Too short. (The Pantry Wroxham Barns, Wroxham)

The Pantry Wroxham Barns,

Wroxham,

Opening times Mon-Sun 10:00-17:00 

As it was Valentines day, I thought what better way to celebrate than with a romantic cafe cycle ride, after all I love my bike. To make up the numbers I also invited Chris (Mrs Crusader) and Barry and Helen and a tandem.

Regular readers may remember that Barry and Helen got themselves a shiny new tandem in December but as yet it hadn't made it out of the garage and I was beginning to think it may only exist in their imaginations. The main excuse for its lack of appearance was that they didn't want to get it dirty in the current wintery conditions. With today being near perfect for cycling, I was optimistic that I would finally get to see it in action. So as we arrived at the meeting point would the new tandem be waiting there?

Once again it was a resounding NO! Apparently Barry still wasn't happy to take it out as he didn't feel he had attached his bell at the right angle yet and it needed further adjustments before he could safely hit the road, so I would just have to be patient.

Recently the weather has been freezing and there has been much whinging and whining from my cycling guests.

Cycling guest cycling top tip No. 60. When cycling in cold conditions you can avoid frozen extremities by making sure your cycling host has not made the route too long.

I consider myself to be an excellent cycling host so had taken on board cycling gust cycling top tip No. 60 by making todays ride a short one. This meant that it wasn't long before we got to today's destination The Pantry at Wroxham Barns.

However today was not particularly cold and there was a warm sun in the clear blue sky. To my disbelief my cycling guests all complained that we hadn't gone very far on such a lovely day and asked if we could go a bit further. As a man known for my dynamic and flexible approach I would have loved to follow up on this suggestion but February's cafe visit planning spreadsheet clearly said that this was to be today's cafe destination and I didn't want to spend the afternoon filling in the necessary forms to authorise a cafe venue change request review (CVCRR), so I had to insist we stuck to the plan.

The Pantry at Wroxham Barns

As it was half term I was dismayed to see how full the Wroxham Barns car park was and expected to have difficulty getting a space in the cafe. Fortunately we had timed things well for once and got inside just before the lunchtime rush. In fact five minutes after we sat down the empty cafe was suddenly full of half termees. As the cafe filled up with fun loving toddlers Barry kept requesting that the atmosphere and ambiance score be reduced, which I obviously ignored.

A very full pantry with its target age group

There was a reasonable cake selection but best of all there were sausage rolls available for me to test out in sausage roll of the year (SROTY).

A reasonable cake selection plus scones plus sausage rolls

We all had sausage rolls while I also had some marble cake and Chris a chocolate cup cake muffin thing. On the drinks front my cycling guests had mochas and cappuccino.

Cakes, drinks and sausage rolls

I wasn't overly impressed with my hot chocolate, although it was a solid enough example, so was astounded when all the coffee drinkers said their coffees were really good attracting a very high guest hot drink quality (GHDQ) score.

Our cakes were ok but a little dry for high marks. Barry, who considers himself a bit of a sausage roll authority, gave todays example the thumbs up as I added our ratings to the SROTY spreadsheet on my phone.

On reviewing my cafe ratings table I was interested to notice that The Pantry had scored in line with a number of other cafes I have been to at local attractions so was pleased to see both the consistency of my rating system and the improved standard of attraction catering when compared with experiences from my youth.

Junior farm timetable

Before we set off Barry pointed to the Junior farm timetable on the wall and asked if he could go and cuddle a rabbit. Sadly the queue of 5 year olds was a bit too long so I suggested he came back on a quieter day, which he reluctantly agreed to do as we returned to our bikes for the short ride home. Hopefully he can spend the time he saved by adjusting his bicycle bell on the mythical new tandem so that we can actually get to see it in action on our next ride.

Scores

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
5.5	8.0	7.0	6.0	4.5	6.20

Route

Click here to down load 26 mile Norwich Tunstead loop GPX file for your GPS