May 2023.
I intend to blog about why repeating Good Beer Guide completion isn’t on the card this year, and one of the reason stares me in the face as I write this from my parents spare bedroom out of which Baa Baa Toure and Alfie the Alpaca gaze longingly.
Yes, spending three days a week “home” in Cambridge puts too many temptations in your way, from the still wonderful Sun to the joys of Mill Road, 10 minutes train ride away.
And every pub revisited in Kingston Street is a pub not visited for the first time in Trowbridge.
But it’s great to have the venerable Kingston Arms back as a Proper Pub after a spell of gastro poshness (apparently).
20 years of Mill Road circuit cosy boozer (and Brewers Gold stronghold) before that blip, and now it’s back, with a sprinkling of the pubby magic dust that makes the Cambridge Blue and Histon’s Red Lion so great.
And just look at these hand pumps;
Quite a “Northern” touch all round.
Those Oldham boys get everywhere.
Good to see a fair few drinkers in the suntrap garden in a pub without food (you can bring your own takeaways in like that Kidderminster place).
It looks lovely, and is welcoming and cosy. Paul Mudge might even be persuaded to make a trip.
I went for the Bateman XXXB, second Bateman in a week, is this a Wainfleet renaissance ?
Probably not, but this was cool and crisp (3.5), and my only slight regret is that I didn’t leave the visit a fortnight, as local legend Dan has just made a stunning discovery;
First Sheffield gets its first Bass this century, and now Cambridge.
retiredmartin 
All the way to Cambridge and you still can’t get away from Chris!
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Is Chris from Oldham ?
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Strictly speaking Chris & Michelle live in Derker, but it is a suburb of Oldham.
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The Red Lion, Histon. Now there’s a pub I’ve been to many times (none of them recently). I seem to remember it was run be a New Zealander back then.
Good beer, Batemans. I had an excellent bottle of Victory only last night. Reminds me, how are the Elgoods beers these days?
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It’s Mark, a Grimsby Town fan I recall running the Red Lion for many years and there was Grimsby memorabilia in the Kingston.
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Taking a quick look on Google Maps, I’m amazed how many of the Histon/Impington pubs seem to still be in operation. Can’t remember its previous name but the only one I can see that’s no longer a pub is labelled as a Smokehouse.
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Walked past Smokehouse today.
It’s actually a real ale gain, was Phoenix Chinese restaurant for many years before that.
Yes, Histon has kept its pubs, bar one (the Station).
The football club has fared less well since beating Leeds.
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“Paul Mudge might even be persuaded to make a trip”. Yes, to see if that’s a proper old Hewitts lantern outside.
Coincidently Cambridge was one of very few places I was thinking of staying for a couple of nights this autumn.
MPA was the only Lees’s cask beer on in their Chester Duttons a fortnight ago. I spent longer in Humphrey’s Old Boot.
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