The Narrow Boat, Northampton

Official site of The Narrow Boat - www.narrowboatatweedon.co.uk

Watling Street has been a major road for two thousand years and until recently a traveller on what is now the A5 could be sure to pass a pub every couple of miles. Nowadays most of those pubs are either boarded up or converted to other uses, and our traveller is more likely to seek refreshment in a drive-through McDonald's. The Narrow Boat, near the once strategic crossroads at Weedon, is one of the survivors, still here due to its position on the Grand Union Canal. As is typical, those who passed this way 200 years ago would recognise the solid building. They'd be quite rightly mystified once inside by the pub-restaurant arrangement beloved of 21st Century British pubcos. In this one the pub bit is near the road, the restaurant 75% at the rear with the views over the canal and protected by a 'please wait to be seated' sign. However if you need to be seated in the loo you don't need it to apply to the gatekeeper and can have a nose round on the way. The best bit is the garden outside, set high up above the canal. Charles Wells, just IPA and Bombardier, neither of which I fancied, so I had a drink of their Dry Hop lager, presumably a Marston's take on a craft lager and refreshing enough, if extraordinary expensive: a pint of that, a J2O and a packet of ready salted came to just short of nine quid. This is very unfashionable rural Northants for heaven's sake It's OK if you passing, and I'm sure nice enough on a sunny day when you can enjoy the garden.

Official site of The Narrow Boat - www.narrowboatatweedon.co.uk