RJP pub adventures

2024 was a good year for pubs with visits to Manchester/Stockport, Nottingham/Beeston, Peak District, Welsh borders, Chilterns and West Sussex/Hampshire giving ample opportunities to visit new pubs and revisit old favourites.  My favourite five new pubs and revisits are as follows:- New pubs Arden Arms, Stockport.   Stockport is a great drinking town and the vote could have gone to the Magnet or Swan with two necks but the Arden just pipped them.  A lovely multi-roomed town centre Robbie's pub with Old Tom on draught which got our Stockport tour off to a good start! Malt Shovel, Spondon.   A friendly multi-roomed classic with a great snug and drinking corridor.  Also reminded me that Pedigree in it's heartland is a cracking pint.  Another one on the list of great Derbyshire pubs. Boat, Penallt It's the beautiful location on the banks of the Wye that make this pub.  The Boat is in Wales but you need to park in England and cross the Wye to reach it...

My favourite pub is The Fountain Head in Branscombe, Devon.  It's not the best pub I've been in, it's not even the best pub in Devon (that's either the Bridge in Topsham, Drewe Arms in Drewsteignton or Rugglestone near Widecombe), but it is my favourite. It's got a lot of things going for it that make it a great pub: Located in a beautiful coastal village, plain, unspoilt interior, great local beer, decent, simple food, a roaring log fire in Winter and suntrap terrace with stream in the Summer.  But it needs something more to elevate it to favouritism and that something else is memories. Our family have been coming to Branscombe on holiday  for donkey's years (excuse the pun - the famous Donkey Sanctuary is just up the road), and it holds very happy memories for us.  It's these memories that make it such a special place for me: Our first holiday together in Branscombe and walking in the pitch black between the Masons Arms and Fountain Head, sitting in front ...

Inspired by an article pinned to the wall in the classic Bell at Aldworth, which in turn was inspired by George Orwell's famous essay 'The Moon Under Water', here's my idea of a perfect pub The pub is located in a beautiful location in good walking country, maybe an isolated pub on the marshes, or close to the sea in smuggling country, or nestled in the heart of a moorland village. T he building is instantly recognisable as a pub: a solid lump of a building in the local style, demonstrably a pub for at least a century.  It will have a free-standing, simple pub-sign or the name of the pub painted on the exterior The interior will be multi-roomed with differing rooms linked by a central lobby or passageway.  The passage or lobby will be spartan with a quarry tile or slate floor and room for some stand up drinking.  The rooms will have a different character with a plain public bar and a cosier snug or saloon.  All rooms will be a symphony of brown wood and tobacco stain...