Church Street
Church Street runs North from the roundabout with Centenary Way
(by the bus
station) and Yorkshire Street (for Turf Moor), until it joins with Active Way
(close to Burnley Central railway station,
where the slow trains from Blackpool and Preston stop) to become Colne Road, the main road to Nelson, which
passes through
the Duke Bar area.
Pubs on this stretch, starting with the furthest from the Turf, are the Talbot,
the Sparrow Hawk, the Coach and Horses and the
White Hart. On your right as you approach the centre is St
Peter’s Church, which dates back to 1120. This is the old heart of Burnley, with the Sparrow Hawk
being a former
coaching inn. Also on this side of the road is Shalimar,
a curry house, of sorts, several taxi firms clustered around the
Coach and Horses, including Goodwill, A1, Tiger and Crown - and various fast food
places, selling chicken, burgers and pizza, so you'll not go hungry, as long as you're not fussy.
St Peter’s multi-story carpark is also
here. As you get to the roundabout, on your right on Keirby Walk, towards the centre and St James's Street is Sam’s, a bar which every so often closes, changes its name and
re-opens (it's currently closed), and the Comfort Inn, a rather ugly hotel which also changes its name
frequently. There were some hopes it
might be demolished a while back, but alas it seems to have survived.
As well as this, you’ll find good accommodation in the Sparrow Hawk (with good
breakfasts and nice rooms) and at the Ormerod (with cheap rates), up Ormerod Road, which is the
street between the Talbot and the Sparrow. (The Ormerod is at 121-123 Ormerod Road, Burnley BB11 3QW, Tel
01282 423255. Click
here for a map.) Ormerod Road also leads up to Queen Victoria
Road, where you’ll find, oddly enough, the Queen Victoria.
You're about ten minutes' walk from the ground here. When
you get to the roundabout you should be able to see Turf Moor. You want Yorkshire Street, under the aqueduct, with the former Sainsbury's (now discount clothing
shop TK Maxx) on your
left and Gala Bingo, which nostalgiacs of a certain age will remember as the Cat’s
Whiskers nightclub, on your right.
Click here for a
map of Burnley centring on the area covered by this crawl.
The
Talbot
Corner of Church Street and Ormerod Road, opposite the Sparrow Hawk
A couple of recent visits have made me realise that I'd substantially
under-rated this pub in the past. I haven't drunk here nearly enough,
and that must be down to where it is. It's directly opposite the
Sparrow Hawk, which isn't a terribly easy place to leave. Perhaps if it was somewhere else I'd go more.
It's not the smartest pub in the world and they do put the emphasis on music, but the beer here is excellent.
Although they've long had beer on, and stuck by it when many pubs in the town were giving up the ghost, previously it
wasn't a terribly exciting range. But on a recent weekend in Burnley I found myself diving across the road in here when
the Sparrow Hawk got too heaving, and I was pleasantly surprised by what was an offer. They had a good range of guest
beers
from small and regional breweries. I sampled a couple, and they were fine. I'm told they tend to have the most beers
on at weekends, which makes sense. Black Sheep
bitter and (never mind) Worthington's seem to be the standards.
The Talbot is close to Burnley College and is Burnley’s main music pub, attracting leather and denim rock fan types.
It gets busy on a Saturday night when the bands are on, and sometimes then the bar can be a bit under-staffed for the
amount
of people trying to get a pint in. That said, compared to the Sparrow on Saturday lunchtime, the service is refreshingly
speedy. Anyway, most music pubs I know don't sell any real ale at all, so we should be grateful.
I’ve seen some
truly terrible pub bands here, but the music is obviously to someone's
taste. Try to find out if the dreaded Slack Alice are playing here first, and if they are, go some other time.
It’s very different in character to the neighbouring Sparrow. This is a large pub, with distinct drinking areas,
and it's much quieter on a Saturday lunchtime, which is worth knowing about if you feel the need to escape from the
throng at the Sparrow. There are some tables for drinking outside, and the gents toilets are excellent, with a row of
heavy
duty urinals. However, away supporters should note that there is a sign on the door stating 'No Away Fans', which
obviously isn't ideal. The recommended police route for away supporters from Burnley Central, avoiding the town centre,
goes past here and up Ormerod Road towards the fire station on Belvedere Road, which may explain their caution.
As an away supporter in other towns I tend to ignore such signs, but it's up to you. As a non-away fan in Burnley
I'll be calling in more often from now on.
