Before we went, we picked out some promising pubs and set off at about 11am. The weather was fine and dry with a fair amount of cloud, but lots of sun too. We'd heard that today was a busy day on the roads as a lot of people were heading off on holiday and the A43 towards the M40 was indeed a bit frantic. It didn't help that there was an event on at Silverstone and a couple of old Bentleys were making their way there!
We became stuck in very slow moving traffic just before we got to the M40, which held us up, but as soon as we were on the B430 we speeded up again. We were now in Oxfordshire and the villages were very pretty, with lots of old stone buildings and scenic views.
Our first pub was The Chequers at Weston-on-the Green and Keith and Mike were hoping for Fullers ESB to be on the pumps. Sadly, it wasn't and this sort of set the tone for the day...
Sophie and I had soft drinks while the men enjoyed pints of another Fullers ale and we sat in the garden enjoying the views over open fields.
The pub was lovely and thatched with low beams, stone-flagged floors and little nooks for dining. It's a real shame that Keith was disappointed with the beer.
We had one drink there and Keith suggested we drive to the village of Wendlebury and a pub called The Lion. All first impressions were good when we parked the car and saw a fair few people sitting outside enjoying the summer weather.
Inside was beautiful - muted colours, stone floors, fireplaces, low beams and lovely comfortable furniture. Keith and Mike went to the bar and asked for two pints of Hooray Henley, which was the strongest beer available. Unfortunately, when the barman pulled the pints they looked like rather large samples of urine! They were horrible! Keith took one sip and said it was off. Not a great impression!
The barman agreed and after much debate, the men went for pints of an Italian lager called Peroni. Sophie and I had a soft drink each (sparkling water and lemonade) and the bill came to £16! We queried it, to be told the lager was over £5 a pint and the soft drinks were about £3! No wonder so many pubs are going under when they charge these prices! We were appalled!
We sat and muttered about the prices and had a good look at the drinks menu. There was no question of eating there!
From Wendlebury we drove past the very busy A34 to Bletchingdon and the Blacks Head Inn. It certainly took some finding and we made a detour to the church first, but luckily, after pushing through what we thought was the village, we arrived to find it on the central green.
A car had arrived in front of us and the occupants were certainly different! This gave us some idea of how the pub was - quirky, individual and a bit strange!
 |
| Keith on the lager again! |
 |
| Hotch potch chairs in the quirky lounge bar! |
The pub didn't have any beer that appealed to Keith and Mike so they chose lager again. Sophie and I stuck to soft drinks but at least the bar bill was a bit cheaper! We had two bags of crisps and discussed a late lunch, only to discover that the pubs we were heading to stopped serving food at about 2pm...I thought that on a Saturday they would be serving all day!
We had one drink and decided to call at The Ben Jonson on the way back to the A43. This was also in Weston-on-the-Green and when we arrived it looked empty. The pub is lovely - another thatched building with stone floors, muted colours and lovely decor. There was nobody about in the bar so we had to go and find the landlord who was in the process of leaving the pub. He found two bottles of beer for Keith and Mike in the fridge and then embarked on a long diatribe about how difficult it was to run a pub!
The pub was completely empty but there were people sitting outside with children. I found out that Ben Jonson was a 16th century playwright, hence the name.
By now we were all getting a bit hungry so we decided to call into The Green Man near Brackley (and Silverstone) which we hoped would be doing food all day. I think there was some sort of Ford event happening at the racetrack the next day as there were loads of souped-up Fords in the car park and a lot of people arriving to stay at the neighbouring Premier Inn.
Most customers were sitting in the garden area so the restaurant was very quiet. We were shown to a table on its own and we had a great view of the speeding cars on the busy A43! We chose from the menu and enjoyed chicken burgers, a vegan burger and a mixed grill. The food was OK and the bill, with drinks, came to a reasonable £65.
We made our way home and Mike disappeared out again to see his friends. We relaxed for the rest of the evening and had an early-ish night. It had been a busy day!
No comments:
Post a Comment