June 2025. Newcastle-upon-Tyne, via Gateshead.
For reasons that will become clear later, I’ve just been searching Blackpool Jane’s blog for mention of her bunions. And people this blog lacks forensic research.
A BIG weekend with Mrs RM in Newcastle (t’other one), doing the culture pubs with Jane and fellow Tangerine Karen.
An early start, too, parked up in the dull but practical Ramada on the Gateshead side, which is looking increasingly forlorn, despite the great micropubs and the Neil Tennent art,
20 minutes walk, mainly waiting for lights to change (Gateshead hates pedestrians, 2 minutes between green lights),
but a pleasant walk over the underrated Swing Bridge takes you the heart of the medieval city,
where you’re reminded what a grand old place this is,
and what a weird lot Southampton fans are.
We make a note to have lunch in the Bridge,
but we’re meeting up at a quiet Centurion, the station bar that isn’t a Tap (that’s across the road).
The Centurion is solid, the bar of choice for “cap on backwards, sunglasses on head man“. It’s better than that place at the entrance to Leeds, anyway, and what it lacks in craft it makes up for in art.
How had I never noticed this one before ?
Well, I guess there’s too much new on the Tyne, and as the first/last pub the Centurion is always rammed.
But not today. Not at 11:30 on a Friday outside the football season.
A hot day, the sort of day when cask suffers. But not here, with the Black Sheep Velo (why !) a crisp NBSS 3+, though frankly it’s hard to enjoy a pub with so much uncollected clutter.
“Right, bunion update…” starts Jane. But you’ll have to wait for her blog for that.
retiredmartin 
It’s a bit different from the Ship Centurion in Whitstable, certainly, though I think it rather a pity that they dropped the “Arminius” from the name.
I wonder why they did that?
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Whoever was in charge on the re-fit of those glorious establishments should be publicly flogged.
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