Atherstone Pub Crawl

An afternoon spent in the north Warwickshire market town Atherstone, situated midway between Tamworth and Nuneaton.  Home to just over 9,000 people, it was once a centre for hat making, has one of those free-for-all pancake day football games, and a pretty impressive number of public houses.

I arrived on a Sunday lunchtime, strolling down the main street to the market square which has three pubs/bars facing onto it and is overlooked by St Mary's church, featuring an impressive octagonal embattled tower.

A few steps from the church is the Angel Ale House, with a place in the Good Beer Guide '24.

Angel Ale House (24 Church Street, Atherstone, CV9 1HA)
Atherstone's sole current Good Beer Guide entry has a fair few regional pub of the year awards hung on the wall and was serving a decent range of real ales when I visited.
Five pump clips, and miniature bottles for you to check the colour, offering up beers from Oakham, Woodfordes, Vale of Glamorgan, and Leatherbritches.  I went to the dark side with a lovely Beowulf 'Chocolate Porter'.  Everything reasonably priced between £3.60 to £4.20 a pint.

 

Sadly the turntable next to the bar wasn't in action, the piped music featuring the lesser-heard Aha 'Take on Me', and the very frequently heard Boston 'More than a Feeling' and ELO's 'Mr Blue Sky'.

There were a reasonable number of punters for a Sunday afternoon, some taking drinks out onto the tables on the square.  The retirement bash seemed to be favouring coffee over real ale, although perhaps the hardcore ladies continued their celebrations by hitting the Bass in the New Swan later in the day.

Talking of Bass...

The Black Horse (156 Long Street, Atherstone, CV9 1AE)
This was one of a handful of pubs in the town promising to serve a pint of Bass and I wasn't to be disappointed on that front.  Two hand-pumps in the Black Horse, although the second had it's Doom Bar pump clip turned around, not causing me any disappointment whatsoever.

The trouble with the Black Horse is that - despite looking like it would be from the outside - it wasn't very pub-like.  There was just one alcove in the front room with proper pub seating by the fireplace.  Beyond that we were into the realm of functional high-backed restaurant chairs.

I took my pint into the back room and decided this would be a good a spot for lunch.  So here's my Sunday nut roast - lacking a Yorkshire pudding - but a good feed for the day.

The attentive staff apologised that it took so long, explaining they had to cook nut roast to order 'cos they don't get many vegetarians.  Still, better than one pub in North Devon I visited recently that didn't do any veggie options as "we're a farming community and we don't have vegetarians round these parts!"

Glancing at the map, I realised that I could continue straight down the road for about a mile and it would take me into the neighbouring village of Mancetter and a heritage pub.
That seemed a good way to walk off lunch instead of just crossing the road to the Old Swan.
The Blue Boar makes for a good pub picture..

The Blue Boar (Watling Street, Mancetter, CV9 1NE)
The current pub was rebuilt around 1940 for Mitchells and Butlers on a large corner plot, car park in front of the sizable building.
I stepped through the door into a loud and raucous public bar, where the local folk had chosen to stand around the bar shouting to each other rather than utilise any of the seating.

On the bar were three beers from the local Sperrin brewery: golden, ruby, and mild.  Alongside Doom Bar.  A pint of the mild for myself, taken into the peace and quiet of the lounge.

Mild on great form.  Local CAMRA mag to read.  Lovely surroundings EXCEPT for that wallpaper!

The Blue Boar has a design typical of large pubs built at the time, where a number of rooms surround a central bar.  Beyond my seat in the lounge was the old Smoke Room which has been extended and turned into a restaurant area.
Here's the PropUptheBar bench seating picture of the month...

Finishing a very satisfying mild, I trekked back along the road to Atherstone.
Long Street really didn't need the boy racer driving up and down it at 80mph.

Back where I was 45-minutes earlier, the Old Swan sits straight across the road from the Black Horse.

The Old Swan (175 Long Street, Atherstone, CV9 1AH)
Another pub with a mention in the Heritage Pub guide, this time because the interior remains little changed since a '60's refurbishment.  The front room has a dozen surprisingly sweary and cheery-looking locals on the three tables facing the bar.  There is a second section to the right of the front door with good trad seating, a busy back room, and a fair few people opting for the garden on this sunny afternoon.

Cask on offer was Banks's Amber or Courage 'Directors', the latter with a cardboard make-shift pump clip.  The Old Swan served a decent Banks's and was a pub I was pretty settled in.

 

Just a short way along Long Street was another destination that I'd got marked down for a pint of Bass.
The Hat & Beaver (I'm reliably informed this is now the only pub with that name in the country) looked every bit a proper boozer.

Hat & Beaver (130 Long Street, Atherstone, CV9 1AF)
Sadly it was a little bit too quiet within.  There are two sections to the bar, one facing the back room and a counter in the front room where you'll find the cask hand pump.
A couple of old boys sat on the bench seating chatting to the landlord and keeping half an eye on footy on the TV.  A handful of folks had picked the table right at the far end of the back room.  I un-sociably sat right in the middle on some well-worn cushioned bench seating, enjoying the Bass. 

After a quiet pint in the Hat & Beaver, I returned to more signs of life in the market square.  I figured I'd call in to the Market Tavern which had a good crowd and a bunch of motorbikes outside.

Market Tavern (21 Market Street, Atherstone, CV9 1ET)
It looked like the Market Tavern was making an attempt to challenge the Angel for a beer guide place.  Pump clips stuck on the beams and lots of signage advertising the real ales and ciders.  There were five handpumps across the bar with two from Windsor & Eton Brewery, a breakfast stout from a brewery I didn't identify, 'Swoop' from Brass Castle, and - my pick - an Unbarred 'Joosy'.

This was a cracking place to finish a crawl around the town.  There were a fair few customers, the sun was shining through the windows, there was some lively music pumping out the speakers, and the very crafty 'Joosy' went down so easily.
All-in-all, a town I knew little about beforehand that was well worth a visit for a crawl around some of the pubs.