Ludlow Best

Actually, the best of Ludlow was two posts back, but as I haven't included the brewery tap or Black Country Ales pub, I figured I could squeeze in one more Shropshire blog post.

If only as an excuse for a little bit more timber-framed glory...

And one of the more unusual places to find Union Berlin stickering...

Normally we would have made a beeline for the brewery not long after arriving in town.  But Mrs PropUptheBar diligently checked opening times before letting me make a wasted journey after 6pm on a Wednesday evening.

Ludlow Brewing Co. (Station Drive, Ludlow, SY8 2PQ)
Ludlow Brewing Company was founded by Gary and Alison Walters in 2006, a 10-barrel plant set up in an old maltings on Corve Street.  Prior to this, you had to go back in history to 1933 for the last commercial beer production in the town when the Ludlow & Craven Arms Brewery was still in existence.  Fair to say the 21st century operation has done rather well. increasing in size and moving into the old rail transit depot in 2011, which enabled them to incorporate a taproom.
A good-sized space, the shiny brewing equipment stands proud in the rear left corner, with a bar to the right.

We'd had no difficulty sourcing the Ludlow beers during our short break - they'd been readily available in all towns and villages we'd visited.  But you get the full cask range in the brewery: 'Best', 'Blonde', 'Gold', 'Black Knight', 'Stairway' and 'Red Dawn'.
I picked the 'Black Knight' - a hybrid stout/porter apparently, not that I really know the difference between stouts and porters anyway.  

 

A lovely dark beer, served in the great condition you'd hope for with the brewing kit a few meters from the hand pump.
There were also a couple of keg beers available from craft offshoot Derailed ('Jam Dunk IPA' or 'Nebula' on this occasion).  Of the two, I only tried the 'Nebula' pale ale, rushing it a bit as they were calling last orders on Friday evening.

Leaving the brewery, we headed through the small industrial estate leading to the lower end of Corve Street.  A 10-minute walk from the centre, this quiet residential area is where you'll find Ludlow's Black Country Ales pub (number 36 of the current 55 on my tick-list).  

The Unicorn (66 Corve Street, Ludlow, SY8 1DU)
A bit more black & white timber frame frontage on a pub that dates back to the early seventeenth century.
The entrance is via a coaching inn style passageway to the side, with a door through to the bar and pleasant outdoor seating to the back.
Black Country Ales added this to their portfolio in May 2025 as they continue to expand beyond the Black Country and make completing their annual ale trail that bit trickier.

Heading into the front bar with its characterful wood panelling and beams, we found seven cask ales and three ciders available.  The regular 'Pig on the Wall', 'BFG' and 'Fireside' were joined by beers from Silhill, Hobsons, Evan Evans and Oakham.
I took a Silhill 'Bullion' through to the large rear room - a space which is much more recognisably BCA than the front bar, thanks to the wide expanse of familiar fabrics, beige wallpaper and a TV screen listing the beers.

Notices in the gents warned me to mind my language...

Talking of rules and regulations, the next place we were heading to has a few.

Dog Hangs Well (14 Corve Street, Ludlow, SY8 1DA)
The first challenge that the Dog Hangs Well presents is finding it.  There's no pub sign and nothing making it immediately obvious that this three-storey Georgian town-house is your destination.  Mrs PropUptheBar looked at me in alarm when I tried the purple door with the right street number on it, thinking I was about to bowl into some unsuspecting family's front room.
"Next one," said a kindly lady passing-by..."look for the light."

Aha.  This is lit at the times that the pub is open - which isn't for a great deal of hours or days of the week.
Once inside, a corridor takes you into a lobby with three rooms leading off it.  We followed the sounds of much chatter to the back room where we found the bar counter.
Rule one was cash only. 
A choice of Hobsons, Gun, or the 360° Brewery. for cask ales on this occasion,  Procuring a Hobson's 'Champion Mild' (on middling form) I took this through to the quieter quirky front rooms.
Rule two was no mobile phones, which I guess make my pictures below contraband...

