24th March 2023.
While I was in the “community hub” Mrs RM was scouring Booking.com for an overnight stop. It seemed a bit odd staying in a hotel so close to Sheffield and Waterbeach but Mum worries about us driving in the dark and it doesn’t pay to worry your mum.
And a night in Spalding meant we could head south via the western Peterborough bypass in the morning and avoid the 5 minute delay caused by the tortuous 40mph roadworks on the A1. These things matter when you have to plough the Great North Road every week.
Mrs RM, bless her, picked the new build Marston’s diner-cum-motel, a “Travelodge with Pedigree”. They can have that line for free.
Not that you’d know from the photos, but it was MANIC. Why had half of Spalding driven out to a chain diner on a Friday night when the town centre is so full of charm. Well, there’s your answer.
Hard to believe from this shot, but it was the Wainwright that was off,
so it was two pints of Pedi on Table 1, the only free table at 9pm, when you’d have expected the burger and banoffee crowd to have thinned.
Oddly, one pint was flat, the other foamy. Both were OK, the burgers equally so. But around us there were more pots of tea than pints.
I contemplated a stroll out to Little London, where the Drayman’s had been a Proper Pub last time I visited.
But a quick look at Facebook revealed an obsession with meat raffles rather th.an murk or mild
How about the pub next door to the Drayman’s ?
Oh.
Anyway, “Take It Easy” came on, we stopped to share a brownie. Look at how much Mrs RM’s Chardonnay cost;
Glad I stuck to the Pedigree, even better than the first (NBSS 3+), if lacking in any sulphurous tinge.
It’s good to observe a real pub at close quarters, and in the morning we have the splendour of the Fens to enjoy.
Stunning, isn’t it ?
retiredmartin 
Has there ever been a GBG entry in Pode Hole? If you are still(not) doing the GBG next year you will be visiting the micro tucked into a shopping parade in Market Deeping
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Should you wish to revisit in six week’s time, you can enjoy the Spalding Flower Parade.
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Have you ever been, Paul ? One of the oddities of driving through those Lincs fens is how little flowers you see, except on the market.
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I’ve only driven through that part of the fens on a handful of occasions, Martin, and none of them were in springtime. I was always under the impression that Spalding was the “bulb capital” of Britain.
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It certainly is, Paul, but apart from at an auction in town you’d hardly know it driving past.
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It is indeed Paul.
My late father used to travel to buy his from there, until he changed to a Mr. Vos in the Netherlands who delivered them direct to his premises instead.
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One night in Spalding could be your last…
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Bill, wasn’t that 10cc, Une Nuit A Paris (Part 1) ? Or am I just showing my age?
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Surely was. We must be of a similar age. Makes a change from Smiths references.
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Stunning?
No.
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But the views over the Fens from the heights of the A148 actually are, Andy.
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No ? I feel cheated.
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“But around us there were more pots of tea than pints” and nearly all the pints are lager in a similar Marstons dining pub near me. And there’s no more cask sold in most of the proper pubs in town.
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