BRAPA and ..... The Bear Faced Cheek of Wadebridge (Cornwall Part 4)

After a quite sedate enjoyable time in Bodmin, the anger levels started to rise as I left the town.

Bus drivers can be thick can't they?

"Single to Edmonton please"
"Huh?"
"Look I know you don't go right into Edmonton ... I think they call the stop Road End"
"Huh?"
"White Cross?  Hal's Grave?"
"Huuuuuuh?"
"Just past Wadebridge?"
"Ohhh, we stop at Wadebridge.  I'll give you a single to there".

Imagine if someone asked me for a variable rate Tailored Business Loan for 5 years, interest only for first year with a 15 year amortisation profile and I just went 'huuuuuh?' and blinked like a pregnant goldfish on acid.  I'd probably be sacked, and rightly so.

Plus it was the shittiest, bumpiest, bladder churning journey anyway, I don't drive but no one needs to drive like him.  I managed to 'alight' without punching him in the jaw, and edged my way towards the hamlet of Edmonton.

But don't think that was the reason I also thought my next pub was shit, true I may not've been in the best frame of mind but I'd had 10 mins walk to unwind, noted it was a GBG regular, cute little location, and felt hopeful and happier walking in .......

And early signs were good as I walked into the bar of the Quarryman (1649 / 2619) and a friendly older barmaid said "decisions, decisions!" as she saw me eyeing up the pumps which was as close to humanity as I was going to get here.  I went for a beer from Padstow, never seen that brewery before, and now I know why.  The problem really was just how 'Central London' it all felt, from the stripped back, bare boarded, insipid greys, blackboards, to the inane but totes hilair gabbling of locals who may all have been from the same family.  It was only when you went to the loos that you got a sense of how the pub used to be perhaps, with bawdy old prints on the walls and dirty red carpets of many years past.  As a camp bloke called Angus tried to fabulous, someone asked his wife what blend of tea they went for.  'Is it Fortnum and Mason?'  "Are they linked to Twinings?"  I didn't come to Cornwall for this level of shitfestery, and worse was to follow when an old bloke took the michael out of one of the younger ladies for liking prosecco.  "Well it isn't champagne is it darling?"  (I do actually agree with him, but we'll shelve that one for now!)  In a more amusing exchange, an old bloke pipes up "I've got an email and I'm worried it might be a scam".  "Well don't open it then!" shouted a younger dude.  "I wouldn't know how!" replied bloke one.  And that about summed it all up.

I drank it all and I'm still alive so can't have been that bad

Kind of thing you'd see in a London pub

I decided to walk back into Wadebridge, it seemed easier that way.  Cars were very kind in letting me cross busy junctions wherever I wanted!  We haven't had a good BRAPA crapper for a while, but one person to slow my progress was a jolly lollipop lady.  The flippin' cheek of it!

Just across the bridge out of Wadebridge town centre, which feels like some kind of heaving transport metropolis interchange in comparison to a lot of places in this part of the county, I came to the next but hold on, what's this, a change of name?  Would it still do ale?  Was it worth even going in?  Well, I'm here now, and I'm counting it!

Good grief!

Yeah, so the old Ship Inn had become the new Bear Bar & Kitchen (1650 / 2620) though am pretty sure a GBG deletion will be imminent, for 'change of ownership' as much as anything else, though I can't say it convinced.  I'll give them one thing, the two female staff members were very good, friendly and inclusive, easier when you are the only customer I guess, but it doesn't always happen.  With 'Someone New' by Hozier blasting out at a ridiculous volume, barmaid Georgia comments 'oh I love this one'.  She's encouraged to go an X-Factor singing it, but reckons she'd just be one of those comedy acts if she did.  I'll admit I don't know this song, though apparently it is a modern classic in the Glumford & Sons mould, which tells you everything you need to know about how much I was enjoying his work.  I'm drinking Sea Fury (pretty average quality) next to a stained glass window, perhaps the last surviving nod to the old Ship Inn.  I wonder if it was a great pub?  Or just another Quarryman?  In fact, Quarryman was a lot more pubby than this and that says something!  Careful what you wish for.  In some ways, I wondered if this was a 'Bedford' theme pub.  Remember how the Bear got deleted for change of ownership/becoming shite?  Well, over the road opposite is a Brewhouse & Kitchen which I was told was equally dreadful by a fellow pub ticker who shall remain anonymous but rhymes a bit with Spartan Paler.  Was this an attempt to merge the two into one Bedford themed pub in Cornwall?  If so, a good effort. 

What might've been

Bar didn't look this nice from memory - nice greenness 

Not on Twitter thank fuck

Glad to be back in Quintrell Downs an hour or two later, I decided to check out one of my two non-GBG listed ticks, for I'd be kicking myself if they ever did make the Guide wouldn't I?

Looks like walking into a Heritage railway station, kind of.

But the Quintrell Inn wasn't all bad.  I mean it was a dining venue foremost, full of low flung leather sofas, and a worrying amount of twild life and overweight parents on the surf n turf, but Wadebridge and Edmonton had set the bar so shockingly low since the early Bodmin promise, any decrease in pub quality wasn't hugely evident.  It had a fish tank, and we all know that is a sign of a good pub.  The Tim Taylor Landlord was decent, if not great, and whilst at the time I declared it my 'local' for the week and said I'd riot if it didn't make the next GBG, I'd never end up going in once more on my holiday which perhaps was telling. 

Fish

Beer

Pub

But in truth, it'd been a disappointing day since Bodmin's Hole in the Wall, and I was glad to get back to my room with a bag of food from Spar and stick on a bit of the VAR World Cup (oops, I mean 'Women') before falling asleep, ready for a change of direction on day three.

Si