A bit of arty mild smut in the snug over the piano, there.
Alongside a chaise lounge, church pews and partitions made from old doors.
The place has been set up in this historic building by the folks who were originally behind the Blood Bay.  The latter has relaxed the rules (by getting a card machine and being chilled about taking pictures, plus not batting an eye when some tourists checked maps on phones to find the restaurant they were headed to).  No such relaxation at the Dog Hangs Well, where I glanced at my screen whilst waiting for the solitary WC and got reprimanded like a naughty school boy.

The odd name was chosen as an amalgamation of the macabre practice of hanging poacher's captured dogs in the Royal woods surrounding Ludlow and the popular Gate Hangs Well pub name.

A bit of further exploration of Ludlow took me south of the town walls to the bridge over the River Teme.  Best poke my head into the pub on the far side.

The Charlton Arms (Ludford Bridge, Ludlow, SY8 1PJ)
Originally known as the Red Lion, this old coaching inn was renamed in honour of the Charlton family who owned the nearby Ludlford House and estate.  It's now very foody, with Michelin logos and AA rosettes on their website.  Rooms facing the water were set up for dining and was packed full when I visited.  But head left of the bar and there are casual areas where it's fine to loiter with a beer.
Cask available was Hobson's 'Best', Wye Valley 'HPA' and Ludlow 'Gold'.  I stuck local with the Gold, in good condition, taken through to a room showing the football.  The local lads were both friendly and very drunk.  All Aston Villa fans, Ludlow appearing to be an outlier in their catchment zone.

Back in the centre of the town, The Church is a recent Beer Guide entry and somewhere I figured I should check out.

The Church Inn (The Buttercross, Ludlow, SY8 1AW)
This is one of those places which dates back to the 14th century, yet is thoroughly 21st century with immaculate paintwork, big bright windows, and a smart modern feel to the busy rooms within.  
It's much changed with a one-time central servery being moved to a small section to one side.  That's where I ended up, out of the way of those finishing their evening meals.  
Note the old 17th century church bell on display at the side of the bar...

A Ludlow 'Best' here was my last pint in the town, with a pop soundtrack and ITV quiz show on TV rather than football.

It has taken me an age to reach Ludlow and I'm glad that I did.  Super castle, a decent set of pubs, and good quality cask ale all round.
I'll be waffling on about London in the next couple of posts - no timber-framed buildings on show.

West Brom Wanderings

I picked the most dull, grey and miserable day to make a trip to the West Midlands. 
Then picked a some dull, grey and miserable bits of the urban sprawl to visit.

My first point of call would be Perry Barr.  
I've never been able to muster the enthusiasm at the end of a day to make the short hop from Birmingham New Street to Perry Barr 'Spoons.  So, I decided to do it first on this occasion to claim this beer guide tick.
A 20-minute bus ride took me up the A34, past the sadly shuttered Barton Arms, and onto the One Stop Shopping centre. 
On the front of this is The Arthur Robertson - not one of the chain's most photogenic locations.

The Arthur Robertson (51-53 One Stop Retail Park, Walsall Road, Perry Barr, B42 1AA)
But step inside and the Arthur Robertson has a bit of character and a decent number of pre-noon punters.  Probably helped by the fact that there are a fair few closed pubs in the vicinity, the nearest pint of cask ale being 0.7 miles away in pubs that don't seem particularly enticing.

This 'Spoons is named after local athletics club Birchfield Harriers' first Olympian and medal winner.
It's populated by non-athletic-looking folk (myself included), spread over several areas divided by large bookshelves and partition walls adorned with old pictures.
Here's the cask range...

Service without a smile and a bit of a disparaging look when I tried to order the Froth Blowers which had finished. Turn the pump clip around!
I settled on a Fixed Wheel 'The Art of Van', an oddly named 4.4% super fruity and chewy IPA.

Then checked out the fairly trad carpet...

...and the Aston Villa display, complete with digital countdown...

Possibly counting down the number of days until it became unrealistic to talk about Villa as 2025/26 title contenders.

As mentioned before, Perry Barr is short on cask ale and general pubbage.
It's even more barren heading westward as I was - 3.3 miles through Hounslow with not even a drop of Doom Bar to drink.
I wasn't stopping at the first available pub, instead taking a roundabout route into the northern West Brom 'burbs to the Red Lion...

