Glossop And Buxton

On Friday we are off on our travels and we head up to glorious Glossop stopping on the way at the Bird Café near Hathersage for a coffee. Sadly, the Bird Café has neither birds nor dogs. So, we sit outside.

We then check into the Bulls Head in Glossop where we are for two nights. We eat that evening in the Bulls Head but in the morning, we are in their sister pub the Queens Head for breakfast. Although we don’t have breakfast, just a coffee, because obviously we are off to Parkrun which is literally across the road. This is such good planning. 

Glossop Parkrun is interesting. Narrow, muddy, rocky, rooty, three laps and to top it all it’s raining. All my favourite things. Not. Maybe not the Lad’s favourite things either especially after he falls in the lake and to the horror of the other runners. Seems it was much deeper than he was expecting. 

We head back to our accommodation for a shower leaving our wet dog in the car. Then we walk down to a café called the Two Hares for a late breakfast. After which we go for a walk around the town, obviously taking in a book shop and a pint at Distant Hills which is out in the back streets. This was formerly the tap room for the Howard Town Brewery which got new owners in 2021 who renamed it renamed Distant Hills Brewery but then closed the brewery entirely last year. It used to brew its own beer but no longer does. They still have their own beers but no one is letting on where they are now brewed. 

In the evening, we walk down to a micro pub called Bar 2 in town but it is full, so we end up back at the Queens for a few pints of Holts then a really excellent curry upstairs at the Queens Spice. 

On Sunday we have breakfast at the Queens while I try and bag some Glastonbury tickets but obviously fail yet again. Then we check out and head to Hayfield for walk up Lantern Pike. We get mixed up in, and maybe confused with, the folk doing the 43km Dark Peak Ultra Marathon but we don’t join in. Near the end of our walk, we stop at the Sett Valley Cafe in Birch Vale then we walk the Sett Valley trail back to the car. 

Then its onwards to Buxton and the very posh Palace Hotel with a disgustingly muddy dog. I’m amazed they let us stay. In the evening we’re in the Red Willow pub where more is clearly 'less'. I’m on the Smoke-less Porter, L’s on the God-less Lager. Every beer is something… less and they’re all very nice. 

We arrive back at the hotel for a Sunday Roast slightly half cut where they have the local Buxton beers in cans. I have the Stout. 

In the morning after a hotel breakfast, we walk the 10-mile Goyt Valley Trail to Errwood Reservoir and back. We resist the lure of the beer and just have coffee in Lumens Bar and Cafe. Then it’s back to the hotel to drop yet more grit on the duvet. Later we give in to lure of the beer and spend a boozy night in the Buxton Tap. When we come out its snowing quite heavily as we head back to hotel for the hot buffet they’re offering for an evening meal. 

We decide not to do an early morning run on Tuesday lest we slip and break something. Instead we visit the Peak Bookshop and then go for coffee in Castleton before heading home where a jumping course with five tunnels at dog training awaits the Lad and I. While L is off to at book talk with Kate Mosse. No not that one.

 (Tuesday 19^th November)

Derby Beer Festival Returns

L is not quite her usual ray of sunshine self, although she says she never is, on Monday morning. It's possibly because she's due in work and what she expects to happen happens e.g. she's home again before lunchtime as there's no sign of her boss. At least she gets to do Sainsburys. Then its cycling for me with Vanilla Porter for afters. 

On Tuesday she tries again and messages to tell me this time she’s been chained to her desk. 

There’s a minor panic when L’s Mum rings 111 with a chest infection, who tell her to get to A&E for 9am. She even takes a taxi to get there which isn’t something she’d usually spend money. Then almost before L's had chance to decide whether to go over or not she messages to say she’s on the bus home. It’s bloody good this NHS you know.  

In the evening, we continue with our training plan. We feed the Lad early and then run when he’s digested it. We do 8k. 

Wednesday has L with another busy day. Book club then work and then Yoga. We’re dog training. 

On Thursday I meet L in Derby after work, she’s already there after meeting her Mum, and we go to the first Derby CAMRA Beer Festival in four years. Having held a summer beer festival since 1978, the 40th one in 2017 was the last one. The city also had a winter beer festival which ran from 2002 to 2020. 

This one at the Museum of Making at the Silk Mill is excellent. The venue is good with plenty of seating for us oldies, decent food and very good beer. Welcome back and long may it continue. 

(Thursday 14^th November) 

Distance Disagreement

L is in work on Monday so she doesn’t get to share in the ‘excitement’ of Sainsbury’s and has to make do with the small and less salubrious Tesco near her work. Later cycling is so ferocious that something falls off my helmet during one of the drills while the cafe is closed so my Dad has to do make do with a massive chip cob at the Exeter. 

Tuesday is Bonfire Night so we don’t do our planned run due to the expected barrage of explosions but the Lad still gets his tunnel treat at dog training. 

We go out early to run on Wednesday morning instead. Afterwards there is a bit of a disagreement over the distance. L’s watch says 7.5k, mine says 8.3k. My watch is mad so hers is probably right but my distance is more impressive. Lunchtime sees me in the Brunswick with my ex-colleague. They have no steak and ale casseroles which is a major crisis but the replacement shepherd’s pies are pretty decent. 

