Chippenham Pub Explorations

On a sunny Saturday we set out to pay a visit to Chippenham, where we'd find some nice pub hanging baskets, a beer festival, a micropub by the station, and several fine pints of real ale.

Is Chippenham popular with pub tickers?
Hmmm, maybe not...

So I headed to the Wiltshire market town with a bit of trepidation, wondering what the pubs would have in store for me.

Our first point of call, the clock having just ticked past midday, was the Flying Monk on the market place.
Life After Football recently suggested that "if a pub can be bothered to maintain hanging baskets then it can be bothered to clean its pipes".  And here I had a chance to test that theory...

The Flying Monk (6 Market Place, Chippenham, SN15 3HD)
Early doors saw just a few locals propping up the bar or sat on the tables closest to it, including a Scotsman in a tartan cap who seemed to have managed to get quite tipsy already, telling his companion that  "we're all doomed".
The old pub dog looked thoroughly bored with proceedings...

Three beers from the North Cotswold Brewery, and a Cross Bay IPA from Morecambe made for a decent quartet of ales on the hand pumps.
The NCB 'Shakespeare's India Pale Ale' was one of those beers that's brewed to an old 19th century recipe, which I'm always a sucker for.  In this case, they've recreated a historic IPA by Flowers Brewery, concocting a fruity, strong 6% ale that made for a fine first half-pint of the day.
Score one for the pub hanging basket theory.

 

We settled on an old church pew in the quiet side room to enjoy our beers with a soundtrack of Tears for Fears and a further selection of 80's pop rock.
But eventually, on came Ed Sheeran, indicating it was time to move on to the Three Crowns.  

Three Crowns (18 The Causeway, Chippenham, SN15 3DB - web)

Where we found an unexpected beer festival.  Wahey!

The local chap being served before us was ordering a pint of the 8% Kettlesmith 'Triple'.  8% beer by the pint at lunchtime - cripes!   "Best strong beer I've ever had", he told me, which meant I had to try it, although a half was quite enough for me.
This was followed with an Innformal 7.1% ruby mild: no Sarah Hughes, but still a very enjoyable tipple.
The 'Stick to the Sensible Beers' resolution will have to wait for 2023.

I really liked the Three Crowns, as do the local CAMRA branch who've presented them with enough framed awards to fill all the wall space above the fireplace in the main bar.
This is a proper pub with the food offering consisting of rolls, scotch eggs, crisps and scratchings, and a bookshelf full of past editions of the Good Beer Guide.  Musical instruments hang from the wall and if we'd have stayed long enough we could have enjoyed the ukulele evening. 

The local park is the #1 attraction on TripAdvisor's Things to Do in Chippenham list, which kinda gave a clue that sightseeing options between pubs were going to be limited.
I'm sorry that we missed the Eddie Cochran memorial, the American rock 'n' roller having been tragically killed in a car accident nearby in 1960.
No statues erected, to date, for Chippenham-born Piers or Jeremy Corbin...

Our ten minutes of tourism were spent in the small museum in the historic Yelde Hall, before we crossed back over the Avon and found our way to the micropub...

The Prince of Wales (8 Station Hill, Chippenham, SN15 1EG - web)
We had this single room micro to ourselves on arrival, although a few more folk arrived a short while later to liven things up a little bit and stop us having to whisper to one another.
The pub was opened in 2018 in the premises of a former flower shop, and was crowned the local CAMRA branch pub of the year in 2020.

Real ales came from Moor - 'Stout', 'Resistance' pale ale, and single-hopped 'Nano Cask', all priced at £4.20 a pint.
I bucked earlier foolish choices and picked the 3.8% nano cask, which was an easy-going session bitter, kept on good form.

Moving on, we crossed the railway lines via the footbridge at the station, which took us handily to within a few meters of the Beer Guide listed Old Road Tavern. 
A step down from the Flying Monk in hanging basket quality, but the parked mobility scooter provided a sign of a good pub.

