Beers, Boats and Boozers, No.72.

Just the one night was spent at Fotheringhay and the next day the sun was shining and lured us onward.

The valley widened out and the views were longer, but there was more room for the river to make wide sweeping bends to add interest to the trip. Here at Elton Mill I was surprised that such a delightful building was empty. It had been built in the 1700's and then rebuilt in 1840 and worked up until 1966 when it ended its working life. It hasn't been used for much since then. What a waste of a building.

This is the village of Wansford in England, so named following a traveler who fell asleep in a hay rick was carried away by flood waters whilst asleep and upon waking asked of a person ashore where he was? On hearing the answer 'Wansford' he replied what, Wansford in England? And it has stuck. It looks an appealing village but there appears to be nowhere to moor up to get a look around.

Actually not very close to the village of Wansford is Wansford Station of the Nene Valley Railway, and as luck would have it there was nobody on the EA ponton just by the bridge, so we stopped and had a walk around the station and the area. We were lucky also when this Battle of Britain Class loco '92 Squadron 34081 came across. It was built in 1946 and after several refits looked just as good now, as then.

The next day we pushed on to Peterborough. When you cross the Nene on the train it doesn't look that appealing but once under the rail bridge and Town Bridge it widens out and there is a promenade and plenty of mooring. The first Town Bridge was built in 1308 out of wood and it lasted until 1872 when it was replaced with one of iron. That didn't do nearly so well and was replaced with this concerete one in 1934. Next to it is the Old Customs House that was built in 1790 and is not the Sea Cadets local HQ.

The Bumble Inn is found on Westgate in Peterbrough and the micropub has been open since 2016, when it was converted from a chemist's shop. They have five hand pulls and plenty of bottled beers. They like to have some unusual beers on the go too.

I tried a beer from the Newport, Wales Brewery. It was started in 2012 by two brothers in law who liked home brewing. They were both electrical engineers. They decided to go for it as a career and had almost instant success as they won gold, silver and bronze at their first Great Welsh Beer Festival and didn't look back having to also take on the industrial unit next door. By 2017 they had to move to a purpose built unit and upgraded to a 30bbl plant and now have 18 fermenter tanks, increasing the capacity five fold. The logo comes from a brother of the couple who had set up a design company after moving back from America and had this name and logo, so they shared it. They thought it appropriate as they were tiny, just the two of them, and they were rebelling against the same old stuff as they brewed what they wanted and added unusual stuff to their brews too.

I tried a pint of their Send Mild a modern Mild at 3.8%. It seems to be a seasonal beer as it was only found between June and October last year. It was a nice dark colour with a nice thick head but had no dicernable unique tasting point ]despite having being brewed with Bramling X and Citra hops.

I next tried a different brewery, Thornbridge. This started in 2005 when two young brewers were recruited to start up a brewery in the ground of Thornbridge Hall, Grade II listed Jacobean Hall 2 miles north of Bakewell. They started with a second hand 10 bbl set up. The first beer they brewed was a bitter, Lord Marple, which is still on the menu. The second was a to be an IPA with a bit of bite to it, and Jaipur was born. This won awards hand over fist and became a massive selling beer. Demand soon outstripped supply and a move to a new brewery had to take place. A purpose built place was constructed at the Riverside in Bakewell in 2009, but since then there have been three major expansion on the site. They still have the original brewery at Thornbridge Hall to experiment, make specials and help out with demand at the main plant. A real success story.

Elio is a Thornbridge seasonal ale, and with that name (elio is Spanish for sun, it could only be a summer ale). It was a new beer to the brewery in May 2019. At 4.7% I thought it would lose a little flavour with the alcohol but the yellow/gold colour and nice white head heralded a great tasty pint. At first the hops come through with fruit and flowers but there is a nice bitter'ish taste to follow. I really nice pint for a pub garden on a summers day. A 'cheerful' pint if ever there was one.