Retirement - Not On Your Nelly!

Himself has only been retired for 3 months and already he's bored. I was about to list the hundreds of things that he'd promised to do, well at least 10, but apparently it's not that sort of bored. So here we are, driving from Cornwall to Hereford to look at a pub with potential, number one on his list on five, all short-listed from his stringent tick list.

Hereford is an interesting city but not a pretty one. It lies on the Wye river about 15 miles from the Welsh border and is said to get its name from Anglo Saxon times, 'here' meaning an armed body of men and 'ford' a place to cross a river. The city has a long military tradition with numerous armies trying to claim it as their own, especially those from Wales. During the War Of The Roses the founder of the Tudor dynasty Owen Tudor, a Welshman by birth and a Lancastrian leader, was executed in the town by decapitation. Scotland too had a go. In 1645 the Earl of Leven and 14,000 Scots soldiers besieged the City but were resoundingly defeated.

The victories of all invading armies were short lived and none succeeded in holding the City for any length of time, including those of the twentieth century when Hereford was home until the late 1990's to a more modern army, the SAS.

The countryside surrounding Hereford is varied and traditional in the English sense, green rolling hills and pretty pastures. The tranquil surroundings look promising as this was the setting we could expect for our pub, according to the agent, and our expectations were high.