BRAPA ... SINGS THE COVENTRY CAROL ALONG THE COVENTRY CANAL (Lully, lullay, thou little tiny twild)
Saturday 14th December 2024, 10am
Lunchtime away kick offs. Gawd bless you Sky TV! So much better for the pub ticker than a 3 o'clocker where you have to break off pubbing and then wonder if you can squeeze something in post-match.
'Twas a first chance for me to see the 'new look' Hull City under our new manager we'd pinched off Reading. Daddy B reported an improvement in our last home game. So were we confident? No.
The Dyslexia Centre is one of the first buildings we see walking from station to pub one. Did you know 95% of Coventry City fans are dyslexic? And did you know the same 95% are also #PubMen / #PubWomen? Yes, how else do you explain the commonly used hashtag #PUSB ?
So now we've got that laboured joke out of the way, we can crack on with our first tick.
An improvement on my previous Coventry 'Spoons experience (not sure what it was called but not a BRAPA tick) when many years ago, before self service coffee machines, it took us AGES to get served due to the sheer amount of old duffers at the bar wanting coffee. Daddy BRAPA is still scarred by the experience and regularly mentions it. Earl of Mercia, Coventry (2872 / 5356) is better. About the national 'Spoons average, but good enough. Cherry beer by Lymestone confuses me by being pale. Brain can't cope. Every other ale is 5% plus, gotta respect it. Carpet a cockle-warming 8.25. Impressive. A good hoover would elevate it to a 9. LOSACW (Lack of spatial awareness Chris Wilder) sits far too close to us despite all the room in the pub to aim at, why do people do that? Body warmth? Stupidity? All in all, okay. Adequate. Solid. Absolutely fine.
Time to catch a bus to within shitting distance of the football ground, because a very helpful TwXtter follower who supports Cov has tipped me off that there's this brewery tap with normally tricky opening hours which opens early for Cov 12:30pm kick offs.
Our bus breaks down before it gets going but we have the presence of mind to jump on the next one behind, just seconds before it departs. Bossing it like a Cov local. And sat on the wheel arch, my favourite bus position.
We trot around the corner, and find it looking all industrial unity ......
Dad's guarded pose says it all, we knew we were entering a throbbing Sky Blue hole here at Byatt's Brewhouse Bar, Foleshill, Coventry (2873 / 5357) as poor innocent tigers, but no problem, it was a gentle beery crowd. A very hard place to judge based on the fact we were here on a match day, and vertical drinking semi-outdoors throughout, but I can appreciate the main bar room atmosphere, and when you've pissed, you wash your hands in the main room to roars of appreciation from the home fans ("ohhhh BRAPPY BRAPA, he has the cleanest hands in York" or something). Oh, and by 'eck, that XXXmas ale paired with Mummy BRAPA's Christmas cake was near perfection, just needed a big chunk of Wensleydale FTW. Kids kick a football around, and then today's BRAPA hero himself who tipped us off about this place, Dan Underwood, spots me and we have a really nice chat with him and his son, then walk to the ground together. It had been a better pre-match than I could've hoped for.
Hull City played quite terribly and lost, which was a shame, and made it worse by actually going 1-0 up to give us false hope. But we only took about 15 fans which I always enjoy, having that personal space around me!
"Corrr, if we did two pubs before, just think how many we can get done before the train home!" I say to Dad, as we stride out in a general town centreish direction, traffic nose-to-tail, thought of waiting for a bus unappealing. The answer was unfortunately 'only two more, plus a pre-emptive'. Where does the time go?
Well, we spent a big chunk of it walking. I turn us onto the canal path and decide it makes most sense to do our more difficult remaining tick first. And yes, I did sing Coventry Carol - the Elaine Paige version obviously. Only briefly, or I'd have been drowned.
It is a helluva walk but most folk we pass are friendly. The pot smoking young chav family, the vodka swigging Polish couple, and the Pakistani pavement blockers with a giant plastic toy car, all is sweetness n light.
