It’s raining in Malta so I’m catching up with my blog and working out how many pints of craft I can afford with my euros.
It’s 2.50 euros for Stella if your eyesight is as bad as mine.
A far cry from Malta, the Peak District softens a bit as you wind towards Ashbourne, with no sign of snow as you reach the Derbyshire border.
Now it’s not surprising I’ve never been to tiny Crowdecote before, but just over the Staffordshire border Longnor looks stunning, with two (non-GBG) pubs serving Robinson’s and John Smiths Cask.
There’s a lot of Britain to explore, folks, and not all of it reaches the Beer Guide.
Crossing the border brings you close to the pastoral White Peak, and you need binoculars to see the snow that is at that moment closing the Snake Pass.
As with snowy Allgreave, Crowdecote is just a pub, a farm and a sense of being very far from the craft beer worlds that are Macc and Buxton.
I could have lumped the Pack Horse in with the Rose & Crown; they share stone walls, horse brasses, genuine welcome, and pride in their beer range.
It rarely happens these days, but the landlord was actually pulling a pint when I walked in. That made up my mind for me, anyways. The Pitchfork was superb (NBSS 3.5+).
The Guvnor had a very unconvincing Derbyshire accent;
“Cheers Pal”
Yes, he was from Staines, so I got to exchange notes on the Beehive, as well as finding out the life story of the couple of retired-but-less-than-gentlefolk from Runcorn. Folk from Runcorn do have interesting life stories, don’t they ?
On another subject entirely, great lacings.
retiredmartin 
Perfect pub, perfect landlord, perfect beer. And very good local lager. Our favourite pub round here.
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I forgot how close you are, Ian. Glad I wasn’t excessively swayed by the Staines accent !
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No mention of the Pipers Crisps.
Have they stooped your retainer ?
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If you’d been reading the blog closely, Prof, you’d have seen I passed the Corkers factory in the middle of Fens nowhere. Just concluding the deal before the transfer window ends.
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stopped even.
All this Hoovering has got me at it too.
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I thought you’d turned Scottish.
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Third post in a row I haven’t been to. Rubbing it in big time! On agenda tomorrow too. Not sure how much you will find in Malta but know it will not be for the want of trying.
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He’s only heading to Malta in a vain attempt to escape the Groupies he’s acquired since the Beer article appeared, perhaps not realising that all Cynthia Plastercaster takes impressions of these days are pink highlighters. I’ve heard he’s referred to as “the shy one”,
We can but assume that you are a man of more resilient character and able to brave these things out.
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It’s a vain attempt to escape, certainly, but unfortunately CAMRA Discourse is loading quicker here than at home ;=-(
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I thought that might have reached meltdown by now.
May peek in and drop a hand grenade or two tomorrow, if I can be bothered. Wondering if GK East Coast IPA meets Nu-CAMRA definition of “modern” keg?.
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Why not ? It’s bad enough.
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“Crowdicote”
“I” think “I” notice a slight spelling error. 😉
“the pastoral White Peak,”
Is it called the Peak District because of all of the peaks?
“closing the Snake Pass.”
Is that near (or part of) the Oopnurthring?
Cheers
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Ha caught you Russ. There’s two different spellings of Crowde(I)cote on that map. Always the way.
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Argh. And it was staring me in the face directly above the other spelling! (blush)
Was going to check but was too lazy. I blame my better half. 😉
(doffs hat at your sleight of hand there) 🙂
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Thank you, kind Sir. There’s a fair amount of places that have alternate spellings in the same village, to be fair.
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I get confused imagining someone saying “Cheers Pal” in England, because the “cheers” part sounds 100% English to me, but the “pal” part sounds like something I’d hear in New York City. Do you hear people saying “pal” a lot in England?
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Others on here will know better than me, I thought it was very northern. I call everyone “mate”, whatever their probable gender or age.
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Yup. Mate for the lads and luv for the gals. So far no one of the female persuasion has called me sexist. 🙂
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Sexist.
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Yes, very Northern, I’d say. Like “mate”, it can come across as a bit confrontational depending on the tone of voice. “What you doing there, pal?”
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“Sexist.”
I didn’t know you were female? 😉
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Never presume.
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I am late on this yet again due to another week in hospital.
Where i come from pal or mate can be said in different ways to either sound friendly or aggressive and i have used it in both ways in the past.
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Agree, its how you use that matters
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Some fantastic walks round there and even better pubs….
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