Real Ale, Real Music

Following my trip to Hartlepool last time out, I've been back in the North East, checking out a few places I'd not visited in ages, plus a few old favourites. Here's where I went.... The last time I'd visited Newcastle was almost 6 months ago to the day, back in September when I combined a visit to see the family with watching FC Halifax Town's game at Gateshead. A few of us had come up on the train on the morning of the match and arrived in the toon to be greeted by steady rain. We'd gone to the Newcastle Tap, just across the road from Central Station, had a couple of decent pints there, and moved on to the Town Wall where from our seat by the window we could see the rain getting heavier. We moved on through the rain to Bodega where I remember we had a great pint of Jarl, and were watching the Merseyside derby on the big screen when news came through of a not entirely unexpected pitch inspection at the International Stadium. Surely this would simply be a formal...

Another football away trip, this time to Teesside, which gave us  the opportunity to pay another visit to a fantastic and famous little micro pub in Hartlepool. Here's how the day unfolded.... It was an early start. I was meeting our Mick and Gaz for the 8.16 from Halifax to Leeds for the first leg of our journey to Hartlepool where FC Halifax Town were hoping to maintain their push for the National League play-offs. I arrived at the station first, my taxi dropping me off at around 8am. Not long after I arrived it was announced that the train had been cancelled and the next one was delayed by animals on the line! So with the lads finishing their breakfast at a local cafe I messaged to appraise them of the current situation but received no response. They turned up a few minutes later, quickly walking just before our booked train was due to leave, telling them when I broke the news there had been no need to rush! In the end we caught a train to Leeds going the other way via Brighouse...

This was my first-ever visit to this proud city at the western end of the West Midlands where I only managed to visit two pubs in what I found was a very welcoming place, but what good pubs they were.... It was bright sunshine and blue skies all the way as I travelled from Halifax via Manchester to Wolverhampton, a journey that took around two and a half hours in total, and this continued to be the case as I had a look around this city of around 263,700 inhabitants, the third largest in the West Midlands after Birmingham and Coventry. I arrived at the city's modern railway station, which has one of the highest bridges across a railway line I have come across! Back on terra firma I walked out on to the concourse and got my bearings. One of the pubs on my list seemed to be close by, but I decided to leave that until last and head off to two others which were more in the city centre and get them done first. The city's name is a derivation of the Anglo-Saxon for Wulfrūn's high ...

Another post from Manchester where, with my original plans for the day thwarted, I spend an afternoon roaming the city centre and dodging the showers as the weather turns increasingly wet. In doing so I check out a new bar, and visit several other familiar and less familiar places along the way.... I'd stayed overnight in Manchester after the previous night's gig and awoke to a bright sunny morning. I got myself up and wandered out of the Travelodge around half past 9 and headed round the corner to Koffee Pot on Oldham Street for some breakfast. It was already quite busy there but I soon got sorted out with a table and shortly afterwards I was tucking into a Scottish breakfast they called the Big Yin, the usual fried breakfast with the addition of haggis, square sausage, and potato scone. Over what was a delicious but very filling breakfast, washed down with a couple of mugs of Builders Brew tea, I formulated my plans for the rest of the day.  I fancied going to Stockport, whi...

I've been back over the Pennines and revisited a few old favourite haunts followed by a gig in a new venue on a typically wet Manchester evening. I had a good evening overall, although unfortunately one of the places turned out to be an unexpected let down.... The spots of rain started to appear on the window as soon as my train slipped through the Pennines, somewhere between Walsden and Littleborough. By the time we arrived in Rochdale, little streams were flowing down the glass, meeting each other, coalescing, and changing course as the train rocked and railed along the track. We arrived in Victoria, and I decided to stay dry,  at least for now, at least on the outside, by heading to the Victoria Tap for a Welcome to Manchester pint. The small bar was quite busy with a mid-afternoon crowd but I got served pretty quickly. I went for a pint of a beer from a new brewery to me, Coleys, who are based nearby in the Weaste area of Salford, just off Eccles New Road. Their website descr...