On Christmas Eve (Sunday) we stopped at Stroud, en route to the Malverns, to experience the carols at the Prince Albert pub. For 23 years they’ve been singing traditional carols in the pub on every Sunday in December. It was quiet when we arrived at about 12pm, but it soon got very busy. We were going to get lunch in the pub, but in the end it was too busy, and we were too engrossed in singing the carols. There were three singing sessions of about half an hour each, with the songs for each session put up on a chalk board. The pub website has the song music and words as a download, with the song numbers, so we’d come prepared.
It was great. Few hundred people singing in harmony, a piano player doing the intros and instrumental breaks. It was good to see some of our friends there. Jan S was there when we arrived. Also Cathy B, and Sid G. And Sam S was there too. And Jeff G.
When the carols had finished Jan S offered to give us lunch so we went back to her house and had welcome cheese and biscuits and coffee.
Then we drove to the Cottage in the Wood hotel, just south of Malvern.
Nice hotel, nice food.
On Christmas Day, after breakfast, we walked up the hill from the hotel to Worcestershire Beacon. Weather was fine, luckily, given the recent persistent rain. Down the hill and we found a pub in Malvern for a pint, then back to the hotel for a late Christmas lunch.
On Boxing Day we drove to the car park on the southern edge of the hills and walked up to British Camp, an old hill fort,
Views were good, we could see Pen y Fan and the Black Mountains in the distance. We did a circular route and had lunch in a the Yew Tree Inn at Colwall.
It was quite muddy.
About 7-8 miles each day.
Back at the hotel for a nice dinner. After dinner we played scrabble and D won twice, to everyone’s surprise. Maybe he’ll be more inclined to play in future.
We’d go there again.