon Hotel, with 'Doc' Robert having joined en route, I took a photo of Mark taking a photo at the front entrance of the traditional Victorian Public House!

Inside we found the remaining 'Farnham Trubbelers' installed in a far corner of the large back room and they had saved some space for us.

My first beer here was Sarah Hughes Pale Amber which was pleasantly sweet. (£1.40 1/2 pint).

View from counter for back room [Photo: Mark Geeson]

The small central bar has three small counters including one to serve the back room.

There are two chimney breasts where coal fires were burning with a minimal Christmas tree decoration on each mantelpiece, in the back room.

This is a large building with a new conservatory at the side overlooking a lawn and the car park.

Passing through the conservatory leads to a broad hall with the entrance to the Sarah Hughes brewery and decorated with framed CAMRA award certificates..

The toilets are found on the other side of the hall.

Lunchtime closing is 2.30pm from Monday to Thursday at the Beacon Hotel but there was still time for me to enjoy a half pint of Sarah Hughes Surprise (£1.45) served with a creamy head and reminiscent of a Belgian Tripel. This went nicely with a pork pie.
Our group enjoyed a conversation with John (75) a local regular customer who told us 'You're in the Black Country, everything's brilliant!'.

Of course, no visit to the Beacon Hotel would be complete without a dimpled glass of the glorious Sarah Hughes Dark Ruby Mild (£3 pint)!

The Britannia, Upper Gornal, Sedgley

It was still raining outside so we caught buses to reach our next destination - Batham's The Britannia Inn.

Inside the pub, after ordering our beers at the main front bar, we chose the back room, on the left side, to sit in. CAMRA's Historic Pub Interiors describes this room as having the, now rare, arrangement of a servery without a counter.

I enjoyed my pint of pale Batham's Best Bitter with a cheese and onion cob (roll) for £4.55.

There is a patio garden area behind the pub, better suited to summer weather! Another idea for a fine day is to follow Mappiman's four mile circular walk from the pub to gain far-reaching views and a chance to sample Holden's beer at the Chapel House (Miners Arms) in Lower Gornal.

Before leaving there was an opportunity to take a photo of the carpeted room at the front which is situated to the right of the main entrance.

The bull's head tiles that feature in Batham's pubs were spotted in the passage leading to the toilets at the back.

Dudley Winter Ales Fayre

Mark Geeson and Tony Lea needed to arrive at Dudley Town Hall by 5pm, as CAMRA volunteers, to help prepare for the opening of the Dudley Winter Ales Fayre at 5.30pm.
After the bus ride back to Dudley, some of us walked to The Full Moon, a Wetherspoon pub for water, coffee or beer according to individual tastes and appetites.

Tim with festival glass - early doors - Cheers!

We returned to Dudley Town Hall for admission to the festival soon after opening time.

The admission package included a programme, a half pint glass (refundable) and a sheet with tokens to pay for beer and cider. Thursday was 'quiet night' but there would be live music on other nights.

Gerald Daniels (Crookham Travel) at top left with 'Farnham Trubbelers' at Dudley Winter Ales Fayre

As relatively early arrivals we were able to join a friendly table that included several locals. Philip Wildsmith (on right of photo) has been involved with Yapton Beerex, a CAMRA beer festival held at Yapton and Ford Village Hall in West Sussex. Visitors arrive from several different countries to attend this festival and I hope to visit the 31st edition in 2020 (15-17 May).

Most of the cask beers I sampled were 1/3 pint measures priced at £1.10 or £1.20. My favourites, as recorded on Untappd, were: North Riding US IPA V32 (ABV 5.5%) a hoppy beer brewed with Citra and Loral hops and Kinver Quindecim (ABV 4.5%) with honey sweetness, brewed to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the brewery.

I also enjoyed a third of Green Duck Wheach, a peach flavoured wheat beer, from the Key Keg bar, priced at £1.60.

The Little Devils food menu for the festival included local favourites: Samosas (£1.20); Gray Paes and Bacon (£2.50) and Bread Pudding (80p).
After spending £10 worth of tokens and sampling a variety of mainly pale beers, it was time for me to leave at 10pm and catch a bus back to Stourbridge.

Now a routine, I ducked into the Duke William, my favourite Stourbridge pub, for a nightcap after the bus journey. A half pint of Craddock's Troll, pale and fruity, would be my final Black Country beer on this visit.

Stourbridge (27/11/2019)

Talbot Hotel, Stourbridge (later photo - 29/11/2019)

The 'Farnham Trubbellers' gathered in the breakfast room at the Talbot Hotel for a 'continental breakfast'. We had been warned the previous evening that a full English breakfast would not be available as the chef was away. 'Normal' service would be resumed on Thursday.

To pass the time before we caught the bus to Dudley as the first stage of the trip to Walsall, some of us would end up in the nearby Wetherspoon pub, The Chequers Inn, at the southern end of the High Street.

The attractive centrepiece of the island bar is a reminder that Stourbridge is traditionally associated with the manufacture of glass. Unlike the coffee from the urn at the Talbot hotel, the bean to cup coffee machine here was worth returning to for free refills.

Suitably caffeinated, there was a chance to snap the stylish 1930's style shopfront for John Pargeter & Sons on the High Street before crossing to Stourbridge Interchange via the subway under the busy ring road.

Less attractively, we noticed a few closed pubs from the bus on the way to Dudley.

However, passing canals and the chance to see Dudley Castle from Dudley Interchange were bright spots of the first stage of the journey on this gloomy day.

