Next on the agenda was the Papermakers Arms. This looked more like it. We manoeuvred around the fellas stood in the doorway smoking and entered the building. Our senses immediately overwhelmed by the sights, sounds and smells, we headed straight to the pool table.
“Members only” came an authoritative voice from behind the bar. We felt sick to our stomachs.
“How do we become members?” we asked in panic. “When the committee meet next” the bartender replied nonchalantly whilst pouring a pint for another punter.
“Are they meeting tonight?” we spluttered. All hope seemed lost but we had one final trick up our sleeves, we begged.
“Just one pint”,
“We won’t cause any trouble”,
“...those two came from Hitchin to be here”.
It worked, we’d charmed him and not long after we had 5 pints, two packets of scampi fries and were settling in to a round of killer pool.
The place was great, locals around the bar gave us their view of the other pubs on our Ilford sessions, advising that one was very rough and we shouldn’t bother. “If your face don’t fit, you’ll get grief”, which was slightly ironic.
Conway opened his egg cup present, hand made by Andy and did a shot of whiskey. Jamie won killer pool.
There was oddly a photo on the wall of one of Conway’s ancestors.
Enjoyable place. The crowd had warmed to us and gave us a hearty goodbye when we left. Off we trotted past the big Wilko’s to the next watering hole.
1 Dec 2022