A PUB which saw its Christmas and millennium parties washed out when tons of water and mud inundated the ground floor on Christmas Eve is back in business.
Landlord Alan Butt was preparing for the celebrations when the torrent swept in on Christmas Eve morning at 1.30am.
It swept away his new white Mercedes car, now declared a write-off, and when the water fell a three-inch layer of mud was left over all the downstairs carpets.
"All we could do is wait upstairs through the holiday while the water went down," he said.
At a meeting in the village last week the Environment Agency and Forest Enterprise were criticised for not doing enough to protect the Wyeside village, which suffers constantly from flooding.
"This time I think there will be severe repercussions," he said. "They will have to take a serious look at it. They have spent a million and a half pounds of public money and they still can't keep us dry.
"This flood caused a huge amount of damage in the village. It has cost more than £50,000 here, and that's without the car."
He had to cancel Christmas and New Year parties but now hopes to make up for this by laying on something special for locals through the rest of the year. He is also planning big parties for Burns Night later this month and Valentine's Day.
He said workmen had been going flat out to dry the pub out and get it ready for reopening on Saturday, but now it was business as usual even if some trip switches were still going off because of the damp.
Fortunately the flood had not affected the famous Tintern Abbey ruins, while the popular pub's collection of pet rabbits, a favourite with children, had survived unscathed.