Brian’s Travel Spot: Heathrow to North Wales via Manchester Airport

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My British Airways Airbus A320, at the gate at Manchester Airport, having flown me from London Heathrow.Welcome to second instalment of the final Travel Spot from my first trip of 2022, covering my return from Boston four weeks ago. The first instalment dealt with my flight from Boston to London Heathrow, a familiar route, although it was my first time on a Boeing 787-10. All my recent journeys have ended at Heathrow, but on this occasion, I was carrying on to my Dad’s in North Wales, following another familiar route (from pre-pandemic times), the short hop from Heathrow to Manchester Airport.

I’ve always had misgivings about this, not being a great fan of short-haul flights, but the simple fact is that it’s always been the most convenient option, the additional cost of the Heathrow to Manchester leg being negligible (or sometimes zero) compared to the outrageous cost of train travel in the UK. There’s also the additional hassle of hauling my bags across central London and/or taking the tube, neither of which are particularly appealing after a long flight. However, after my experiences this time, compounded by the difficulty in getting from Manchester Airport to North Wales on a Sunday (three trains and a bus), I’m going to be reassessing my options on future trips.

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Dark Woods Coffee x Ruffians

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A lovely espresso made with Dark Woods’ Driftwood and served in my Kaffeeform cup at Ruffians on Maiden Lane in London,I’m always surprised that there aren’t more speciality coffee shops in barbershops/hairdressers since they seem a natural fit to me. That said, London’s been at the forefront of this particular niche, ever since the first incarnation of Sharps Coffee Bar on Windmill Street. The latest entrant is Dark Woods Coffee x Ruffians on Maiden Lane, just south of Covent Garden.

Ruffians is a small barbershop chain, originating in Edinburgh, with this, it’s first London outpost, opening eight years ago. The coffee, in that respect, is a recent innovation, starting with a small pour-over bar before really taking off last spring with the addition of the Sanremo espresso machine, which coincided with the move to Dark Woods Coffee.

The result is a lovely little coffee bar at the front of the barbershop, with a concise espresso-based menu, pour-over and a small retail selection. Everything is served in disposable cups, so don’t forget to bring your own, although you’re welcome to one of the four yellow stools at the windows at the front, or the bench outside.

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The Penny Drop, London

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A beautiful cortado, served in a glass on a blue saucer, at The Penny Drop.It feels harsh to call The Penny Drop an international chain, but that’s what you get for having two coffee shops, one in Melbourne and the other in London. Melbourne came first, opening as a pop-up in 2015, before finding a permanent home in 2016. A year later, the penny dropped in London, with the opening in June 2017 of a coffee shop on Tottenham Street, just off Tottenham Court Road. Technically this puts The Penny Drop in Fitzrovia, enhancing the area’s already excellent reputation for speciality coffee.

The two Penny Drops are very different, with Melbourne offering a 100-seat restaurant/coffee shop, while The Penny Drop in London occupies a small space which seats 20 at most, and that includes the benches outside. What’s more, it’s a throw-back to the sort of coffee shop that I remember in the capital 10 years ago, but which now seem increasingly rare. With coffee from a rotating cast of roasters, offering two options on espresso, another on batch brew and more on pour-over through the V60, all of which change every week or so, The Penny Drop is a genuine coffee shop, its food offering limited to a small selection of cakes and pastries.

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Jaunty Goat Bakery

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A gorgeous espresso in my Kaffeeform cup, made with the house espresso and served at the Jaunty Goat bakery in Chester.There seems to be something about Chester, speciality coffee and bakeries, which, you could argue, all started with the Jaunty Goat bakery. The third Jaunty Goat, it joins the original on Bridge Street and the vegan Jaunty Goat on Northgate Street. Opening in July last year, the same month as Kookaburra Bakehouse, the pair were then joined by newcomer Fika⁺ in December that year.

The bakery has an interesting location, almost directly across Bridge Street from the original, although it’s completely different, a small spot with a simple counter offering takeout coffee and pastries, with the ovens at the back. You can also buy bread and coffee beans (either loose or in packets). While the bakery only uses disposable cups (so don’t forget to bring your own), there are pair of tables outside on the broad pavement, where you can watch the world go by as you enjoy your coffee.

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Fika⁺

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An AeroPress of an Ethiopian single-origin from Heartland Coffee Roasters, served in a carafe with a cup on the side, all presented on a wooden tray.Chester’s rapidly-expanding speciality coffee scene shows no sign of slowing down, with the latest addition, Fika⁺, opening right at the end of last year. An evolution of micro-bakery Gnome’s Kitchen, which itself only opened in 2020, Fika⁺ occupies a wonderful location near the middle of a short row of buildings on top Chester’s city walls. Right next to The Northgate, part of the city’s original Roman walls which are now almost 2,000 years old, Fika⁺ looks out over the canal, itself a relative newcomer, having opened in 1774.

Fika⁺ is vegan, joining the likes of Jaunty Goat on Northgate Street and the Doughnut Whisperer down in Rufus Court, both a short stroll (and a flight of steps) from Fika⁺. All the bread and cakes are from the micro-bakery in Hoole, made with locally-sourced ingredients wherever possible. The coffee is from Heartland Coffee Roasters, the ubiquitous Landmark blend on espresso plus single-origin options on batch brew and pour-over (V60 or AeroPress), along with tea and hot chocolate.

Since it’s relatively new, Fika⁺ is constantly evolving. For example, this week sees the launch of the concise all-day brunch menu, while there are plans to expand the opening hours, particularly as the days get longer.