The Red Lion (190 All Saints Way, West Bromwich, B71 1RH)
This is prime desi pub territory, where the old sprawling roadside hostelries have been repurposed as eating spots with public bars and cricket on TV.
The drinker's room is the small front bar, although most of the traditional features have been zapped out of it in a smart refurb. 
I stuck in the back dining room, an extension leading to a large covered patio area.  Booth seating around the sides, 20-20 from Colombo on giant HD screens which you're never more than a couple of meters away from.

Thumbs-up for the Red Lion - not just for the superb model lions in front, but also for serving real ale: Sharps 'Twin Coast' or Wye Valley 'Butty Bach'.  A West Midlands fave Butty Bach for me, presented in good condition.  Accompanied by a paneer Balti that didn't look much portion-wise but successfully filled me up.

Time to walk off some of those calories with a fairly long trek down Heath Lane - a straight line on one road which changed names several times as it weaved through different eras of housing estates, before becoming Witton Lane, home to my next pub.

Three Horseshoes (86 Witton Lane, West Bromwich, B71 2AQ)
This was the obligatory Black Country Ales pub on a West Midlands day out.  They took over and refurbished the Horseshoes in 2016, lining the bar with hand pumps, upholstering the seating with tartan, and hanging old pictures of the local area on busily beige wallpapered walls.

Too many ale choices for me to contemplate when the bar staff were poised to pour my pint as soon as I arrived at the bar.  So I selected the Bosun's Brew Co 'Castaway', thinking it was a new brewery for me, before Untappd smugly confirmed I'd had the exact same beer before.  I'll never succeed as a beer ticker.

The 20-20 cricket continued on the TV, accompanied with the 8 minutes 57 seconds of November Rain as I sat down and sipped a perfectly enjoyable pint.

On the walk to the Three Horseshoes I'd passed a large grey estate pub which I figured was worth poking my head into.
Picture hampered by clouds as grey as the building and too many parked cars.

The Gough Arms (Jowetts Lane, West Bromwich, B71 2QR)
Crikey...they made pubs big once, didn't they?
This is a sprawling open-plan place with various distinct areas - the loungy bit, the pool table to one side, a big horseshoe bar looping around to face both front and back spaces.  I ordered the sole cask, a quite acceptable pint of Banks's 'Amber' at a very respectable price.

There was some community stuff underway in a raised area up involving piles of clothes and fabrics followed by fish and chip lunches for a group of older ladies, one of whom scowled at me an awful lot.
This looks to be a great community pub, advertising meal deals, bingo, music, and indoor car boot sales.  Long may it last.

Leaving the Gough Arms, there was some big back-tracking on myself to reach the Royal Oak - close to my lunchtime curry in the Red Lion, but not open at the time I'd been nearby.  I hopped aboard a random eastbound bus which saved some of the walk, then made the final trek into the side streets just as the rain started.

The Royal Oak (14 Newton St, West Bromwich, B71 3RQ)
Stepping in, there wasn't a soul in sight: the TV's on, the lights off.
It took an age for the someone to arrive and serve me a pint of 'HPA' (other options being 'Butty Bach' and 'Proper Job').

It's a lovely little two-roomed pub, made cosy with the bench seating around the sides of the rooms and proper pub furniture.  Nice cushioned bar too...

If the lights had been off prior to my arrival to save on electrics, the TVs in each bar could have been unplugged too.  A replay of Birmingham Ladies vs Crystal Palace with no-one to watch it really was pub telly for the sake of it.
A local arrived shortly after I'd sat down, so I didn't remain entirely by myself.
And despite it possibly being the first pint served on the day, the Wye Valley 'HPA' was great.

Out into the increasing gloom and drizzle, and quickly onto bus number 74 to the centre of West Bromwich.
I feel a little bit guilty that I wasn't intrepid enough to explore the busy hub of West Brom itself.  But the chaos of school home-time at the bus station and the dreich day made me just want to move on and claim my last Good Beer Guide tick in the area, a couple of miles up the road.

