A Bitter Day.

 It was raining when I woke up this morning, and it continued to do so until the Archer's had finished. Today had already been decreed a day of rest, by me, as I had things to do. The main job was to construct the Hedon Museum March Newsletter. I am trustee of this small museum in our historic little town and the newsletter is just one of the jobs I do. I am quite pleased with them, certainly compared with whet went before. Whilst I was key bashing on the computer Helen had a walk into Lidl once the rain had stopped. By the time she returned I had finished my work and had sent it off to my readers.

We are moored on the wide towpath before you get to Shobnall Park. There were only two of us when we arrived on Saturday, but there are a few more of us now.

We decided to walk back into town later on as we had booked to go to the pictures later. Burton on Trent is the brewing capital of the UK so it would be remiss. Yesterday we visited three pubs and I had three dark ales, none of which were bad at all, and three nice pubs too. We headed to the nearest real ale pub to the moorings.

The Weighbridge is just that the weigh bridge of a coal yard next to the station. It started out as the Middle Earth in 2015, and over the years the lease was taken over by Wentwell Brewery, Burton Old Cottage Brewery and final by Muirhouse Brewery in 2019. Richard Muir named the brewery after himself and the fact that he started brewing in his garage. It was a bijou but friendly place and well worth a stop over on the way into town. I had a pint of the Tick Tock Boom, which is a special bitter. It had lovely caramel notes and a damn fine pint. 

This old grain store is now the Ibis Hotel, but as a sign of modern times it is now housing Immigrants awaiting their paperwork completion. A lovely building and I am glad it is being used. They are also the landlords of the Weigh Bridge Inn.

On the other side of the railway, opposite to the Ibis, is this lovely industrial building that started out as the premises of one of the original bi brewers in Burton On Trent, Samuel Allsops New Brewery built in 1859/60. It has been refurbished to offices, but obviously all are not full!

Just a little further down Station Street is the Roebuck Inn. It was built in the early 1800's and was virtually the Brewery Tap of another of the major Burton brewers Ind Coope as the brewery was opposite. It was remodelled in 1956. I had a pint of Ten/Fifty Extra Special Bitter by Grainstore Brewery as we had just passed the grainstore. It had been started up in 1995 in Oakham in Rutland. Again it was a nice caramel tinted in colour and taste.

The Devonshire Arms was next on our route. It had been built as a private house around 1830 but was a pub by 1850. It is Grade II Listed. It was Eadie's Brewery pub until 1932 when they were bought up. I had another special bitter, Reservoir by local Gates Burton Brewery which is based in Shobnall.

The beer first started around 2007. It is a nice pub with copper table tops that Helen admired from afar. It has been a day of special bitters. I seem to have been drinking stouts and porters right through the winter, so has made a nice change.

We were booked in to see the British film Allelujah. I was expecting a little bit of a comedy romp by Alan Bennett about NHS and old people. However it was a real rollercoaster of a ride that dragged you through every emotion and covered all that is good, and bad about the NHS. I love British films. They are so nicely paced compared with American pictures. Well worth a look if you can.

On the way home we passed this old Methodist Church built in 1860. It was declared redundant in 2014 and a local businessman took it on as a business and event venue.