Canterbury Folk Festival

This year saw the first Canterbury Folk Festival in full swing in the Dane John Gardens over the last weekend in June.  A full weekend filled with sunshine and folk music, in the beautiful parkland setting of the Gardens overlooked by the bandstand where all the acts would be playing from.

All you need for a good folk festival, apart from good music of course, are craft beer and local ales, with fruity finishes and deep malty flavours.  I had the Rocking Robin Robin Redbest ale (the same one that Sally is enjoying below) which was seriously yummy, a light bronze easy drinking bitter made with Kentish hops.  I must admit, for a determined non-ale drinker, I am finding more and more that are quite quaffable!

To keep everything balanced, you also need delicious food from independent food stands, including Wimbledon ready strawberries in pots with lashings of fresh cream, carried around on trays by ladies from Simply Strawberries, duck wraps and duck fat chips, piles of fresh olives and huge containers of pad Thai noodles from A Taste of Thailand.  I had the plantain crisps and chilli balls from Vinngoute, which lived up to the translation of its name.

Music, food and ale is also best shared with a bunch of friends as chilled and relaxed as you are (Ben even more so as Green Diesel would not be playing until the Sunday afternoon, so he was completely off duty). Shay, Ben, Nick, Sally, Ellie, John and I had already arranged to meet by the Bandstand in the early afternoon but we ran into other familiar faces throughout the day who would pull up a pint and join us.  Canterbury is really very small and at an event like this you are pretty much guaranteed to bump into a number of people you know.

Finally, to really make you folk festival experience complete, you need a dog.  The ultimate hipster accessory that every good folk aficionado should not be without.  I should have tied a red scarf around his neck.  Opportunity missed.

James was in Malta with Steve on a lads holiday, and Sasha was visiting her sister so I was dog-sitting Jackson for the weekend.  With James and Sasha's permission, I packed up his water bowl, a litre of fresh water and a bag of dog biscuits and brought him along for the afternoon.  I quickly discovered that if you have a dog at a festival, especially one as large and good natured as Jax is, you very, very quickly make friends with a lot of people who will just come up and cuddle him.  He was like a magnet for small children and mid-30's gruff men who insisted on calling him 'good boy'.  He looked rather bewildered by all the attention, but took it with good grace.

This was the first time Canterbury had hosted a folk festival - Broadstairs and Faversham are the traditional homes of folk around here, but its popularity is growing, evidenced by the 5000 people who descended on the Bandstand for the weekend.  From 11am to 6pm each day we had the delights of folk in all its format, from rock to acoustic to blues (Thomas Ashby, second photo above) bluegrass (Gentleman of the Few) and reggae, courtesy of Jimmy and the Riddles.  There were a plethora of delights for your ears to feast upon, all repeated again on the Sunday with more bands playing, including old favourites Green Diesel.

There were also Morris Dancers (of course, its a folk festival in England, you can't get more traditional folk than Morris Dancers), balloon twisting clowns (one little girl had a balloon version of Ariel from The Little Mermaid, it was quite something), Mr Softee ice-cream and of course craft stands.

Kids dressed in Tinkerbell outfits were twirled in dizzying circles by their parents whilst teenagers hoola-hooped and flung diabolo's high in the air in time to the percussion beats and older couples dangled their feet in the cooling waters of the fountain.

We sat and chatted in the sunshine, occasionally taking it in turns to walk Jax in the shadier areas of the park under the trees where the scent of South American BBQ was drifting through the air from the newly occupied Kiosk.

Eventually I had to pack up and get the dog home as his dribbling was getting a little out of control and he kept eyeing up people's food, but the others carried on their festivities long into the night (I know as I kept getting text messages asking if I was walking back into town to meet them.  The texts got noticeably drunker and more demanding every hour), but by that stage I was tired and my feet hurt, so I was rather lame and just curled up on the sofa with a film.

Here's hoping this is just the first of many years of folk in the gardens.

The Canterbury Tales

If you are at all familiar with Canterbury, or even if you are not, you should have heard of Chaucer.  The medieval author of saucy bawdry who to this day is capable of making school children sob into their school dinners as they try to translate what is effectively gobbledegook to the modern ear. 

Middle English has that effect on people.

The 20 or so tales that form his magnum opus describe the antics of a group of pilgrims as they travelled from Southwark of all places to Canterbury.  During the long journey they needed entertaining and so told stories to each other, some lewd, some romantic, some tragic and some farcical.  These stories collectively became known as the Canterbury Tales.

Now, I can't say for certain exactly what sort of stories you are likely to overhear in The Canterbury Tales these days, but I'm pretty sure that there will be some lewd, some romantic, some tragic and some farcical in there.  After all, human nature hasn't changed all that much in the 700 odd years since Chaucer got his quill out.

The Canterbury Tales is located opposite the Marlowe Theatre, next to Pilgrims.  It has a very different vibe to Pilgrims though.  The Tales (as it is affectionately known by the the locals) attracts a slightly rocky, indie crowd and is definitely a student magnet pub.   The shot list is a fairly strong indication of this.  Sinead and I decided to try out the Cherry Bakewell's (or I may have impulsively marched to the bar and ordered a couple then force fed Sinead - I forget).  They taste just like cough syrup, something my parents used to have to hide from me as I would quite happily gulp it from the bottle, sickness or no sickness. 

