The Crown

It had been a while since we'd had a beer with our friends Jule, Gray, Val and Paul so we arranged a long overdue Saturday afternoon drinking session in Lichfield.

In theory Lichfield is relatively simple for us to get to, the 785 goes straight from Amington to Lichfield city centre, however the ten minute walk to the bus stop literally put a dampener on the whole day. I am not exaggerating when I say that the rain was of biblical proportions, we were absolutely drenched, so much so that we even contemplated turning back and going home. Bravely we soldiered on but the prospect of being sat on a bus in wet clothes for forty five minutes knowing we'd be out drinking in those very same clothes for several hours wasn't a good one.

I have no idea what we must have looked like when we eventually turned up at The Crown and met Jule and Gray, we've certainly had better starts to days out.

We had been to The Crown before and I will admit it was a much better pub than I had remembered it to be. Gray remarked at the time that the choice of beers was very impressive, and this was a very good point. Everyone (including real ale drinkers) is catered for, I had a pint of previously untried Greene King St Edmunds which was very drinkable, El Gray was on Spanish lager San Miguel and the girls were on Stowford Press cider.

Flooding on route meant that, as our bus turned up late in Lichfield, we missed the start of the England v New Zealand autumn rugby international which was a shame as I would undoubtedly held my ground and not have been intimated by the Haka !!The game looked close but the fact that the All Blacks were already winning when we arrived wasn't too much of a surprise.

The decision to come into Lichfield on a day when Blues had got a home fixture had been taken some weeks before however Blues had a new manager so good times were undoubtedly ahead of us (yeah right !!) so we kept an eye on the score once the game got underway with Gray pacing round the pub like an expectant father !!

We didn't get the result we wanted in the rugby and Blues's nil nil felt like a bit of a disappointment which is more than can be said for v*lla's nil nil at West Ham. there was much air punching and celebrating from their fans in the pub, then again they had just lost a record breaking six in a row !!

Full time in the football was the trigger for us to move pubs though not before our time in The Crown was captured with the obligatory photo..

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