retiredmartin

March 2025. Old Goole.

That Discourse discussion about beer scores rather assumed I only go to the “top beer towns” like Sheffield, Manchester and Wem, so the next few posts come from sunny Greater Goole.

Two very tricky new Guide entries to the east and north of Goole, in fact: the sort served by one train on a day the pub is shut, and no service at all on Sunday when it’s open.

I actually doubted I could make it make it back from Laxton as I began an epic Sheffield-Donny-Goole-Saltmarshe trip that Thursday, admiring the views of Goole Fields.

No, honest. In 1994 I dragged Mrs RM up to this wasteland just because it looked interesting on our AA atlas (and for a charmless curry at the end).

See ! There’s places called Marshland on there. It’s a place of magic and mystery, if you’re visiting from Drax.

Goole station greets you with brooding skies and a closed pedestrian underpass.

But within minutes you’re in the heart of a town so vibrant that Dutchman Vermuyden came over here to escape flat canals and Heineken, creating a town of flat waterways and Carling.

Please don’t correct me. You weren’t around then either.

It’s forty (40) minutes to my connection with Saltmarshe (request stop alert !), so my choice is a) town centre Spoons or b) keg port boozer in Old Goole.

Well, that’s an easy decision.

The half mile west is charming, dotted with art,

and the sort of open sky serenity I mock in the Fens.

I was last here nearly a decade ago, when there was more than just the Vermuyden left,

but it’s the industrial docks keg boozer of your dreams, just waiting for that takeover by Docks Beers or Brew York.

Look what you could have had, 30 years ago.

Now, it’s John Smiths Smooth, Extra Chilled. Should have had the Guinness but the tap was hidden.

12 minutes to down a pint of over chilled bitter, say “Ullo” in a Humberside accent 3 times, and read the Goole Times cover to cover.

If I can make the 16 minute walk back to the station in 10, I might just sneak another half in.