BRIGHTON ALE TRAIL – 22.5.07...
BRIGHTON ALE TRAIL – 29.5.07
Our caravan travelled south from Blenheim, and we went to a caravan club site at Sheepcote near Brighton. We were booked in for 5 nights, and would be seeing what real ale pubs we could find in the area. We were on grass here, a lovely change after the months of hard standing pitches. Due to the journey down, we decided not to venture out into town on the Tuesday night and just went to the local supermarket to stock up for our stay.
Wednesday morning, we caught the bus into town and had a look for some Good Beer Guide pubs. As it started to rain however we dived into the Royal Standard and had our first Harvey’s Sussex Best Bitter. Even at this early hour this one roomed pub near the station seemed popular. Next was the Basketmakers, a Fullers house that was quiet. There was the full choice of Fullers beers with a couple of Gales and a guest. We had Gales Butser and Thwaites Lancaster Bomber here. It was an interesting pub to look round with all sorts of tins adorning the walls. Next was the Lord Nelson where the bar served three areas and a gallery. We ate here while drinking their excellent Harvey’s beers. We had 4 in toital, Copperwheat beer, Hadlow bitter, Armada Ale, and Olympia. We had been advised to try the Prince Albert where they brewed Hepworth beer, and had Prospect here. From there we found the Evening Star with its wide range of micro beers. We had Maypole Mayfair, Bartrams Red Queen, Hidden Pleasure and Dark Star Meltdown. It was here we found the Ale Trail booklet where there were 40 pubs listed and some goodies on completion of the trail I decided to have one even though we had no chance of completing it as it covered a lot more areas than Brighton and we only had 4 days there. We finished the day at the Spoons Bright Helm where we had WJ King Five Generations before finding the miniture railway back along the coast to the marina near our campsite.
On Thursday we bought all day tickets on the bus and went out to Hove. We had a long trek up to the Downsman where we sat in a lovely garden with Sharps Doom Bar and Harvey’s Sussex BB. We found a bus back down to Hove and walked to the Romans at Southwick where we had Elgoods Cambridge and St Austell Dartmoor. I wasn’t impressed with the cleanliness of this pub with ants running round the windowsill among crumbs of food. A bus then took us to Shoreham where we tried the Red Lion, a very old pub with low beams. We had Weltons Old Harry and White 1066 Country Ale. Back down to the Buckingham we found a great choice of beers and had Traditional Scottish Ales Scotch Mist, Archers Par 5 and Hogs Back Spring Call. Needing food, we caught the bus back to Shoreham where we had a carvery at the Royal George, but no drink as there was no real ale. We finished the day off in Portslade where we found a lovely local, the Stanley Arms with excellent choice of beers. We had Triple FFF Rock Lobster and Whitstable Naval Reserve here before heading back to the caravan.
On Friday we caught the bus into Lewes and first tried the Brewers Arms. This was a nice clean looking pub with a fire escape leading down to a garden area. We had Northumberland Legend of the Tyne No 6 here and Shardlow Mayfly. The Gardners Arms was next with Tring Shaw Thing and White Gold. There was a game called Toad in the Hole here – strange one. It was also a popular pub for visiting CAMRA members with lots of mags from all over the country. The Elephant and Castle was an interesting pub to walk round with its animal heads – one of which still had Xmas bells on. We had Wychwood Hobgoblin here. The Lewes Arms was a multiroomed pub from a small bar leading to a long wait for service, and I didn’t like the fact that a pint was £2.55 and the half was £1.35. We had Otter Ale here. I wished I had known the history of the pub at my time of visit though as they had got Greene King to climb down over the stocking of Harveys beers. From here we bussed to Shoreham as someone had recommended the Duke of Wellington. This was a friendly local serving Dark Star beers and was being renovated. We had Dark Star India Pale Ale and Dark Star Sunburst here. A bus along the coast took us back to Hove where we found the Neptune and more Dark Star – Hophead and Sunburst. This lovely pub was packed but we managed to find seats. The walls were adorned with photographs and I particularly liked the wall with the Stones photos. It reminded me of my bedroom wall in the 60’s. The Hove spoons had been recommended so we called and had Itchen Valley Winchester Ale. At the Sussex Cricketers we did not have any ale as there was not a lot of choice and we did not know what we would fing at our final call the Hand In Hand. This was a lively pub brewing their own Kemptown beer. We had 4 of their beers: Kemp Town Bitter, Sunshine, Ye Olde Trout and Dragon Blood that turned out to be a red beer. We made our way back to the caravan and I had only collected 6 stamps from the ale trail pubs, so we planned our last day to make 14 pubs to bring the total to 20 and qualify for a tee shirt.
Saturday we set off with the objective to get the remaining stamps needed to get a tee shirt. We knew we would have to do some again but with limited time we wanted to stick around Brighton and Lewes. We also had to finish visiting a couple of Good Beer Guide pubs. As there are so many I will just list them. I can’t even remember where we had lunch now, but we would have it on the route somewhere.
The Bugle – Harrveys Olympia. Prestonville – Gale HSB and Gale Butser. Cobblers Thumb – Wells Bombardire and Harveys Sussex Best Bitter. Basketmakers – Gales HSB. Lord Nelson – Harveys Sussex XX Mild. Battle of Trafalgar – Hop Back Summer Lightning. Evening Star – Dark Star Summer Solstice and Ballards Nyewood Gold. Wagon and Horses – Harveys Sussex BB. Greys – Harveys Sussex BB. Dover Castle – Shepherd Neame Early Bird. Sir Charles Napier – Gales HSB. Horse and Groom – Hop Back Summer Lightning and Taylor Landlord. Mitre – Harveys Knots of May. Black Horse Lewes – Brains Rev James. Elephant and Castle Lewes – Wychwood Hobgoblin. Dorset Lewes – Harveys Cliffe Quarter Ale. Gardners Lewes – Goddards Fuggle de dum, Hampshire Wild Thing and Weltons Summer Gold.
We had a brilliant 4 days of ale drinking.
