IT’S HAPPY HOUR AGAIN. THE DRONFIELD TAP

September 2024. Dronfield.

I’m not sure what the technical term is for my inability to sit still at home for even a single day, “itchfeetus” or “gardeningavoidingis” I guess.

So it was that 28 minutes after arriving home in Sheffield (28 minutes is one clothes wash) I was heading to the station without a plan other than to go anywhere else.

Well, why not Dronfield ? No visit since 2017, a growing Derbyshire town (pop. 21,261) I’d declared the “Glossop of the East” in the certainty it was about to go crafty and flood the GBG with micros. I was wrong.

Even the Wetherspoons is a fake;

but at least it sells Crispy Beef.

I couldn’t remember the town at all, bar a recollection the football team (Thornbridge GBG entry attached) was called “Sheffield”, which seems cultural appropriation of the worst kind.

Two possible directions to head from the station; let’s head right/south.

By luck not design the first red “P” you come to is the Guide perennial the Dronfield Arms,

a solid looking place with on-site brewery, rarely a good sign.

Far more reassuring is the handsome charity box,

a craft keg selection stretching from Beak to Carling.

The barperson is a gem, and not just because she tells me it’s Happy Hour from 3-5.

A cool, crisp pint of the homebrew Wild Light for £3, NBSS 3 if I’m being honest*,

an eclectic soundtrack including “Boys Will Be Boys“, and two very Yorkshire Old Boys discussing George Clooney and the England cricket captaincy (“gotta be Rooooot”).

A solid pub with a Proper mix of custom, Two Wine Women joined the Old Boys and the Darts Lads as I left in search of something, anything New and Shiny.

*And I always am

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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.

11 thoughts on “IT’S HAPPY HOUR AGAIN. THE DRONFIELD TAP”

    1. Yes, Dronfield was the only place on the next train on the departures board that I didn’t really know.

      There’s quite a few stations on the route up to Huddersfield I might end up doing that way.

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  2. A bad case of wanderlust, methinks. Home certainly isn’t where the heart is, in you case, Martin, although it doesn’t hurt to go off piste, from time to time.

    Having said that, Mrs PBT’s would be seriously questioning both my sanity, and commitment to our relationship if I kept disappearing like that – but each to their own.

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  3. You’ve prompted me to check my diaries for the 34 times I’ve caught a train from Stafford railway station since the beginning of last year and, though some have been for changing trains rather than my destination, it has been
    6 times to Wolverhampton,
    4 times to Stone,
    3 times each to Atherstone, Birmingham New Street, London Euston, Manchester Piccadilly and Stockport,
    twice to Crewe and to Penkridge,
    and once to Edinburgh, Lichfield Trent Valley, Liverpool Lime Street, Macclesfield, and Nuneaton.
    My train journeys have reduced since having a bus pass that I’ve used more a dozen times from Stafford for Stone, Rugeley, Lichfield or Uttoxeter.

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  4. “I’m not sure what the technical term is for my inability to sit still at home for even a single day, “itchfeetus””.

    My grandmother always used to say that her globetrotting father in law, my great grandfather, had itchy feet (as a kid I thought it was a medical condition). He once left their home in Manchester and the next she heard from him was a letter telling her to bring the rest of the family to where he was in America.

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    1. That’s extreme.

      If anything, Mrs RM is worse than me. We arrived home from an Albanian trip this Summer and that very evening she was looking for cheap coaches to Andorra. The next morning she was off on a solo adventure. Imagine ! An unaccompanied woman !

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