retiredmartin

June 2025. Byker. Newcastle.

Thanks to Pub Curmudgeon for the blog title. Only took me 3 years to use it.

Usual half pint of Doom Bar, Mudgie ?

Day 2 of 2 on the Great Tyne Tick, and this is where Greater Newcastle’s normally impeccable metro let us down.

Stuck at Tynemouth without any sign of trains heading anti-clockwise to Whitley Bay, we decided to cut our losses and do Ouseburn. Passing Wallend, a sign indicating a 47 minutes wait for the trip in the other direction confirmed our decision.

Ouseburn means Byker, not the most bucolic of places, even though there’s an alliteration to be used there.

Byker also means Spoons, and either because I’d told Jane there was a dinosaur there (there isn’t), or because it was likely to be the last loo stop for, ooh, half a mile.

Yes, I’d have stopped for a pint at those prices, and an entertaining little range,

but I sensed the charm of the High Main was lost on the rest of the group,

and my encouragement to “Just look up. Byker is lovely” was pushing my luck.

Five minutes through the housing estates,

and you arrive in the industrial estates housing, at last count, 37 microbreweries.

And Two by Two, with Big Trip, are my favourite breweries, if a pub blogger is allowed such indulgence.

Some difference of opinion on the merit of the architecture here,

but my only concern was with the cask, the Way finder struggling a little in the heat compared to Mrs RM’s keg and Jane’s (inevitable) cans.

Can a tap room EVER match a real pub for beer quality?

Talking of real pubs, you can guess what comes next.