October 2024. Lincoln. Look at the concentration in those fingers as pub men pore over Stafford Paul’s meticulous list of essential Lincoln pubs on our Big Day Out. Obviously I would have preferred something a little less trad, but I feared Glory Holes would force our crew to make an agonising decision between Gamma Ray… Continue reading LINCOLN PART III – WIG AND MITRE
Author: 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.
UP THE (STEEP) HILL SIDEWARDS – LINCOLN PART II
October 2024. Lincoln. More random pics from last Tuesday’s (call it by its name) pub crawl round Lincoln. Seven (7) pubs, not a GBG newbie among them so wasted effort if you’re a focused ticker. Which I no longer am, and can do pubs “recommended by Blackpool Jane” like the Royal William IV instead. I… Continue reading UP THE (STEEP) HILL SIDEWARDS – LINCOLN PART II
A PAUL MUDGE MASTERCLASS ON THE IMPACT OF PORK SCRATCHINGS ON THE HEAD ON THE BEER
October 2024. Lincoln. Some sad news from Wolverhampton last night. No, it really is. One of very few brewery tours I genuinely enjoyed, mainly due to the wonderful Banks’s tour guide showing us the art of the pull. Paul Mudge seemed to be taking the news better than I’d expected last night, I guess he… Continue reading A PAUL MUDGE MASTERCLASS ON THE IMPACT OF PORK SCRATCHINGS ON THE HEAD ON THE BEER
LINCOLN – THE CULTURE BEFORE THE CASK
October (finally) 2024. Lincoln. The US Southworths’ Grand Tour had reached Lincolnshire by last Tuesday, and a gaggle of UK pub men converged in the county town to assist them in the correct spelling of “flavour” and advise beer scoring of schooners. I had an early start from Sheffield to bag a pitch in the… Continue reading LINCOLN – THE CULTURE BEFORE THE CASK
TOP 100 PUBS – THE MILLSTONE, STAMFORD
September 2024. Stamford. Unlike “up all-night BRAPA“, I take my time cross-checking the old to new GBG, colouring in maps, and compiling a long (long) list of pubs to be visited in GBG25 TY (ticking year). So I’d initially missed the fact we had a bran’ new entry in stunning Stamford, a great town with… Continue reading TOP 100 PUBS – THE MILLSTONE, STAMFORD
BELGIANS IN BISHOP’S STORTFORD
September 2024. Bishops Stortford. It had seemed an eternity since Stortford (or “The Bish” to the kidz) had a newbie in the Guide, which says a lot about the pace of pubby change in Hertfordshire. Blimey, you could walk to the Belgian Brewer in just over an hour, perhaps do a day trip from Albania… Continue reading BELGIANS IN BISHOP’S STORTFORD
TAKING MICHAEL TO ST MICHAELS
September 2024. St Michaels. Kent. Just as the challenges of one set of octogenarian parents ease (a little) so the challenge of the other set rise to the surface, and by last Sunday it became imperative we got Mrs RM’s dad out of the house for a bit before war broke out. Perhaps the fastest… Continue reading TAKING MICHAEL TO ST MICHAELS
GREENE KING IPA MAKES AN EMOTIONAL RETURN TO WATERBEACH
As the Southworths know well, Waterbeach is a boom town, its progress to essential visit status only hindered by an absence of cutlery and plates. Incidentally, I was reading on Mumsnet (my only reading these days) of the American obsession with the “house tour” which might explain the Southworths enduring fascination with my Mum and… Continue reading GREENE KING IPA MAKES AN EMOTIONAL RETURN TO WATERBEACH
ALL HUNKY DORY IN BURY ST EDMUNDS
September 2024. Bury St. Edmunds. Another night in Waterbeach, another lone new GBG tick. Yesterday I took a lovely fellow ticker to nine (9) South Yorkshire pubs; I think he was hoping for double that. But Chris Tavaré didn’t become our greatest cricketer by dealing in fours and sixes, oh, no. And a snatched Constitutional… Continue reading ALL HUNKY DORY IN BURY ST EDMUNDS
AT THE RACES – NEWMARKET’S BULL
September 2024. Newmarket. Most weekends are still based in Waterbeach, but at least there’s a chance of a snatched tick in GBG25, with a first furtive foray across the Suffolk border last Friday. “Why didn’t you pop in here when we stayed in Newmarket last month ?” Well, that’s an annoying question, Mrs RM, almost… Continue reading AT THE RACES – NEWMARKET’S BULL
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