Travellers Rest, Tarporley

Visited in May 2010 Splendidly unspoilt and old fashioned basic brick-built pub situated a few miles outside Nantwich on the busy A51 road to Chester. The four rooms in this friendly, family owned free house feature some ceiling beams, fixed bench seating and some unusual wicker seating. Notably the four rooms are located in 2 separate parts of the pub, accessed through different external doors. There's the seemingly compulsory outside toilets. There's no fruit machines or music here - in this pub that is reminiscent of a different era, beer and conversation rule the roost. The pub is listed in CAMRA's National Inventory of Unspoilt Interiors. Another notable feature is a splendid bowling green behind the pub and, on my early evening visit, local players were arriving to practice in preparation for a league match the following day. Parking outside at the front of the pub was becoming difficult due to the volume of cars arriving and I noted that very few of the bowls players seemed to be using the pub. Beers on were Weetwood Cheshire Cat and Eastgate, together with Tetleys Bitter, which, the friendly landlord told me, were now the regular offerings. The Cheshire Cat was in good form and, at £ 2.25p, noticeably cheaper than I had paid in Nantwich earlier. The pub is a CAMRA Good Beer Guide regular and is well worth a visit if you like pubs of this nature. Do note, however, that it doesn't do weekday lunchtimes and do take care when exiting the car parking area back on to the main road as the traffic can be deceptively fast.