Our destination is FarGo village, presumably because it is 'far to go'. Finally made it!
A bit of accidental casual sexism to kick us off at Twisted Barrel Brewery & Tap House, Gosford Green, Coventry (2874 / 5358) as I see two young ladies by the dartboard and assume they are staff fixing the lighting around the board, but no, they are playing. Silly me. They aren't Luke Littler, or Rich Birley, but better than me. Barman is a chirpy livewire and gives us the hard sell on the Twisted beers and in particular some keg chocolate stout that's proving popular. Too cold, too fizzy, perfect example of why cask beer is better, particularly the black stuff. With peculiar knitted characters dotted around the low settees, it is a long wooden Pret a Manger style bench for us chumps. Strangest thing about the place is all the pop-up food stalls outside. 'Sticky Chicken' is almost in the entrance way. And yet a sign tells you no food is allowed on the premises - the exact opposite of what you'd expect in such a set up! I mention this to a local couple we get chatting to in our next pub and they say its because the Twisted lot went vegetarian, so stopped all food coming in! Huge if true. 8/10 on the BAT (Brewery Ambient Temperature) scale, gotta commend that.
We take a bus back into town, well a posh coach to be precise, driver keeps growling "POOL MEADOW" at us so we're like 'we've no idea what that means, but let us hope it is in Coventry and not Leicester!' Thankfully, the coach lets us off quite central. Time for my final Coventry tick, including outskirts and suburbs, for the first time in BRAPA history .....
Ooops. wrong door Daddy B. Let's try that again!
Much better! I'd heard great things about Hops D'Amour, Coventry (2875 / 5359) dating back to its pre-GBG days and those wise voices of 2022/23 weren't wrong, a modern day micro classic .... in much the same way Tamworth Tap is, and we all know how well that's done for itself. Vocation are my 'brewery of 2024' according to Untwappd , and this Gingerbread Stout is a dream - well, until you get three quarters down and realise milky gingerbread CAN be too much of a good thing. A lucky pub for us too as a couple of faceless goons vacate a table at just the right time, we settle down with a jolly angular pair of park runners. This sparked some debate online - park runners or pub tickers, who's the weirdest? They have links to Nottingham, Bude and Congleton - turns out we walked past his mother's house on our recent Congleton day out. They even recommend us a 'nailed-on' pre-emptive, which we have time for before the Brum bound train. I could've happily stayed here all evening, and I don't often sing that.
A short walk in a station-wards direction too, sort of, this recommendation really did appear to tick all the boxes .....
.... but what's this Triumph, Coventry, zero cask? And with Daddy BRAPA having an urgent wee, I can't ask him if I'm missing some hidden handpump. Maybe key keg, or maybe our park runners simply didn't know the rules of the game. Anyway, Indie Craft in Kendal didn't do cask when I went and then it made the Guide. Twelve Taps in some Kent town I forget didn't even try, and that always gets in. But a warm gentle soothing tidy place to have a drink. A father and two sons serve me in an elaborate display of teamwork, I go for a pint of their 1940, misreading it as 1904, the year Hull City were formed. Never mind, I'm sure 1940 was a great year too .... actually on second thoughts, perhaps not! Cov n Hull are super-bombed bedfellows, how apt. Dad's back from #LongestWeeEver and decides the pub deserves its place in the GBG (see below). The crowd are sleepier than in Hops D'Amour, a few old grumps, and a few young grimps feigning excitement in mute televised Nottingham Forest which I'm convinced is related to alcohol consumption. An olde worlde Christmas playlist dominates, lots of Bing Crosby, Tony Bennett, that kinda thing, oh and there was a massive leafy hedge I quite admired. A decent spot.
Fizzing good! Get Daddy BRAPA to write all 4,500 descriptions
Let's get this party started!
Despite being on open tickets home, we decided to cut our losses here, Hampton-in-Arden and Meriden will just have to wait. And the train home went smoothly if you ignore the scumbag / Sheff Wed / Strongbow incident!
See you Sunday for the Thornbridge redemption arc,
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