The Tales is a bit grubby, a bit shabby and a bit rough around the ages but it is warm, welcoming and inviting, filled with people who are more interested in art and music and debate and conversation than in standing around, waiting for other people to notice them (anyone else think of Cocktail when they read that - fairly sure I just ripped off a line from that film).

The atmosphere is definitely what draws people in -it is unpretentious and friendly and you can banter quite happily with the bar staff and the other punters as you wait to be served.  

In addition to the shooters there is a broad mix of ales, some of which you may find on offer and spirits (boasting the largest spirit measure in Canterbury), as well as your usual mix of lagers.  Prices are reasonable, just watch out for the interval queues from the Marlowe Theatre - you don't want to time your glass running dry with the masses from next door descending!

We finished rehearsal relatively early one night so rocked up for a couple of quiet bevvies and a relax on a Friday night.  This is probably the quietest I have ever seen The Tales.  I've tried to blog it before but given up as all the photo's just came out as the back of someone's jacket and their head, and I'm not tall enough to reach over the crowd for the wide ranging shots like other people.  Tall people.  People who don't need to climb on the kitchen counters to reach something from the top shelf of a cupboard.

The Tales is a late night license venue so attracts huge crowds of people as all the other places give them a kick in the backside at closing time out of the door.  Get here at 11pm and you won't fit in the door, I don't care how hard you suck your gut in.

There is a bit of a gothic vibe to the Tales with its blood red walls, baroque wall paper,  raging fire place, rough hewn wooden furniture, creaking sofas and creepy Victorian portraits.  Like a lot of Canterbury pubs it is also a bit windy inside, more a connection of small, intimate rooms linked by the bar than one large, anonymous space. 

Candles stuffed into Jack Daniels bottles long since drained of their liquor litter the table tops, dripping trails of red wax begging for an inprint of a seal. 

It was these corded bottles that provided the inspiration for one of the most baffling games I have ever witnessed the boys play.  Ben and Tim spent a good 15 minutes staring in fixed fascination at the oozing stub of the candle softly dripping the last of it's life down the neck of the bottle, debating the exact moment in which it would plunge into Jack's belly.

It was fascinating stuff.  You can tell by the fact that Sinead has given up trying to talk to them and is now on her phone.  I'm photographing them, although it has to be said this is more out of puzzlement than fascination.

Elsewhere the crowd was entertained by the mixture of music spilling out of the Jukebox.  Approaching the Jukebox is an act of courage itself - you will be judged based upon your song selection (music snobbery - it's a thing) and woe betide the individual who puts One Direction or Justin Bieber on.  The Tales also puts on regular theme nights of music, such as the Disco evening at the start of March to celebrate the last showing of Thriller at the Marlowe.

I like the Tales.  It's not the most fancy of pubs in Canterbury but it feels genuine, unpretentious and real.

Also the music selection is superb.  Sadly the vocal range of the customers isn't always as good.

The Foundry

On a dark, dark night there was a dark, dark street

Down the dark, dark street there was a dark, dark building

Hanging from the dark, dark building was a dark, dark sign

Under the dark, dark sign there was a dark, dark gate

And through the dark, dark gate, there was a microbrewery full of light, and laughter and lots and lots of craft beer and ales being quaffed by a cheerful, high spirited crowd!

Welcome to the Foundry, a craft brewery pub on White Horse Lane, secreted behind a high gate in an old industrial building.  The building used to be a Victorian foundry (hence the name, obviously) that used to produce cast metal for use all over the Empire and the building certainly has that Dickensian workhouse feel about it.

Beyond the austere and foreboding gates though there is an attractive courtyard with communal seating and plants which is lovely in the summer and used as an overspill in the winter, as this place is very, very popular.  You are normally guaranteed a table up until about 10pm but then, as all the other pubs start to empty, people flock towards the Foundry, drawn by the home-brewed beers, local ciders, late night opening hours and upstairs dance floor.

 The pub's microbrewery is visable from the bar and the cask ales are all sold on the premesis.

If you aren't a big fan of real ales or beers there is always the local cider collection to tickle your tastebuds

As well as your usual selection of spirits and rather nice wines.  The Foundry has been nominated for A Taste of Kent Award for the Foundry Man's Gold so if you are really stuck with what to choose, I would recommend starting there!

The beers on tap change on a regular basis - there was a nice mix when we were in there a couple of weekends ago. 

Although I'm not a die-hard ale drinker I did try the Little Red Rye (fairytale reference in the name - I couldn't resist.  I'm easily pleased) and was pleasantly surprised by it - it wasn't too hoppy or dark for me.

There is also a huge menu to help you soak up that vast array of beers, ales and ciders you will be tempted by.  There are sharing platters (including a pie sharing platter with 3 pies and 3 1/3 pint brewers beers), steak and ale pie, mushroom and ale pie, ribs in beer BBQ sauce, beer battered onion rings, ale gravy, ale battered cod, rarebit with ale, pate with cider, are you noticing a theme here?  There is food which doesn't feature ale, beer or cider as well, including a rather attractive burger menu. 

If you end up lost on a dark, dark night down a dark, dark street head towards the severe looking Victorian building.  You will be surprised at what you find inside!