retiredmartin

 

Shameless clickbait for a genteel Huntingdonshire post that does at least feature sausage rolls, a Cock and several bushes.

These publess walks are getting a bit wearing now, but at least the 3 miles from Houghton Mill through the Hemingfords back to St Ives were without Social Distancing drama.

The tiny Houghton Tea Rooms were taking advantage of the National Trust closure by offering bargain coffee and hot sausage rolls delivered by drone and paid for by a contactless machine at the door.

As you’ll know, a beer and coffee combination before a walk is fatal, so perhaps the pub closure is a good thing.

Hemingford Abbots is the smaller of the two  contiguous villages, its 635 residents legally obliged to live under thatch.

It does, however, have the pubbier of the Hemingford “boozers”.

The Axe & Compasses is a proper village pub that looked impossibly alluring as we pressed on into the Grey, pausing only to say “Hulloa” to the gentlefolk with pitchforks cheery waves.  They’ve never seen their village so quiet and I sense they’re not entirely happy about it.

“Is it much further ?” said Mrs RM, as we crossed the meadows leading to the county’s poshest pub.

“Only 20 minutes” I lied.

The Manor Gardens (£5) had just re-opened.  Social Distancing didn’t look to be a problem.

Frankly, the village is a honeypot, but the usual Grey visitors aren’t flocking back ’till the Cock re-opens.  Walking half a mile on an empty stomach isn’t an option.

This is Cambridgeshire’s top dining pub (Spoons aside), AND a GBG perennial.

Simon got here in 2018 and forgot to take photos of thatch but did warm to the piped Blackadder in the Gents (it’s Dudley & Clive in the Ladies).

If there’s a more gastro line-up than Adnams, Brewsters and Oldershaw I’ve yet to see it, but as with Simon I can vouch for the beer quality and pubbiness of the Public bar.

Anyway, more thatch.

You’re dying to see pictures of flat roof pubs in Carluke now, aren’t you ?

Patience, patience.