Appreciate your coat (Fairhaven water gardens cafe, South Walsham)

Fairhaven Water Gardens Cafe,

South Walsham,

Opening times 10:00-16:00 Everyday

This is always a difficult time of year for cafe cycle reviewing as everyone's thoughts begin to turn to Christmas. There are less cafes that are open or cycle guests available who aren't preparing for the festive season. I was therefore pleased that firstly I secured some guests; Chris (Mrs Crusader) and Barry and Helen and their tandem. And secondly, with the help of some twittering action, I confirmed that Fairhavens water gardens cafe was definitely open today. 

We met up at today's meeting point for a route that Barry had prepared and then set off towards our venue in South Walsham.

On the way I told my guests that British cycling seemed to have copied my excellent cycling guest top cycling tip feature as they had put a top ten winter tips article on their website and advertised it on twitter. I had been interested to see how it compared with my feature but was shocked when I got to their winter tip 4. It said 'ditch the cafe stop' which is very counter to my whole ethos. Apparently this is because you are likely to keep your coat on in the cafe and not feel the benefit when you go outside again. This is the level of advice I expect from my mother and not a well respected organisation like British cycling so I suggest your ignore their top winter tips and stick to the ones provided by my knowledgeable cycling guests.

Unfortunately none of Chris, Barry or Helen proved to be very knowledgeable cycling guests after all and couldn't come up with a decent tip so it was left up to Barry and Helen's Tandem to give me a worth while top cycling tip.

Cycling Guest top cycling tip No 7. Don't unnecessarily cycle through puddles as it gets your bike cold, wet, muddy and very unhappy. 

It was a cold day but with wind behind we made good progress to Fairhaven water gardens cafe. 

Outside Fairhaven water gardens cafe with distinct lack of signage

There is a nice outside patio seating area where we left our bikes before heading to the warm inside. As always I went to the counter to check out the cakes where I found there was a fairly small cake selection. However I was torn between the Pear and Ginger cake and a cheese scone so still could award a reasonable effective cake selection (ECS) score.

Cake selection

I ordered a hot chocolate and Barry a Cappuccino. Chris and Helen went for a Mochaccino which is apparently half hot chocolate and half cappuccino so we had all combinations covered.

In the end I chose the Pear and Ginger cake and Chris and Helen both went for coffee cake. Once again Barry was a cafe cycling disappointment by going for a sausage roll, which is clearly not a cake so I asked him to sit on a separate table until he could start taking cake reviewing seriously.

Cakes and drinks with sausage roll moved out of picture

Despite the drinks all coming out of a machine I thought my hot chocolate was very good. Barry thought his cappuccino was a bit weak which obviously feed into the mochaccinos so the guest hot drink quality (GHDQ) didn't rate so highly. Although I liked my Pear and Ginger cake the coffee cake was a bit on the dry side so the cake taste quality (CTQ) was only an average score as well.

Overall Fairhavens water garden cafe was a nice warm stop on a cold day and I'm sure would be even better if you included time to go round the gardens as well, but we didn't. I obviously made sure I removed my coat whilst inside the cafe, just in case British cycling were right.

After replacing my coat we set off on the journey home which went smoothly and we even got some egg news action. Remember for up to date Egg news flashes and all the latest cafe cycle news then follow on twitter (Cake crusader@cafecycletour) or like the new cafe cycle tour facebook page.


I have two more pre Christmas rides planned in final preparation for the end of year cafe cycle awards. So more news on those soon.

Ratings

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
6.5	5.5	5.5	6.0	7.0	6.10