retiredmartin

May 2023.

Press on while the weather is good for blogging.

I arrived in Bridgnorth a week after the Southworth clans left.

I would have loved to have met them and shown them the town’s cultural highlights, including the actual home that Hector lived in.

Apart from Hector and the pub stock, the town is famed for the funicular that carries you from the Spoons and spoon shops in High Town to the baps and Batham’s in Low Town.

It’s a remarkably well-pubbed town of only 12,079; I make it 27 entries on What Pub.

But the closure at Christmas of the famous cliff railway due to a crack in the wall has caused chaos and consternation, cutting off the route betwixt High and Low Town to the gentlefolk who arrive in droves from Wombourne and Stourbridge. Bridgnorth feels notably quieter than before, even compared to last year’s flying visit.

I took the steps down. It really is steep,

But you get to see the inscriptions on the ancient walls, mainly pub reviews from the 17th century.

Down at the bridge 3 minutes later all is calm,

and the look back to High Town reminds you why so many come to a place without mainline rail station or obvious attractions.

Twenty-seven (27) entries on What Pub so I shouldn’t really be surprised I haven’t visited the Fosters Arsm but I kind of am, as it looks like a GBG cert.

Whatever reason for it not being in the Guide till now, it’s a minor corker in the busy Wolverhampton town pub mode, with Wolves and Led Zep memorabilia,

and as I’d been dreaming of Banks’s Bitter on the walk down I’m compelled to go Amber, a cool, rich, creamy, straw-tinged pint (NBSS 3.5).

The chatty landlady tells me the sorry tale of the funicular’s battle with errant walls and legalities over wall ownership.

It’s a pub that clearly comes alive from the Golden Hour, though there’s a bit more trade in the lovely garden to the rear.

“Hopes to be re-open by July” says the funicular website. Can’t come soon enough.