retiredmartin

February 2024. Doveridge, Uttoxeter.

You left your ticking hero in the dark, on the muddy approach to Doveridge Grave Yard.

You may remember Kentish Paul (gently) chiding me for the act of walking public roads from Uttoxeter last year, and although this was a marked path it seemed scarcely less foolhardy, though a man who has walked the back streets of Panama and Harare on his own is hardly likely to be scared of the Dove Valley.

Still, I was pleased to emerge into light and see the Cavendish open.

Half a dozen in for curry night in the lounge, another half dozen in for the banter at the bar.

You’ll remember (you won’t) that the young lady I have career advice to on Uttoxeter station came from Doveridge and I would have been delighted to find she’d taken my advice and been sitting at the bar drinking a sixth pint of Pedi, but alas, no.

I’d imagined Doveridge as quite an upmarket place, and perhaps it is, I never got further than the pub on the edge of the village, but the banter concerned a Swingers hotel in Retford, possibly called the Pink Panther (not on What Pub).

On no account should the Swingers be confused with the Swingle Sisters.

The Cavendish is a pleasant all-rounder with a cheery landlady who topped up my Pedigree without my asking, so Stafford Paul would be happy here. A cool, foamy NBSS 3+, and I neither know nor care whether it came from the Burton Unions or a beer factory in Wolves.

Not sure why I took a photo of the table leg,

but it was more picturesque than the walk back to Uttoxeter, a walk I judged a better option than waiting half an hour for a 401 back to town that may never come.

Uttoxeter looked a great, mystical city emerging from the gloom as I escaped from the hard shoulder of the A50.

And, indeed, it is.