Visit the Talbot's website at
www.thetalbotburnley.co.uk.
The Talbot, Church Street, Burnley BB11 2RS.
Tel 01282 412074.
Click here
for a map.
Becko's Burnley boozer of the month, March 2002
The
Sparrow Hawk
Corner of Church Street and Ormerod Road, next to the Talbot
The Sparrow recently changed hands. Landlords Steve and Julia Baker,
who built the pub up to be the local real ale flagship, sold up in February 2002. While it's early days under the new
landlord, he appears to have had the good sense to retain the staff and keep the excellent beer range, so fingers
crossed that it will remain a compulsory stop on visits to Burnley.
The Sparrow has long deserved to be considered as the finest pub in Burnley. It’s easy to miss because it doesn’t
particularly look like a pub. In fact, it’s a hotel of good size, of which the bar forms one important part.
This disguise has probably helped it to become the relaxed matchday pub it is. A door policy tends to apply for
high profile games, but for routine matches, well-behaved away supporters can get a drink here in peace.
Inside, the main bar (the Sparrow Bar) divides into a right angled lounge and a pool room. Décor is 1970s
style mock-tudor, although there's been a pub on this site for a long time, and the Sparrow was once a coaching inn.
Recent years have seen the development of ‘Smithies café bar’, a separate area with an emphasis on food,
at the back of the building, and the 'Farrier's Loft restaurant' upstairs.
The Sparrow Bar is known for selling an excellent range of guest beers from micro breweries from all around the
country, and regularly stocks the three main beers from local brewery
Moorhouses. A recent innovation has seen the
award-winning and excellent Black Cat mild taking its place on the bar alongside Premier Bitter and Pendle Witches
Brew. No visit to the town would be complete without sampling some Moorhouses' beer, preferably Black Cat, and this
place is your best bet. They also tend to get in other dark beers, such as milds and real stouts.
The café bar is regrettably real beer free, selling only smooth products. The room isn't really to my taste,
but you can walk your decent pint round from the main bar. Similarly, you can eat in the main bar, but you’ll have to
go around and order it from Smithies. Since Burnley's recent rise up the league, the Sparrow Bar gets very congested on
matchdays, with standing room only, if that, but Smithies is much quieter. They have a well-deserved reputation for
decent food, although some of the stuff on sale these days strikes me as a mite pricey for East Lancashire. It should
also be said that beer is on the expensive side for Burnley too, although it’s naturally still cheaper than drinking
in London and it’s a premium worth paying for access to an excellent choice of beers.
On matchdays the football special of mega cheap pie and peas is a must. The pie is meat and potato and the peas are
mushy, which is as it should be. Even better, you buy these from a counter for instant consumption. Excellent pre-match
stodge to soak the beer up and fortify oneself against the inevitable cold wins coming off the moors.
Unfortunately slow service on matchdays has long been the Sparrow's Achilles heel, and it does not seem to be
improving. The bar is very small and it does get crowded, but on a recent visit there was a worrying lack of people
serving. It took an age to get a pint, to the point where we ended up decamping to the Talbot across the road in
frustration. That they'd run out of food was also disappointing. Hopefully these are problems that can be ironed out.
One other caveat is that the beer quality can be variable at times, particularly with the Moorhouses Premier,
which seems to be a hard pint to handle. The overall standard is, however, still very high.
It’s interesting to note how the character of the pub changes effortlessly according to the time of day.
On Saturday lunchtime it’s packed with the Burnley shirted throng throwing pints down. On Saturday nights it’s
couples, smartly dressed and perfumed women, men with smart casual shirts tucked into trousers over beerguts,
running an expert eye over the turn (‘not as good as last week’s’). On Sunday lunchtimes, it’s families taking
the old folks out for a nice spot of lunch. The Sparrow maintains that Northern tradition alive and well in Burnley:
if it’s the weekend, you’ve got to get a turn on. On these nights the place gets noisy with bands and singers.
In time honoured fashion, these are always described as ‘terrific female vocalist’ or ‘brilliant male/female vocal duo’.
Needless to say, they’re generally crap. I’ve seen some shocking acts in here of an evening. A cover version of
‘Billy don’t be a hero’ still sticks in the mind, although I try to expunge it. Nevertheless, it all seems to go down
quite well, and the people of Burnley permit themselves a bit of a bop.
They've recently had their licensing hours extended on weekend nights. On Friday night, for example, they now
happily stay open until 1am, and it's a idea that seems to have taken off; it's still very busy around midnight.
