Garden Hermit Goes to the Pub 2

You don't need to be a sci-fi buff to believe in monsters, and I'm sure you could name one or two that might be challenging the world right now...

...however having established (in my last post) that the good folk of Christchurch, and the Saxon Bar in particular, are on their guard against any such challenge,  I was able to rest easy as our CAMRA micro-bus tour moved on to the next stop,  the Drop The Anchor Brewery.

You may not have heard of this brewery as it is a relatively new start up, and before this visit I hadn't tried any of their beers either.  Despite them being a new micro-brewery, the purpose of the CAMRA visit was to present them with an award for one of their beers (their first award I think).

The brewery truly is micro, occupying the first floor gable end of an industrial unit used by Molly's Den the antiques, memorabilia and craft emporium.  The space appears to have been the original mezzanine office area for the industrial unit, and micro brewing ki…

Long, long ago, in the Kingdom of Nog - err I mean Wessex - King Alfred the Great ruled his Saxon subjects, with a wary eye on the Danes (who, according to Wiki, are people who live mainly in Denmark), fearing that they would invade...


At that time Christchurch was one of the most important ports in England and was one of King Alfred’s burghs - a fortified town, to help keep out the Danes.  
Fortunately the 'important port’ mantle was ultimately to transfer to Southampton and spare Christchurch from thousands of steel shipping containers.  
Nevertheless even today the Saxons of Christchurch are wary of the erstwhile invaders of centuries before and signs banning mobile phones are clearly evidence of subconscious fears that Danish visitors, apparently here to enjoy themselves, don’t get on their phones and rustle up a surprise invasion.
Of course this doesn’t mean you can't use it to take photos for your pub blog...

I’d better start at the beginning before I talk myself into y…

You spend most of your life thinking it will never happen and then suddenly...it does...




Having been a little ‘distracted’ over the weekend, by a birthday which, for the second time in my life, started with the number 6, it has taken me until Monday night to recover sufficiently from the trauma and write another GHGTTP post...

Anyway you may be expecting the ‘birthday edition’ post - and who am I to disappoint...

Having watched excitedly as my ‘60th' sparklers fizzled and died (metaphor there somewhere), I made a wish that was something to do with Hampshire becoming the Draught Bass epicentre of the UK, and blew out the candles on my choc-chip and blueberry birthday muffins...



....only spitting all over them a little bit in my desperation to blow the last one out (well I have reached that age when I am entitled to dribble...)

Naturally, as is their forte, Google wanted the world to know about the significant birthday of a renowned garden hermit and part time pub blogger...



Natura…

Through a crack in Mother Earth
Blazing hot, the molten rock, spills out over the land
And the lava's the lover who licks your boots away
Hey, hey, hey, if you don't want to boil as well Be-be-better start the dance
D-d-do you want to dance with me?

...well I only need half an excuse for a nice bit of Genesis...

...but this post really is tenuously linked to volcanoes, or to put it another way... Crackle Rock Brewery from Botley in Hampshire.

Rewinding a bit....a Saturday evening pub shed meeting (in my back garden) was rapidly approaching and the nervous wait for a well known on line retailer, and their shipper - I won't reveal their real name, lets call them 'Parcel Farce', to deliver the 'featured brewery' beers, turned into a major traumatic event....

...for the second time in succession Parcel Farce failed to deliver the beers intact, citing exactly the same set of circumstances for both deliveries, as recorded on their tracking website...


Now call me cynic…