The Grey Friar, Preston

despite the unpromising exterior it's a decent alternative to the rather majestic Twelve Tellers, though I wonder if it is suffering a little as it was quiet even by Tuesday morning standards. I couldn't see anyone else eating breakfast at 9 this morning which is very rare in a Spoons these days. beer choice nothing special from what I could see.

Large open Spoons with the bar on the left side. Steps up to the window seats which is where I sat. Reasonable enough beer choice with two sets of six pumps. One plus is that the toilets are up four or five steps to the left rear - not the usual long haul job.

Now while this doesn't have the grandeur of the other, newer, Wethers this isn't too bad. Its not great either but it does its job and is worth a visit. It is, as noted, not the best looking place and it has the usual Wethers interior the beer choice was decent on this visit.

I went into this one with some dread as it looks absolutely hideous from the outside. Inside it's standard Wetherspoon consisting of a large rectangular room with the bar on the left and raised areas at the back and to the right. There are some bookcases at the back. It's rather like a giant version of one of the 1990s shop conversions but because there are windows at the front and right it's not dark and dingy. The bar has twelve hand pumps where the two GK beers were doubled up and there was a cider, Doom Bore, Exmoor Gold, Purity UBU, Everard's Inbetween, Hawkshead Cumbrian 5 Hop, Lytham Blond and Vale Black Beauty Porter. I went for the 5 Hop (£2.50) which was in superb nick. This is a standard Spoons that I thought was slightly above average.

It,s a spoons used to be a carpet shop pop in to say you have been plenty of hand pulls on the found it very cold when the door opened