A Little Taste Of Italy

This is Jeanie Barton & Marysia Zipser, both friends of mine and who I met up with tonight at the Star Inn.

Marysia is promotes arts and heritage tourism, and is organising a week long tour of Tuscany in October. Gail and I were about the first to put our names down for the trip as it sounds a great experience.

The tour is also part of an exercise to get Tuscany twinned with Beeston.  It's something that the Tuscan mayor is keen to happen. And that can only be good for Beeston, when Italian tourists come over and see what Beeston has to offer.
Marisa gave a couple of presentations about the holiday, while Jeanie, a jazz singer, entertained everyone with her Italian themed songs.

The local paper ran a story about the plans, and the reporter had rung me up for a chat about the idea and what I thought of it, which of course I did. I also mentioned my photography and this blog which they printed almost word for word.

Super Star

The Star Inn in Beeston has a new owner and has just gone through a major re-fit over the last few weeks.

Today was it's grand opening. Alas, we weren't able to be the first customers, as it opened during the day, but we popped down tonight to see how they had done up the old place.

It was originally a coaching inn, hence the large doors you can see where the coaches went through. The pub also appeared in two TVdrama serials that were made in the 1980s, Auf Weidersehen Pet, which was about a group of builders and Boon, which concerned an ex fireman who became a private detective.

As you can imagine the place was heaving, as locals were seeing what the place now looked like from it's earlier 'spit and sawdust' incarnation. In fact it was that packed, I found it a little difficult to take any decent photographs, so I took one of the freshly painted brickwork outside instead.

Maybe when the publicity dies down & no so crowded, we will visit again and I'll be able to take some better shots, of the different rooms. Although you can see one of the rooms which has been designed like a library, with book wallpaper. But there is a small collection of real books that you can read whilst enjoying your pint.