The Rising Sun (116 Horseley Road, Tipton, DY4 7NH)
Back in 1999 this was crowned CAMRA National Pub of the Year, although I suspect it's changed a bit since then.  The Victorian hostelry was taken on by Black Country Ales in 2013, so provided the common sight of lots of hand pumps and a deli counter full of cobs.
For a change (on my pub visits), it was full of customers - not a seat to be had in the busy main bar.  So I've failed miserably to get a decent pic outside or in.
It's not really somewhere I'm likely to be passing any time soon for a return visit to put that right. 
No, not even for the seance night...

But I was pleased to tick off another BCA pub, content with my cheese and onion cob (posh packaging!) and pint of Small World 'Winter Bank'.

It took much longer than expected to travel back to West Brom on the slow-moving traffic-clogged Black Country New Road.  Having had enough of buses, I jumped on the tram back to Brum.  All of which wore me out and indicated it was time to head home.
Although perhaps there was still time for this...

 

Cheers! 🍻

Halesowen Pub Explorations

Way back in March, Chairman John elected to pull off the M5 on the way back from our Wigan weekender, providing us with a comfort break complete with cobs and Black Country Ales.   
Although he put 'City Plumbing B63' into the sat-nav to incorporate a mystery-tour element as to where we were going.

Waggon and Horses (21 Stourbridge Rd, Halesowen, B63 3TU).
This red-brick terraced gem dates back to the 1830 when a chap called William Jones applied for a licence to sell beer and cider.  Black Country Ales took over in 2017 and didn't take long to win a local CAMRA branch award by having handpumps stretching the length of the long bar.
It's quite the looker inside: a narrow room divided into two sections, with cushioned bench seating galore, etched windows, a bit of tiled flooring, and a feature fireplace. 

Perhaps the folk of Halesowen prefer big plates with Yorkshire puddings for a Sunday lunch rather than a cheese & onion cob...and who can blame 'em.  The Waggon and Horses was far too quiet on our visit, although this didn't seem to affect the 'Jubilee Ale', brewed to celebrate 25 years of Black Country Ales.
Being kind to a pub ticker, our group agreed to stroll a little further up the road to score a GBG'25 tick.

King Edward VII (88 Stourbridge Road, Halesowen, B63 3UP)
Looking good.  Not a Batham's boozer, but painted in their favourite colour.
There's a no-nonsense pub sign.  And lamps.  And an advertisment for Happy Hour pints for £3.50.
Cask ales available were Wye Valley 'Butty Bach', Enville 'Ale', and Stourport brewery BOA 'Lock n Load'.  The previously untried 'Lock n Load' for me, a fruity session IPA on good form.
Had we been sociable, the locals were in the back room on t'other side of the bar. But we didn't disturb them, sticking to the comfy front room with its ample pictures on the walls and decorative plates on the beam.

That had given me a taste for the pubs of Halesowen.
So, leaping forward a few months I made the return to the West Midlands.

From Birmingham centre, the number 9 bus transported me the 8-miles across town in time for a midday pint.  There's a lot of green within easy reach of Halesowen - the big Leasowes Park, an English Heritage abbey, and the Clent Hills visible from the top deck of the bus.
Regrettably, I missed all of that and can only report that it's really not worth making a long journey to explore the Cornbow shopping centre.
Would it be worth coming all this way for the micropub?

Roberto's Bar (55 High Street, Halesowen, B63 3BG)
Yeah, I think so.

The Roberto in question is Roberto Ross, the owner of a micro brewery in Netherton who also ran a bar in central Birmingham prior to opening this venue in 2022.
Roberto's consisted one rectangular room with proper pub furniture throughout and red leather sofas by the window.  The walls were decorated with Euro breweriana, pump clips, a Union Jack, and a TV listing the beers and latest Untappd check-ins.

A check-in of Mousesweet 'XXXK' mild for me.
Craft pump clip...

£5 for a pint of the 6.5% mild.

For those more sensible than me, there was also a Utopian 'Blonde', or a 5% IPA from the brewers of my strong mild, Mousesweet from Audley in Staffordshire.

Being as I was 30-seconds away from the local Spoons whilst sat in Roberto's, I figured I'd poke my head in. 
"Lively", said the CAMRA website.
Promising.

Here's my entry into the 'Make a JD Wetherspoon pub look really unappealing' photo competition...