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Brian’s Travel Spot: Boston to Manchester via Heathrow

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My British Airways Boeing 787-10 on the stand at Boston Logan Airport, waiting to take me back to London.Welcome to the penultimate Travel Spot of my first trip of 2022, covering my return from Boston in mid-February. 2022 got underway as 2021 had ended, with a visit to North America, flying with British Airways in World Traveller Plus (aka premium economy). This time, however, rather than flying to Atlanta before returning from Boston, I flew to and from Boston. In another twist, instead of returning home to Guildford, I continued on to my Dad’s in North Wales, taking the familiar (from pre-pandemic times) short hop from Heathrow to Manchester.

Initially, I had planned to cover the whole trip in one post, but as is often the case, this Travel Spot grew in the telling. Therefore, I’ve decided to split it into two instalments, with this, the first, covering my flight from Boston to Heathrow. The second instalment covers the short hop from Heathrow to Manchester.

I flew out to Boston in mid-January on my way to spend three weeks in Maine with Amanda before flying back two weeks ago. On my previous trip, I took the bus down from Portland to Boston Logan airport, but this time, Amanda and I caught the Downeaster, Amtrak’s train service linking Boston with Maine. We go to Boston on Friday afternoon, spending 24 hours exploring the city before I made my way to the airport on Saturday evening.

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Meet the Roaster: Speckled Ax

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The Speckled Ax roaster, a refurbished 20 kg Petroncini roaster from the 1970s, in the Walton Street roastery, with the tell-tale woodpile against the wall behind it.Regular readers will know that I have a soft spot for Portland’s coffee shop/roaster, Speckled Ax, which I first visited in June 2015. Back then, there was just the original coffee shop on Congress Street, with the roastery out in South Portland. However, Speckled Ax has been busy in recent years, opening its flagship Thames Street coffee shop in 2020, and then, a year later, moving the roastery to its new home on Walton Street, where it also opened a neat coffee bar.

On my return to Portland at the start of this year, I caught up with Matt, owner of Speckled Ax. I’ve already written about the coffee bar, so today’s Meet the Roaster is all about the roastery. Although an outstanding roastery in its own right, consistently turning out some excellent single-origins and blends year-on-year, Speckled Ax’s particular claim to fame is as one of a handful of wood-fired coffee roasters in the USA (reminiscent of Witney’s Ue Coffee Roasters in the UK). The magic happens in a large, industrial unit behind the coffee bar, where you’ll find the 20 kg Petroncini, a refurbished Italian roaster from the 1970s, its fire box filled with local kiln-dried wood.

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George Howell, Boston Public Market Update

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Details of the coffee menu at George Howell, Boston Public Market.When Amanda and I arrived in Boston last weekend, getting coffee was top of our list, and where better than George Howell in the Boston Public Market? It helped that it was on the way to our hotel, plus the New England winter had taken the weekend off, resulting in a glorious spring day, so we were able to take our coffee (it’s takeaway only thanks to COVID-19) across the road to the Rose Kennedy Greenway, where we enjoyed it while sitting in the sun.

I originally visited the coffee bar almost exactly six years ago, in February 2016, not long after it had opened. These days, it (and the Boston Public Market) is still going strong, do so well, in fact, that it’s now open seven days a week and has moved across the aisle to a much bigger counter, at least doubling in size. The basic offering remains the same though: top-notch coffee (espresso, batch brew and pour-over through the Chemex) along with a large range of retail bags of coffee for sale.

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Brian’s Travel Spot: Amtrak Downeaster, Part II

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Amtrak Genesis P42DC diesel locomotive No. 108 done out in Amrtrak's red, white and blue 50th anniversary colours at one end of the Downeaster which took me from Portland, Maine to Boston North Station where it's resting at the end of its journey.Welcome to the second and final part of my Travel Spot dedicated to Amtrak’s Downeaster, which connects Boston with Brunswick, Maine, providing five daily services in each direction, departing from/arriving at Boston’s North Station. In Part I, I took a trip from Portland, where I was staying, to Brunswick, taking the opportunity to check out Amtrak’s business class along the way, before returning by bus.

Part II covers the journey Amanda and I took two days later in the other direction, from Portland to Boston, where we travelled in coach class (Amtrak’s standard class for travel). Incidentally, although I’d travelled in coach class many times before, this was my first detailed look at Amtrak’s refurbished coach-class seating. Along the way, we tried out the café car, sampling the on-board coffee which we put up against some of our own that we’d made on the train.

Other than my trip to Brunswick two days before, I’d only taken the Downeaster once before, at the start of my Portland-to-Portland trans-America train trip in June 2015. Since then, for a variety of reasons, the bus had always proved more convenient, so I was keen to see how the train stacked up against the bus.

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La Colombe, Seaport

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An espresso, made with the single-origin option, the Women of Ketiara from Sumatra, served in my Kaffeeform cup at La Colombe, Seaport.Regular readers will know that one of my go-to American coffee places is La Colombe, the roastery/coffee shop chain from Philadelphia. Along with its Philadelphia coffee shops, I’ve visited La Colombe in New York City, Washington DC, Chicago and, most recently, Boston, when I caught La Colombe, South Station between arriving by train from New Haven and catching the bus to Portland. However, that still left the subject of today’s Coffee Spot, the Seaport location, which I was able to catch just before my flight back to the UK on my most recent trip.

As the name suggests, La Colombe, Seaport is in Boston’s Seaport District, just across Fort Point Channel from Downtown Boston.  Although the address is Northern Avenue, it’s actually around the corner on the pedestrian strip connecting it with Seaport Boulevard. A fairly small shop, with just seven tables inside, this doesn’t stop it from providing the full La Colombe offering of two options on espresso, another two on batch-brew and two more on pour-over. There’s also a range of in-house teas and draft lattes and, if you’re hungry, cakes and pastries. For now, La Colombe only uses takeaway cups, so don’t forget to bring your own.

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