If only the turn was on a curfew, as the noise can get in the way of a good conversation. You can always go somewhere
else and then call in for a late pint.
During the Burnley Blues
Festival, which takes place over the Easter weekend, the Sparrow usually
holds a beer festival, where an even wider range of weird and wonderful beers are on sale. Be warned, however,
that the pub gets very busy around that time of year, filled with sad gits in denim who think they own the place
because they come in once a year, intolerant of the week in, week out football crowd who they perceive to be
getting in their way. It can get particularly crowded and quite uncomfortable, particularly if there's some
godawful acoustic blues 'set' taking place.
The Sparrow Hawk is one of four Burnley pubs listed in the 2003 CAMRA Good Beer Guide.
Visit the Sparrow Hawk's website at
www.sparrowhawkhotel.co.uk.
The Sparrow Hawk Hotel, Church Street, Burnley BB11 2DN.
Tel 01282 421551.
Click here for a
map.
Becko's Burnley boozer of the month, August 2002
The
Coach and Horses
Church Street
A basic pub, perhaps, but worth knowing about as one of a handful of local
outlets for the excellent
Stockport brewery Robinson’s,
and worth a visit on that basis. They stock the bitter, of which I've had some decent pints in here. The current
landlord wasn't happy with our previous characterisation of this place as a bit run down and grubby, prompting us to
pay a fresh (and naturally anonymous) research visit. It's certainly much cleaner than it used to be.
Unfortunately the Robinson's bitter was too cold, and the smooth version seems to be given more prominence than the real
stuff.
The Coach and Horses has a beer garden, and is very handy for taxis and fast food.
Another local pub where you can get Robinson's is the Wood Top on
Accrington Road.
The Coach and Horses, 48 Church Street, Burnley BB11 2DL.
Tel 01282 424478.
Click here
for a map.
The
White Hart
Church Street
After a long spell of neglect, the White Hart was
refurbished and re-opened a couple of years ago, and it now merits an occasional stop for the regular visitor to
Burnley. That said, the recent redecoration of this straight and square building has robbed it of
a lot of its former bleak charm. Colours are the ubiquitous creams and tones, and the
walls are crowded with the kind of meaningless clutter of context-free prints that you buy
by the yard. Almost by accident, one interesting photo of Yorkshire Street heading towards Turf
Moor, taken we think in the 1920s, has found its way in there, but otherwise you could be
anywhere.
On the other hand, perhaps it's working. In the old days, I once called with my brother on a
matchday Saturday and we were the only people in there. But recently I've called in once or twice of an evening
on visits up North and it has been heaving. This seems to have been incorporated into the weekend night circuit.
Of course they tend to have some kind of karaoke thing going,
albeit with the largest selection of singalong tunes I've ever seen - fancy doing Ace
of Spades anyone? - but just when you wouldn't expect it, there they are selling beer, and
it's been alright. On a couple of visits they've had a selection of two or three beers on, and I've had decent, if
expensive for the area, pints. They apparently now stock regular beers from the
Everards range, and I had a pint of Tiger last time. It will never
be my favourite beer, but it wasn't bad.
Queen
Victoria
Queen Victoria Road
I must confess complete ignorance of this place.
It’s yet another of Burnley’s clutch of new-ish pubs, and is close-ish to the Turf
without being near to anything else in particular. Indeed, although it’s not on
Church Street it’s stuck in this section of the guide because it doesn’t really
belong anywhere. The fact that it’s a little of the beaten track means it’s
reckoned to be a safer bet than most for away fans, and is usually recommended in all sorts of supporters' guides.
However, you need to know that it is a
Brewer’s Fayre (where does that ‘y’ come from?) / Travel Tavern kind of
place, and as such caters firmly for families and kids. Food is king here. Accommodation is also a key part of
the package,
doubtless reasonable and
soulless. Naturally, this is the sort of place I avoid like the plague, and the fact that
it isn’t on any of my normal routes between station and ground means I’ve never
been tempted to visit for the purposes of research. That said, I expect some of you have
kids and are looking for somewhere to take them. This might be the place. Given the family
aspect, I expect that coach parties of football fans won’t be welcomed, but small groups
shouldn’t run into trouble. I was told they now sell some kind
of beer, after a spell without, so a full investigation may be required when time allows.
The Queen Victoria, Queen Victoria Road, Burnley BB10 3EF.
Tel 01282 450250.
Click here
for a map.
Last updated November 2002
Burnley pub pages main menu
