Camping it up

Let's get one thing straight. We don't do canvas. So when Annie announced that there would be another Buxton camping trip to celebrate her birthday, we decided to opt for the kind of camping that involves a coal fire, home-cooked food and beer from a pump rather than a bottle.

Yes, that's right. We stayed in the pub next door. Next door to the camping field, that is. We had every intention of sitting around the campfire at some stage, and quaffing brewskis from bottles and plastic cups, but for sleeping purposes a hand-carved late-17th-century mahogany bed and a nice firm mattress are so much more suitable for aging bones than lumpy damp grass and anything you have to inflate, and with our shower currently out of commission, the opportunity for a room with en-suite shower was too good to miss.

So we arrived at the pub/camp site around 6pm, and being the first there settled into the... er... settle to await further arrivals and sample the beer. And, later, the food, which was excellent. Nikki and I both chose one of Graham's pies - me the steak & ale; her the steak & stilton - and we both marvelled at how much meat he can get into a single pie. These are large pies - probably a good 12" diameter - so you "only" get a wedge, but wow! a wedge is all you could manage. The pies are a good inch-and-a-half deep (3-4cm in new money) and with pastry being not much more than a millimetre thick on top and bottom, most of that depth is solid meat. Delicious. Served with a vegetable medley (crunchy broccolli, zingy carrots and peas that tasted as though they'd only just been podded) and some of the most excellent chips ever tasted. I nearly didn't have room for pudding! But only nearly.

The Friday nighters were a small but select bunch and we enjoyed more beer, more chatting and more coal on the fire until the campers retired to their camp, and we climbed the creaky 15th century stairs to bed.