I took a few days off work over the Bank Holiday weekend as my wife and I were due to look after our grandson yesterday (Wednesday) while his mum and dad went to a wedding.
The plan was to take him to Chasewater Railway, which is not too far away from CastleCannon. He's only two, but telling him, "Shall we see Thomas the tank engine?" and a couple of renditions of "Choo, choo." seemed to give him a rough idea of what we planned.
Our daughter and son-in-law dropped him off just before midday, which was a little annoying as I knew that Chasewater closed at 4 pm, and we were planning on having a pub lunch before visiting the trains, so that potentially left us a window of about three hours. I'd already looked on the web and found what looked like the perfect pub for the day and future Sunday lunches. Our dog Charlie is part of the family, and we take him pretty everywhere with us. I remember when we first got him from a supposedly Kennel Club registered breeder. When we got Charlie home after a hundred-and-sixty-mile journey, our vet said: "You do know he has a hernia?" I phoned the breeder who said: "I'll have him back if you like?" I was apoplectic with rage "HE'S NOT A TIN OF BLOODY BAKE BEANS!" I bellowed down the phone. Oh wait, I'm getting off the subject. I just wanted to show Charlie is not "Just a dog" to us.
The Crown at Brownhills looked perfect! A whole section is dedicated to explaining how dog-friendly they are, and I have to admit they really are. Charlie got a bag of assorted treats and a bowl of water, but we need to rewind slightly. So Me, the missus, our grandson and Charlie arrived just after 1 pm; the car park (There's two of them) only had a couple of cars, and as we walked around to the entrance, we could see some people enjoying their meal. "Looks nice." said the wife as we entered. The restaurant was packed solid with what appeared to be pensioners, and when I say packed, I mean there wasn't a spare table to be had. There was also a queue of about ten pensioners waiting to be served by a slightly stressed woman behind the bar. The wife and I stood there for a good five minutes, looking like a couple of lost souls. We hoped to grab someone's attention and find out where we could go with a dog. Finally, a guy moving like a streak of lightning appeared, clutching two plates of haddock and chips. As he came back from the table, the wife cornered him. "Excuse me, where do we go with a dog?" No, he didn't say "To hell"; he showed us around the other side into the bar-come-dining area.
We looked through the menu and chose the most difficult of meals: Burger and chips twice and fish fingers and chips for the grandson. As I approached the end of the bar, I saw a hoard of pensioners salivating at the counter. "Excuse me." I called to the harassed barwoman. "Please don't tell me I have to join that queue?" while pouring two drinks, she replied Yes, I'm afraid so." pretty miffed I joined the queue.
13:24:
Me: "Can I have the Burger and chips twice, and I'll have the fish fingers and fries for a two-year-old, please?"
Barwoman: "Have you got a voucher?"
Me: "No, I haven't"
Barwoman: "You have a voucher, don't you!"
Me: "Umm? OK. I have a voucher."
The meal should have been around £36, but there was a 30% discount! Ah, so that's what this 'voucher' was all about, and it explained why the pub was bursting at the seams with O.A.P.s! We thought it was strange that a pub was so busy at lunchtime on Wednesday. And so we waited, and we waited, and we waited!
14:20
Wife: "Where's our food!?"
Me: "Your guess is as good as mine?"
The wife stormed off to the bar. A few moments later, the harassed barwoman came to our table. "There's one more meal to come out, and then the next one is yours," she said. The meal duly arrived about five minutes later with barely warm chips, although the burger was OK, I suppose. Ravenous, we wolfed our food down; it'd been that long since Charlie had fallen asleep under the table. Hot, stressed, and not in the best of moods, we headed to the car.
Now, I'm not sure if the pub had been let down by staff, but I'm not convinced that was the problem; I got the feeling that there were always only two people on during the week. The thing is, what they really should have done is warned you that there would be, in our case, at least an hour's wait. We saw a few couples go to the bar and ask for their money back mainly because, like us, they'd called in for something quick to eat. When you have a good idea to increase your business, you should have a plan in place to cope with the success because that success has left a bad impression. Should we go back? Are we likely to be waiting for an hour again?
15:05
We arrived at Chasewater Railway all excited. I wasn't expecting steam trains to be running, if truth be told. It's not exactly high season at the moment, plus they're hardly likely to get lots of visitors midweek, but the grandson would still have enjoyed it. As we approached the station entrance, we spied the billboard outside announcing "Rides in the Brake Van £2.00," only to be totally crushed to learn the last ride of the day was 14:30. We'd missed it by half an hour all because of that goddam pub!