Winchester and Cheriton in July.

[RogerB]

About to leave now - should be on the 9.35 from Waterloo and then its straight to the Old Gaol House for a BIG breakfast!

[Quinno]

About to leave now - should be on the 9.35 from Waterloo and then its straight to the Old Gaol House for a BIG breakfast!

I'm on the 9:46 from Reading and should be getting into Winchester a few minutes before you - I'll catch you at the station.

[trainman]

nb. Goodens Gold!

[Farway]

nb. Goodens Gold!

I collected RogerB, Quinno & PSM from Winchester station at 1130 prompt, they were ready & waiting but informed me they had slaked their thirst in a 'spoons first

Had a bit of detour around Winchester, due to Sat Nav & certainly not the driver, honest Guv

Also had a bit of a mini detour to Cheriton due to awful road smash at Cheriton cross roads, police & ambulance, half a car in a field etc, so the road I had intended to take was closed off, so had to go onto Hinton Ampner cross roads & back track, but arrived spot on opening time time at Flower Pots, first car in the car park

The Goodens Gold was sampled, as were a few others, Roger started from top of beers board & Quinno from the bottom. Loads of pics taken. I think it impressed, and the owner was chatting to the PuGgers, Roger managed to offload one of his local CAMRA newsletters on to him

Then onto Hinton Arms, which was fairly busy, mainly diners, Quinno had an off half, which landlady pronounced fine, but was cloudy Sarson's, it was swapped for another brew without quibble, but I think it spoiled what could have been a pleasant experience

No idea what was going on, but the car park was full of Porsches, Jags, vintage MGs etc, one of the PuGgers likened it to a Jeremy Clarkson wet dream. I of course ruined it by parking my 10 year crabby red Skoda in among them

Then back to Winchester, I dropped them in car park where the 3 of them were last seen heading off to the Black Boy

Nice to have met you all

PS one PUG T shirt was being worn

[RogerB]

Back home in one piece. A big thanks to Farway for his transportation expertise and negotiations around the local accident black spots. Nice to travel in a Skoda without anyone I know knowing about it and the car park contrast among the cars of more senior reputation was worthy of a photograph that unfortunately never happened! PS It was actually Quinno that was offloading CAMRA material to all and sundry!

Following our 'Spoons brekky and the aforementioned out of towners to the Flowerpots and Hinton we managed to tick off the Black Boy (amazing junk pub), the Wykeham Arms (interesting bits and pieces), Royal Oak (oldest pub - having a laugh), Eclipse, Old Vine (a lucky dip), Westgate Hotel (another lucky dip), St James Tavern, Fulflood Arms, Hyde (spent a large proportion playing with the dogs in the garden) and still managing to get a reasonable train back home. Thanks to my fellow companions, hopefully I will have made enough notes to remember enough proper memories in due course.

[gillhalfpint]

Glad to hear another Skoda on the rounds. Don't knock them, we started with a Skoda Estelle 22 years ago, and are now on our 4th. The Octavia estate is a great tow car, and we can't knock them for reliability over the years.

[RogerB]

Screwed up a bit on the "different pint in each pub" rule! The Hinton's Own is Bowmans Swift One rebadged which I didn't know at the time I had a Swift One in the Hyde Tavern. I feel cheated!

[Farway]

Screwed up a bit on the "different pint in each pub" rule! The Hinton's Own is Bowmans Swift One rebadged which I didn't know at the time I had a Swift One in the Hyde Tavern. I feel cheated!

I am in awe you could notice the similarity after so many pubs visited on the day

[RogerB]

I didn't notice at the time - I looked it up this morning!

[Farway]

Just for info, and nothing to do with beer or pubs, you may recall on way to Cheriton we passed a perfect geological bowl, "Matterley Bowl" which has been used for music concerts, and I whinged about the traffic it generated

Just by coincidence a report has just been issued on this, JLS Concert in 2010