L is in Belper with her friends on Thursday. Two of them travel up from Derby by bus, the other being bus-phobic goes by car. We run again in the evening, or Wombling as L describes it, and do 7k. She’s my Madame Cholet and presumably I’m her Great Uncle Bulgaria. I’m not sure who the Lad is. It all makes you feel like some post-run passion but you can't as you've already indulged this morning and you’re too old to have it twice. 

We do Alvaston Parkrun on Saturday and then there’s a home match with Derby drawing 1-1 with Plymouth. 

Sunday is our Members Day Dog Show, an agility show for just our club members. The Lad gets plenty of eliminations but also plenty of tunnels. Which are the reason for the eliminations.

(Sunday 10^th November) 

Small Things Like These

I am not alone in Wolverhampton. L and the Lad are here too. We are booked into the Novotel and I meet them in the hotel bar after the gig. 

The reason L is here is, of course, East Park Parkrun. After that little jaunt we go back to the hotel for breakfast which they are helpfully serving until 11am. Perfect. It’s a good one too. Lots of different fruit and yoghurt plus the usual options. 

Then we head back homewards. I drop L in Derby and then go to my Dad’s where I install his new phones, shop in Borrowash and do the Navigation pub. 

Back at home later there are fireworks everywhere so we stay in and, with the Lodger out at a display, we hide under the duvet with a big bottle of Leffe. 

Sunday see L at yoga at Wollaton Hall and then we do a joint gym in the afternoon. 

Later L wants to see the film ‘Small Things Like These’ but as it’s sold out at Broadway so we go to Quad in Derby. The (in my opinion) badly managed Quad is very quiet and now only open Thursday through Sunday with food no longer served. Which will no doubt see it decline even further in popularity. 

We eat beforehand at the Exeter, a Roast Beef cob that turns out to be a huge baguette. Nicely washed down with an Indian Porter. 

 

In ‘Small Things Like These’, Cillian Murphy plays a man who witnesses Ireland’s notorious Magdalene Laundries where the church homes unwed mothers who were made to toil in abusive workhouses while having their babies taken away and sold to foster parents. It all takes place in the Dickensian 1980s.

An uplifting evening. 

(Sunday 3^rd November) 

Interpol

Tonight, I’m in Wolverhampton at the Grade II listed Civic Halls, which have recently reopened after a lengthy renovation, for the first time in a while. I am here to see Interpol perform their classic second album ‘Antics’ in full, on the occasion of its twentieth birthday. It’s a historic venue to see an historic band play an historic album. 

First though are Dust who are from Newcastle. That’s as in Newcastle, Australia. They are a five piece and with a punk saxophone and get a generous 45-minute slot. Their opener was a bit muddled opener but after that they settled down into more traditional fare with simple chords but they are into their long intros and outros. 

They also have real problems with the sound which keeps cutting out although I’m not sure they notice. Either that or they are being very professional about it all. 

 

They’re pretty good when they get down to it with some moments of brilliance in there amongst further muddles and their new single ‘New High’ was pretty catchy. 

In the setup period between the two bands they rig up a sheet up in front of the stage. They are clearly planning on hiding the band from us when they come on. Some may say it’s theatrical but it’s a ploy I’m never a fan of. I just find it annoying and it also kills the traditional between bands entertainment of watching the roadies set everything up. 

 

So we start with the band ‘hidden’ behind the sheet, turning them in to just silhouettes, but it goes on way too long and I spend the duration of the first song looking for how it’s attached and wondering how they are going to get it down again rather. When I should have been concentrating on the first song, the album opener ‘Next Exit’, which I feel it ruins. 

Thankfully as they move on to ‘Evil’ it drops and everything else is perfect and Interpol have no sound issue like the support band did. 

Antics is played in its entirety and in order. It is top notch nostalgia with riffs that take you back in time and that are delivered perfectly by Daniel Kessler’s guitar while Paul Banks‘ voice has aged as well as the venue. 

It’s an album with few, if any, weaknesses right through to 'A Time to Be So Small', a track that is often forgotten sitting at the end of the record. 

After a short break the band return to play a selection of classics from their other albums which sees significant set list variations every night. This is something they have always been every good with and it’s also nice to see a nice long set from them. That's something they've not always been so good at but it’s all ten tracks from Antics tonight and then ten tracks more in the second half.  

First up is 'Pioneer to the Falls' from the very underrated 'Our Love to Admire'. This is followed by its album mate 'No I in Threesome', a track that has been avoiding me for decades but I finally get to see them play it tonight. 

Then there's 'Obstacle 1' which is always huge and 'Lights', always epic. Then after a couple from 2014’s ‘El Pintor’, ‘My Desire’ and ‘All the Rage Back Home’, before 'Rest My Chemistry' which closes the set. 

They return for a second time which sees them surprisingly play 'Roland' to me for the first time then they end with their debut single 'PDA'. 

Historic venue, historic band. Sublime.