Lured by the Siren

Siren Craft 5th Anniversary & a short exploration of Wokingham

What a difference a day can make...yesterday I took the opportunity to paint picnic tables outside in warm sunshine & blue skies.  Then by Saturday morning Beast II (© all the newspapers) had hit, bringing with it Arctic winds and more snow.
I'm frustrated that I didn't get any photo's which demonstrate quite how bad the weather was this day.  The best I can do is point out that there are at least 10 woolly hats in the picture below...

On Saturday 17th March, Siren Craft Brewery opened their doors in an industrial unit near the village of Finchampstead to celebrate their 5th anniversary.  So with tickets pre-booked, we jumped on the shuttle bus from Wokingham station to get there ready for opening time.  There were two temporary bars set up in the brewery, plus more beers available in the recently added Tap Room (the warmest place in the venue, where all the in-the-know folks bagged their seats on arrival).

The programme offered up a spectacular list of intriguing, experimental and often very strong beers.

Mrs PropUpTheBar declared her first choice, 'Fresh Cream 1: Coconut' (an 11% 'bourbon milkshake with toasted coconut') to be a 5* beer and she's usually the meanest beer rater ever seen on Untappd.

The Brett IPA 'Wilde Geest', the 'Salted Caramel Shattered Dream' and the 'Maiden 2017' 11.3% barley wine were all highlights - in fact there wasn't anything that we tried during the afternoon that we didn't rave about a little bit.

And among'st some great music they played Black Lace's 'Agadoo'.  

That wasn't a dance - I was just shifting from foot to foot to combat the cold....

We sampled everything we wanted to, popped a couple of bottles in the backpack, then caught the shuttle back to Wokingham, giving ourselves ample time to visit a few of the towns pubs. 

Jam Jars

Close to the railway station is The Queens Head (23 The Terrace, Wokingham, RG40 1BP). It's a picturesque old English pub and charming inside as well as out, with low beams and a log fire.  This was a Six Nations day so the pub was full of part-time rugby fans occasionally shouting "G'wan Wales" and such like at the TV. 🏉 😠
Each beer has an identically coloured jam jar sample in front of it, to help you choose.
I picked the Hogs Back 'TEA'.  Great to have it served in a lovely Hogs Back tulip glass, which quite possibly made it taste better.
Apparently the garden is very nice, but probably not when it's -2℃.  

As we walked towards the centre of town, we spotted the Broad Street Tavern (29 Broad Street, RG40 1AU), which had a Cask Marque sign and looked like it may be worth calling into as the next retreat from the cold.

The red-bricked Broad Street Tavern

This is a Wadworth house with their full range of cask ales on offer.  I opted for the '6X' which I hadn't had in a while and which was tasty and in good condition (or was I just suckered in by another beer served in the right glass?).
It's a bustling town boozer, with a long room stretching back past the bar, plenty of customers and, yep, more rugby on TV.
There was a relaxed and pleasant atmosphere in the Broad Street Tavern.

Grabbing a bite to eat from an interesting-sounding menu we opted for a Baked Cheese Board Sharing Platter.  Both agreeing that we would have happily not shared it.  

We made a final push on through the centre of town in increasingly heavy snow - perhaps I've bit a bit too blasé about the trains home running smoothly and this bout of bad weekend weather not causing any disruption?

The town centre is the site of the most hefty roadworks I've come across since Antwerp last month....

Wokingham roadworks.   It's not blurred.  The camera is on a Siren Craft Barley Wine setting....

Our final pub of the evening was the Good Beer Guide listed Crispin (45 Denmark Street, Wokingham, RG40 2AY).  This is one of the oldest inns in town, named after St Crispin, patron saint of cobblers (and that's something I do write a lot of....)

As we'd started at 1pm, I think I can be forgiven for not actually remembering much about the Crispin.  Except that I liked it and was surprised that this wasn't CAMRAs local pub of the year (the Queens Head is on a good run of winning that particular accolade). 
And it had two front doors. 
And a decent selection of ales from which I picked a Rebellion 'Relativity'. 
And that I finally succumbed and got hooked on the end of the last rugby match of the day on TV.