PAPER LABELS

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Just what you want. A Gooner serving beer with a paper pump clip. What do you think when you see a homemade pump clip ?

Scarcely less credibly, it’s the return of Archers, who kept The Imbiber going singlehanded a decade or so ago with their monthly release of two dozen new beers named after Swindon Town roundabouts.

I had no idea Archers were still going; it must be 10 years since I saw their beer in a GBG pub and it was noticeably absent (or well hidden in the craft section) at the GBBF last week.

It was, I think, the only beer on in Machynlleth GBG perennial the Dyfi Forrester, the last pub on Paul and my mini-crawl before the witching hour last train to Newtown.

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Why do all small-town Welsh pubs look like they’re about to fall down ?

In 2016 I had a decent Bass here, in complete silence. At least at 7pm it had the atmosphere of a Digbeth boozer, without the incomprehensible accents.

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“Arthur’s Corner”

There’s three things to tell you about the snack menu;

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Proper pub snacks
  1. They like their cheese
  2. They’re hot
  3. No you can’t use your contactless card

Pub snacks, darts and pool, a decent beer (NBSS 3) and loads of banter.

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Clear, wet and lacings

But that’s not my endearing message of the Dyfi.

This remarkable outside Gents is.

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Published by retiredmartin

Retired NHS, doing long walks around UK and the world to record the great bits. Focused on Good Beer Guide pubs and live music.

33 thoughts on “PAPER LABELS”

  3. We’ve circled the wagons and pitched camp in Brookings,Oregon for a few days.
    It’s just inside the state line from California and first impressions are good.
    Lots of touristy places but also one nice old divey sort of bar/social club that looks right up our street for a watering hole.
    We went out to buy some milk and bread for breakfast this morning but it took us four hours,four Bloody Mary’s,two margaritas and a couple of beers to get back.
    Hardly worth eating now the early evening session beckons.
    America still manages to puzzle with its contradictory message on social customs.
    We visited West Coast Organics on an industrial estate to purchase some local combustibles – it was like visiting Halfords.
    Rows of large glass jars with a dizzying variety of marijuana and all perfectly legal.
    The state law also makes it perfectly legal to stroll down the street smoking a spliff should you wish but it’s against federal law so whilst a local rozzer wouldn’t bother you an FBI agent could arrest you.
    We then popped across the road to the Chetco Brewing Company – a typical industrial estate micro-brewery with undrinkable home brew.
    There Mrs PP-T was told off for smoking a fag with her pint on the outside decking area but was able to step to the outside of the wooden fence and puff away but not allowed by law to have a drink in her hand.
    The Yanks are still puritanical about most things except food.
    No-one raises an eyebrow if you’re a fat bastard eating yourself into an early grave.

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    2. I get the impression that the USA hasn’t succumbed to the current wave of anti-drink puritanism to anything like the same extent as the UK.

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      1. No, but on TV you get the impression Americans are either pissed on a bottle of Bud Lights or go to the bar and drink 20 shots. There’s no in between pictured.

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      2. You also seem to get the impression that virtually any character in a US tv show who is ever shown regularly frequenting any sort of bar is going to immediately develop into a raging alcoholic.

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      3. In the Unites States, a person who plays the tuba is known as a tubaist or tubist, but in the United Kingdom, an orchestral player of the instrument is known simply as a tuba player. Whereas, in a brass band, or in a military one, they are referred to as bass players.

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      4. I don’t think we have Mudgie. I really don’t sense a lot of anti-drink feeling. On the smoking front I don’t think people want to breathe the second hand smoke, but I don’t think they care if someone smokes. Drugs are a different story. Big splits there. Some very against any drug use. Others legalize away. Our puritanical instincts are much more apparent on things like sex and reproductive rights…

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      1. I don’t think the Dyfi Forester has seen a paint brush since I stayed there in July 1988.
        I think it even passed by the “1959 Green” paint that was so popular thereabouts in the year of the adoption of the national flag of which it was the lower half.

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      2. Do you think Welsh pubs are more likely to offer/have offered B & B, compared to England?
        Reckon I’ve stayed in a dozen or so Welsh pubs in last decade, many of them quite basic.

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      3. It might be that Wales has many small towns, towns that were too small for a proper hotel so it made sense for a larger pub to have several letting rooms, and to be the only place in town for a proper meal ( Machynllethians have small appetites and so Toasty Cheese Melts are proper meals, maybe served with lava bread on Sunday lunchtimes )

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  6. That pub is conspicuously basic. Like the line about Archer’s filling the Imbiber’s pages with those lists of ‘new’ beers, most of which were blends. Guessing Evan Evans have acquired the brand name. The (New) Imbiber recently ceased publication but has retained an online presence.

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    1. End of an era for the Imbiber.
      I’d occasionally pick up a copy in one of the free houses that stock it, but inevitably feel disappointed it was just a huge list of one off beers brewed for festivals and notes from brewery trips.

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      2. Yes, and the occasional article on pubs in less unheralded towns like Bridport and Glastonbury before pub bloggers came along 😉

        Do you remember Taste in the late 90s. That was great.

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  7. Interesting/obscure fact that Machynlleth, although it’s on the west coast of Wales, is actually in Powys, and before that the historic county of Montgomeryshire.

    The Dyfi Forester certainly hasn’t been put under any kind of “corporate microscope” 😀

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    1. I just remember in the 1970s cycling from Cardiganshire to Machynlleth on a Sunday for a pint – or two.
      I don’t quite remember when Machynlleth was the capital of Wales.

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      1. Machynlleth and Dolgellau are very similar in population and geographical location at the head of estuaries, but very different in character.

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      2. Machynlleth would have been much bigger if the big sea port for Ireland had been built a few miles downstream at Ynyslas as was intended.

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      2. Memorable downstairs toilets would include the Coeur de Lion in Bath, the Prince of Wales in central Brighton and the Stormbird in London, perhaps then.

        They’re not quite so bad, in that there aren’t miles of corridors to navigate too, just what pass for staircases.

        Not what Van had in mind, maybe

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