Bel & The Dragon at the Red Lion Hotel, Aylesbury

Official site of The Red Lion Hotel - www.redlionhotelwendover.co.uk

Official site of The Red Lion Hotel - www.redlionhotelwendover.co.uk

We stayed here, after completing the Ridgeway. Wendover looked a hot bed of activity.... So, in order of importance to this site Beer - Four real ales on. The London Pride was dodgy (and every pub in the village is a Fullers) but the Butcome Rare Breed was both unusual and excellent. Food - Evening meal Average. Strange Service. Nice breakfast. With good service. Room - Excellent.

A town centre hotel in a former coaching inn, reputed to have been stayed in by Oliver Cromwell during the Civil War, which has had most of its charm stripped out by successive modernisations and extensions. The frontage still looks impressive, but behind that facade is a mass of mediocre modernity. It is currently owned by Fullers. The outside seating area – referred to as a beer garden - at the back is well-heated and lit, and it provides a good view into the bedrooms for the voyeuristic smoker. There is a pervading smell of stale tobacco. Inside, the main bar is very busy and a little downmarket compared to some other nearby pubs. There are several advertisements for meals of various scales, but these do not appear to be available during opening hours as (so we were told) the kitchen was closed. Since locals were being provided with chips and sandwiches, though, I may have misunderstood this, as I was trying to decipher the discourteous babble generated by the rude yoof masquerading as a barman. Fullers wifi is available. The customers were more pleasant, and the reception and conversation were very welcoming indeed. Three ales on – I had the faux-HSB which was in poor condition, indicating only a homeopathic level of consistency with the real stuff from the old Horndean Brewery. Probably worth including on a town crawl if they can improve their beer handling, but it's not somewhere I would wish to linger.