The Great Liverpool Pub Crawl

Jun 14 2008 by Mike Chapple, Liverpool Daily Post

THE realisation that pubs and Yours Truly were set for a lifetime’s romance came one Christmas Eve at 16 years of age.

Our Kev and I had been grafting hard for seasonal pocket money on the local farm, and the older lads who worked there full time invited us along to make a hefty dent in our brown pay packets at the local, the Blue Anchor, on Aintree Lane.

Those were the days when the “Bluey” still had its saloon bar where us men of the soil could safely march in with our muddied boots and Levis without being told to sling our hooks.

It was patrolled by Alf, a small officious man who wore his Whitbread blazer with pride. And though he served a truly awful jar of mild, for which slops were regularly used as a top-up, his Guinness was the stuff of legend.

So it was over pints of the black stuff, chasers of rum and puffs on the tinned cheroots, we merrily toasted in the season before stumbling home to crank up some heavy metal on Mum and Dad’s old gramophone.

I remember thinking that the experience had never made me feel so close to “belonging” – for want of a better term – and, in its simple fashion, was probably the best Christmas I’d ever had.

Through the years since, other Liverpool pubs have occasionally been central to life’s pivotal moments, venues where joy and sadness, shared hope and solace have been meted out in equal measure.

I remember the years of living away during the 80s when jobs in this city were at a premium.

Coming home, your heart would leap at the first sight of the Mersey as the railway track weaved through the long curve taking in the Runcorn/Widnes bridge and the knowledge that, in about 45 minutes’ time – or three hours, if the customary breakdown occurred – you’d be knocking back pints with loved ones at favoured watering holes such as The Swan, in Wood Street, or Ye Cracke, on Rice Street.

There were other times when the Liverpool pub and its company could provide the only shoulder to cry on.

Memories of such events were jogged after being sent Brian Reade’s 43 years With The Same Bird, which chronicles his own topsy-turvy love affair with Liverpool FC.

In it, he recalls the day after Hillsborough as we sat alone together in the corner of The Lion, in Tithebarn Street.

We’d spent that sombre Sunday in Castle Greyskull banging out eye-witness accounts in our dual roles as fans and journalists, before realising we could stand no more.

The pub, a pint and quiet conversation about the horrors of the day before was the only answer available, albeit only temporarily, to help ease the pain.

It’s this affinity with the pub and the important role that it does sometimes play in people’s lives that provided the inspiration both for this column and the spawning of The Great Liverpool Pub Crawl, the new book wot I wrote.

In it, I’ve tried to capture the essence of the pub culture that continues to thrive here, despite a government that seems determined to tick all the wrong boxes when it comes to helping our surviving boozers keep their heads above water.

I hope it proves to be a worthy legacy to what you and I continue to hold dear – through the good times and the bad.

* THE Great Liverpool Pub Crawl is available, priced £8.99, and is available from all major book stores, including WH Smith, Waterstones and Mersey Shop.