30. Bank Holiday Monday impromptu crawl of Jericho (again), Monday 26th May 2003

Dave and I decided to have a couple of pints whilst watching the second half of the First Division playoff final at the Anchor, which is one of our newest and best finds, especially for football as they will show any old shit on the big screen. After a couple of pints here, we'd got the taste for beer, and decided to slip in a few halves which might take us to enough pubs to constitute a crawl. Our intention was to go to the Gardener's Arms on North Parade, but this was shut so in the event we had to make do with the Rose and Crown. This is a lovely little pub, with an excellent garden and fine decor, and scores highly on many fronts, though it is expensive. The day we went, Bass, Adnams and Hook Norton best were on draught. Whilst in the garden, we decided to revise the scoring system so as to remove one point from the service and add it to the barmaid, since there were a number of pubs that we'd return to on the basis of barmaid alone. The new system was used to mark the Rose and Crown.

The next pub for the new system to be tried on was the Royal Oak, and a good job too, as there was a barmaid. The range of draught beer is not spectacular - Pride and Bass - but there are a good selection of Belgian bottles for those interested. Although this pub has been made trendy recently, I think it was a good thing as it could have done with a kick up the arse, and there are now some very comfortable seats.

Time to push on to the Bookbinders Arms, a fine pub with many bar snacks and ales. On our visit they had St Austell Tribute, IPA, Abbot, Morlands Original, Hen, Bombardier and Ruddles, though on other visits there have been more in barrels behind the bar. It's a cosy place to settle in for an evening and even though it has a fake Morrells atmosphere is still well done, and there are free monkey nuts.

Stepping down to the Globe, we found out what a Jericho local is more like. Just IPA and Pedigree on this time, but the Globe is still OK and quite cheap, though the pool table is not. Having said that, we preferred the Bookies. The very cheap food has sadly departed from this place too :-( Emerging onto Walton Street, we decided to find out what Jude the Obscure had to offer. Ridley's Tolly, Deuchars IPA, St Austell Tribute, Abbot and IPA is not a bad range, and the quality was superb, though we noted some twat ordering a Tribute shandy. The atmosphere was enhanced by a group of students ordering Bacardi Breezers. The Jude is another good pub, well worth a visit, though it can get crowded.

The Jericho Tavern looked like a toilet so we gave it a miss and instead cycled to the Old School, which itself isn't wonderful. However, there was some proper beer on in the shape of Greene King IPA which was not that good. There was no reason to dwell longer than necessary, so we went across the road to Worcester College bar to play a bit of pool with Rob Simpson and his mate, before rounding off proceedings at Keble College bar, which resembles the deck of the Starship Enterprise, for a couple of pints of Wychwood Owzat which actually wasn't that bad at all ...

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Dan Lovegrove
dan@doctor-lovegrove.com

Last updated 8th June 2003.