Separate posts - A Walsall Wednesday wander and Destination Bloxwich cover our group's visit to historic pubs in Walsall and Bloxwich.

Returning to Stourbridge from Bloxwich, via Wolverhampton, the group set off for The Chequers Inn (only to discover that the kitchen was closed). However, as I had eaten earlier, I visited the Red House Boutique, near the subway from Stourbridge Interchange.

Red House Boutique (later photo - 28/11/2019)

Featured in CAMRA's Good Beer Guide, this large pub is popular with a younger age group and the classic hits music playing from Gold radio was mainly to my taste.

Sitting on my own in a quiet corner, it was nice to be approached by manager Danii to ask if I was enjoying my £3.50 pint of Northern Monk 'Don't mess with Yorkshire ale'. She explained that they regularly have tap takeovers at the pub like their current range of Northern Monk beers on cask and keg.

In turn, this would become my excuse to later approach Danii at the bar and ask her to pose with a copy of Ullage, the West Berkshire CAMRA magazine, which I edit.

After finishing my pint, I returned to the nearby Duke William, visited earlier the previous evening.

A half pint (£1.85) of Craddock's Cast Iron stout would make the ideal nightcap.

It was pleasant to return to the table by the side windows and relax in the dimly lit room with just the sound of lively conversations rather than a radio stream that included irritating advertisements.
I left for the Talbot Hotel before midnight as there would be more Black Country pubs to visit on Thursday.

From Stourbridge to the Bull and Bladder

A pleasing way to arrive in Stourbridge is on the West Midlands Railway shuttle from Stourbridge Junction to Stourbridge Town. This was the final stage of my train journey from Newbury via Reading and Worcester on Tuesday 26 November, 2019.

The small railway vehicle heads downhill on the 0.8 mile branch line which can claim to be the shortest in Europe.

After crossing the ring road, a short walk along Stourbridge High Street leads to the Talbot Hotel, a traditional coaching inn which dates back to the 1630s.
I had time to take a photo of the High Street from the second floor bedroom before noticing that the shower fitting was damaged and leaking into the bath. After returning to reception via the creaking staircase I was able to change keys for a different room.

The hall passage to the rear second floor bedroom gave views of the hotel's open courtyard. The tower of St Thomas' Church beyond could be seen from this bedroom. All the floors appear to be sloping at second floor level!
A short walk via Victoria Passage led to Barbridge, based in an old retail unit since 2015.

Barbridge, Stourbridge  [Photo: Mark Geeson]

Mark Geeson and the 'Farnham Trubbellers' were already well established on the high level seating and the only seat I could find was at low level! Mark established that our group included CAMRA members from seven different branches. This is a bar with an appeal to all ages that features music memorabilia.

A blackboard lists four cask beers and four keg beers. My first beer here was Black Iris Snake Eyes, a 3.8% ABV hoppy pale (£2.90 pint 'Happy Hour'). Blues music was playing on the sound system. Our attempts to revisit this bar on subsequent days were unsuccessful as it may have closed early.

As Craddock's Brewery is based at the Duke William, Stourbridge, this was the next pub we decided to visit.

The Duke William was the second Craddock's pub to open in Stourbridge (in 2009). The brewery was installed at the Duke William in March 2011.

Trevor - The Duke William

The Duke William has atmospheric lighting, a fireplace with a stove, and hops for decoration.
Pieminister pies are available with a blackboard above the fireplace giving further details.

My first beer here was Craddock's King's Escape, a 4.7% ABV cask ale. Craddock's pubs have a loyalty card system where stickers are given for each beer and once a card is filled with eight stickers a free beer is offered. Our group were soon able to fill a card!

The Vine Inn aka The Bull and Bladder - Farnham Trubbellers assemble!

A trip through residential streets on a National Express West Midlands number 8 bus service from Stourbridge Interchange to Delph Road, Brierley Hill, took us close to the Vine Inn, also known as the Bull and Bladder. This is the home of Batham's beers.

The public bar on the right of the entrance has an Edwardian bar and a three-bay bar-back with a central clock and a bell for calling 'time'. On arrival, only Batham's Bitter was available but this was the beer that I had been looking forward to drinking.

As the public bar was already busy our large group found tables in another of the rooms and carried our beers through.

One of the large cheese and onion cobs from the bar made an ideal accompaniment for a favourite beer. Martin Taylor's Bull & Bladdered blog post, about his visit to the Vine in April 2019, includes photos of the public bar and a cob at this 'classic pub' which is featured in CAMRA's inventory of historic pub interiors.

A long room at the back of the building has further seating and a darts board over a fire place.

Thanks to an earlier arrangement made by Mark Geeson, our group was privileged to be invited on a tour of the large cellar by landlord Tom. He mentioned that at busy times, the pub can empty a hogshead (54 gallons - shown in photo) in a day. There were also barrels (36 gallons) of Batham's beer in the cellar. (For comparison, the largest size container of cask ale seen in pubs in the south of England is usually a firkin (9 gallons) although brewers supplying CAMRA's Great British Beer Festival are asked to use kilderkins (18 gallons)).

Photo: Mark Geeson

Bitter, Mild and (seasonally) XXX are the three Batham's beers served. Roger Protz's 'Black Country family affairs' article in What's Brewing (January 2020, with same text as linked Protz On Beer blog post) has more details about Batham's 'delicious and uncomplicated' beers, from the brewery located behind the pub.
After this enjoyable introduction to the Black Country and its beers we would catch a bus back to Stourbridge and our hotel for rest before a visit to Walsall the next day.