The William Shenstone (1-5 Queensway, Halesowen, B63 4AB)
Yep, it;s not a looker is it?  The addition of half-a-dozen hanging baskets can't detract from a brutal bit of concrete.
The pub is named after an 18th century poet and landscape gardener whose grave is across the road in the grounds of the St John the Baptist church.  Halesowen is also the birthplace of Manchester United winger Lee Sharpe, so I figure Spoons missed a more recognisable naming opportunity there.

Here's the beer range...

I stayed loyal to my own birthplace and ordered the Nottingham 'Legend'.  Not on legendary form, unfortunately.  Another case of 'probably should have returned it, but didn't'.
Despite a beer of dubious quality, I got the feeling that The Bill Shenstone was a decent JDW - a sizeable L-shaped room with a well-worn carpet and a wide variety of custom, plenty of whom were doing odd things and making people watching a fine pass-time.

Moving on, Google suggested it would take 16-minutes to trek the 0.7 miles to my next destination - westwards on Stourbridge Road and straight past the Waggon & Horses and King Edward again.
Further along the street is another Black Country Ales pub...

The Whitley (Stourbridge Road, Halesowen, B63 3QX)
This one became part of the chain in 2018, apparantly giving the place a total makeover, creating an open-plan space with familiar decor and ample ale choice.
Leatherbritches 'Comfortably Numb' was my pick, because I'm a sucker for the Pink Floyd vinyl/CD-style pump clip. 

Loads of space in the pub - looking quiet compared to Spoons - although there were a few folks dotted around beyond the edges of my picture.  I took the seat in the window with the best vantage point of the proper pub carpet...

Black Country - time for the obligatory ale and cob shot.
Oooof...that's a lot of onion.

My dilemma at this point was that my remaining Good Beer Guide tick in this area was a 4pm opener and it was no-where near 4pm.
The kind folks at Diamond Bus conspired to waste 45-minutes of my time as I waited for a non-existant service to somewhere I'd spied a potential GBG tick.  At which point I figured I'd just walk towards The Crafty Pint and see what was on the way.
Ah, that'll be the Hunting Tree...  

The Hunting Tree (Alexandra Road, Halesowen, B63 4BL)
This is quite a splendid red-brick building, standing next to a roundabout in the far-flung housing estates of western Halesowen.  It has a mighty impressive garden attached to it, if only the weather wasn't so overcast on this occasion.
The building was originally the family home of local button makers the Grove family, although don't expect a National Trust period-piece interior.  It's very much the smart modern open-plan pub with parquet flooring, gharish wallpaper and paintwork in various shades turquoise shades.

The lone cask hand pump was hidden around the corner of the bar, out of sight of the folks ordering their Peroni and house white.  I didn't expect much from the Wye Valley 'HPA'.  Yet it was a fine pint - well presented in matching glass, fresh and crispy and thoroughly enjoyable.

Less enjoyable was the soundtrack of B*witched and Whitney Houston, until Warren Zevon's 'Werewolves of London' somehow snuck onto the pop playlist.
Sat by the pool table in the side room, I could follow the La Vuelta cycling on a rather excessive choice of 3 TVs visible from my stool.

A quick check of the time revealed that the clock had ticked past 4pm and I could tackle the final plod down the hill to the 2025 Good Beer Guide-listed Crafty Pint.

The Crafty Pint (8 Wassell Road, Halesowen, B63 4JU)
This is a little out-the-way of central Halesowen, just over a mile down the Hagley Road.  A bus back after my beer, I reckon.  The bar is in a little run of shops which includes the neighbouring barbers and All-Occasions florists.  Handy for the Hasbury Chippie too.

The Crafty Pint is a micro which has expanded in recent years to make it a decent sized place.  Although I think the locals were less inclined towards the tables in the side room, based on the scowls I got for nabbing the choice seating in the window. 
There were a decent number of punters making their way in not long after opening, cask being king, with beers from Wye Valley, Salopian, Oakham, Titanic and Neepsend to pick from.

A top-quality pint of Neepsend 'Manu' for me.

Bringing to an end a good trek around some of the pubs and bars of Halesowen.
I'll leave you with the artwork in the Crafty Pint WC.
Does Ursula Andress in Dr No count as 'mild smut in the gents'?  No, surely not...