Couple quit cafe after 40 years on The Wrekin
It has been a famous sight for walkers up The Wrekin for more than 150 years – but this is the last Christmas and New Year holidays Tom Bolger will be spending in the Halfway House.
Mr Bolger, and his wife Philomena, are due to sell up next year and move to Ireland.
But they celebrated Christmas in the famous old house one last time his week.
He said this year was the first for a decade that he hasn't spent the day with his family as they are in the midst of moving out.
"This is going to be the first year for a while we haven't got the family round because everything is packed up," he said.
"It has just been me and the wife this year, so it was quite a nice quiet Christmas.
"We haven't even got any of the Christmas decorations up this year as they are all packed away ready for the move."
The sale of the house is all but done, with a few things still to be ironed out, but Mr Bolger is not expected to move out until the middle of January.
He said: "I lived in Germany for 18 years and had rented the house out until 1998.
"My family moved back with me in 1999 or 2000 and ever since then we have had the family around each Christmas.
"It's a big house so is good for having family round."
He said he has one memory of Christmas in the house which always makes him smile.
He said: "Me and the wife would go to the Huntsman in Little Wenlock when we only had one child, but we had to sort out a childminder.
"Back then we didn't have a 4x4 to get up the hill so we had to walk down to the car at the bottom.
"I had to walk down to go and pick the babysitter up, walk back up, then walk down again with my wife, then back up when we got home, then back down to take the babysitter home, then back up again.
"Then I had to get to walk back down to go to work at 6am. Things were different back then and I was a lot fitter but it makes me laugh, thinking about us walking up and down there all the time.
"Now, no matter how much snow or ice there is I can get up the hill in the new 4x4s."
Mr Bolger, who is 67, said he and his wife have opened the shop, that sells refreshments to people making their way up The Wrekin, as much as they could over Christmas. They were today serving crowds enjoying a brisk Saturday walk. He said: "It's difficult trying to run a shop while you have lots of family around.
"People come up there on Christmas Eve, Boxing Day, New Year's Day, all the time.
"We have this one fantastic bunch of pensioners who come to the house each year about a week before Christmas.
"They're an absolutely fantastic bunch. I open the shop just for them and we make them some mince pies. Last year only 10 of them came because we had such bad snow but we had got enough mince pies for 30 people. There were none left when they went though."