Old Road Tavern (Old Road, Chippenham, SN15 1JA)
The Old Road Tavern is Grade II listed and was built some 140 years ago.  The bar counter serves two rooms, with a third containing a pool table to the side, and a garden to the rear, into which most of the punters had been lured by the good weather.
Proper pub furniture, beer mats, eclectic ornaments on the high shelf, framed pictures of classic rock stars...and good beer. 

There were two beers from Bristol's New Union Brewery, with my 'Moose River' being in good condition and most enjoyable.  Other choices included ales from Frome and Dark Star.

Handily close to the train station, this was our last port of call on this day's Chippenham pub explorations.
I have to politely disagree with Sir Quinno on this occasion and wouldn't put Chippenham on my crap pub towns list.  We spent an enjoyable afternoon in the town, although I wonder if my judgement was impaired by the pre-lunch 8% triple?

Living in a Box

The first of a few Wiltshire pubs on the blog.  Several weeks ago I paid a visit to the village of Box which sits on the A4 between Bath and Chippenham.

I may not have set foot here before, but I had whizzed under Box Hill on Brunel's 1.83 mile railway tunnel on numerous occasions traveling on Bristol-bound trains.

The Faresaver X31 bus from Bath dropped me in the village centre.   But beware: it's still some way up a steep hill to a neighbouring hamlet to get to the local Good Beer Guide pub.

I guess the fact that the Quarrymans Arms promotes great views gives a clue that it's gonna be uphill.
But I hadn't prepared for quiet how out-of-breath I was going to get trekking up the lanes and on footpaths through the woods to Box Hill.  I was fairly hot 'n' sweaty and unpresentable by the time I reached the pub.
Not for the first or last time.

Quarrymans Arms (Box Hill, Box, SN13 8HN - web)

This is a charming single-storey, vine covered pub, dating back some 250 years.  Relatively small within, the front section has some bench seating and rustic wooden tables, with pewter tankards and pump clips adorning the beams.  The rear room looked intended for diners, with the best seats in the house being those by the picture window where the views were indeed spectacular.

A Butcombe house, three of the beers were their own: 'Best', 'Gold' and 'Chinook', with a fourth from Liberation of Jersey being a fruity, chewy 'West Coast IPA'.
Priced at a countryside dining pub beer tariff rate. 
I took my pint to the outdoor tables at the top of the slopes overlooking the Bybrook Valley.  Which also meant I got to take my scruffy self well out of the way of the handful of immaculately dressed wedding guests who were emerging from the residential rooms.

Cooled down and refreshed with IPA, I made my way back downhill, under threatening grey clouds, into Box.  With a gap before the next bus, I decided it would only be right to call in to the central village pub.

Queens Head (High Street, Box, SN13 8NH - web)
This building dates back to the 1700's and became a coaching inn midway through that century when the new London to Bristol road was opened in 1761.

The front door took me into the Brunel Lounge, with a considerable cake display on the bar...

As I couldn't really imagine being served a pint over the cake stands, and as there wasn't a soul in sight, I walked though into the basic public bar to the side where I felt much more at home.
WhatPub had suggested I'd find Greene King and Wadworth beers here, but it turned there was a more interesting and appealing choice of Bath 'Gem', St Austell 'Cornish Best' and Ramsbury 'Jubilee' on offer.

The Ramsbury was a lovely pint which went down a treat.
Keith Moon picture on the wall, odd sport on TV (paddle racket?), Fosters drinking darts players, a chatty landlord and some inoffensive pop music in the background.  If I wasn't watching the bus times, I could easily have settled in the Queens Head for longer, feeling comfortable in this pleasant village pub.

And visiting Box brought to mind this 1987 number 5 hit, which has nothing to do with the Wiltshire village.  Although if you're looking for musical connections Peter Gabriel is a local resident and has his Real World Studios in Box.

Living in a Box join Talk Talk and Motorhead as bands that released self-titled singles.
Possibly (?) the band with the highest charting single named after themselves?

Enough 80's pop distractions - back to the pubs...and to Chippenham for the next post.