BUS, BUS, BUS, BUS, MAGIC MICRO BUS – A GATESHEAD GREAT

October 2023. Gateshead.

An absolute deluge of posts coming up from Newcastle; old favourites, new favourites, that bloke from the 1975 AND Les Dennis.

Saturday night sees the hotels either side of the Tyne fill up and double their prices; the Durham House Hotel is probably too far from the Toon for tottering hen parties to contemplate walking on Saturday night but 20 minutes to the bridge is fine for me.

Safe street parking, close to one of the best town parks in England, the cheeriest B & B owner anywhere. OK, if you eat his full English breakfast you might not make it back a second time….

The walk into Gateshead was a real treat, despite the loss of that iconic car park that Michael Caine immortalised in Get Carter.

Who knew the ‘Heed had such gorgeous architecture near the bus station.

What Gateshead didn’t have this Saturday afternoon was any shoppers. I wonder where they could be ?

Luckily, the pubs were full.

OK, that meant Mrs RM had to find me a perch on the windowsill of the Microbus we’d literally walked past in June, but I can live with a busy pub.

A riot of colour on the walls and in the glass, campervan chic,

folk of all sorts,

and some superb beer from Twice Brewed (4.5) and Fierce Mango juice (not allowed to score keg, innit ?). Talking of Twice Brewed, we reminisced about the eponymous hotel we’d stayed at on the Hadrian’s Wall walk 2 years ago, famous sycamore (RIP) and all.

Hard to describe how jolly it was, reminiscent of that wonderful Town Mouse over the bridge, and I know its impressed my fellow tickers this year.

And that musical reference ?

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.

5 thoughts on “BUS, BUS, BUS, BUS, MAGIC MICRO BUS – A GATESHEAD GREAT”

  2. Well that’s Keith Moon, so Magic Bus. And it is a magic little place. Had pints of George Samuel Brewery’s Porter (Harvey) and a 4T’s Brewery Stout on cask there which were both magical, before switching (cuz they didn’t have any more darks on cask to try) to a keg Stout, which was good but a reminder that cask on song is still the best.

    Then off to be trashed 4-0 by The Heed, and it could easily have been twice that. Not so magic.

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  4. “Bus, Bus, Bus”.
    For one who never used buses I’ve got on surprisingly well with my bus pass these past four months.
    However, my last three trips haven’t gone so well ;
    29th September. The Cannock bus had no intention of stopping outside the Sun and only did so after I leapt out into the road.
    12th October. The 10.25am for Eccleshall was cancelled meaning a two hour wait for the next one.
    25th October. The 9.30am for Brewood didn’t turn up resulting in me getting the 9.40am for Rugeley instead.

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