Sunday 5th April 2026 Like, totally .... A lot of water has flowed under the bridge (probably a Scottish one) since I brought my remaining Oxfordshire tally down to just two pubs on Easter Sunday, which this year coincided with BRAPA's 12th birthday. What a mature young man he's become (just don't take him to Newark Northgate). Flagging from a heavy Saturday, I drank a weird murky green 'Lion's Mane' concoction from M&S as I make my way from Bicester Village to Oxford, which

59* (not out) new Good Beer Guide pub ticks for the month of April, meaning I only need one more tomorrow (30th) for it to become my best month of 2026 so far. This takes me onto 3407 out of approx 4500 Good Beer Guide pubs, so I'm 75.7% complete. These are heady times at BRAPA Towers, and no time to rest on those laurels as my birthday BRAPA holiday is imminent. The celebrations have started early in York's excellent Black Horse. Get it in the Guide! Drunk in Derby, earl

Saturday 4th April 2026 Easter Saturday, or National Bass Day to those who celebrate (anyone else see the decisive question on 'Who Wants to be a Millionaire?' the other night) began in sunny breezy Charlbury, waiting for a bus north to Chadlington as Storm Dave rattles the perspex. GBG super-regular, the surprisingly wet-led Rose & Crown sadly isn't open yet or I'd be whipping in a swift half. I'd slept like a log on my second night in Bicester, which won't surprise those o

Ready for a 'long read' (ugh!)? Even by my wordy standards? Best pour yourself a stiff drink. This is both a painful and satisfying day to recall. Friday 3rd April 2026 "I'm not in a funny mood, I'm in a funny way!" Daddy BRAPA, South Oxon country road circa 12 noon A' red dot' tick = a Good Beer Guide pub which has been in the previous five editions (or more). The working theory is that these will be the better pubs to tick off, both in terms of quality and longevity. D

Thursday 2nd April 2026 Even the cash machine at York station was getting into the Easter spirit as I tootle down to sunny Oxon for a full week away, with the intention of mopping up (most of) my remaining 19 ticks, with a view to getting stuck into neighbouring counties when I run dry. I would've taken mini Jesus as a bonus pub mascot but Ivor Panda is famously atheist. It has taken me FAR too long in my pub-ticking life to realise you can do York-Oxford/Banbury directly by

Saturday 26th March 2026 International football weekend could mean only one thing ..... Daddy BRAPA car day (woop, woop). Let's hope Hull City fluke promotion so my calendar is full of similar blank Saturdays caused by the Premier League's 38 game season and even more ridiculous kick off times than we currently suffer. Dad might not be so enthusiastic about this prospect when I ask him to turn down a dirt track on the North Yorkshire Moors in the pitch black so I can have a p

Thursday 26th March 2026 2017 was the last time I ticked a pub in Herefordshire. Poor form! I was on holiday with the parents in a remote cottage near Eastnor which had loud owls and an obelisk. I went to Ledbury one evening to 'help' Daddy BRAPA to post a letter, with the view to tick a couple of pubs before Mummy B. wanted us back for a ploughman's tea and vintage Bergerac. "Daaaaad? As Ledbury has a train station, please could we do a couple of villages instead?" I wh

Saturday 21st March 2026 Misty 7am pint at York's premier Wetherspoons? Tempting as it was, I kept my eyes on the prize and headed down to North Kent via London for a seven tick extravaganza to bring me down to 15 pubs required in the third 'pubbiest' GBG county (behind Greater Manchester and North Yorkshire). I've said it before and I'll say it again, if Kent is the garden of England, Sittingbourne is the backyard at 25 Cromwell Street. At least it wasn't the nearby 'Fount

Saturday 14th March 2026 West Brom away. I had no intention of going to the game so a Warwickshire NFFD (non-football football day) was on the cards. Nothing against West Brom, probably my favourite West Midlands set of fans, but it is an impossible area for pub ticking when you're a (fairly) experienced WM ticker. Weird you might think, with its proximity to both Brum and the Black Country, but it somehow never works. Plus they always gub us no matter our respective leagu

Greetings from an uncommonly clean and fresh smelling York Tap . The stout is drinking well, I'm wired for sound like Cliff and we are officially past the halfway point in the 2025/26 Good Beer Guide ticking year. 59 ticks (+ 10 pre-emptives) make March my most productive month since November. I've reached 3348 ticks, that is roughly 74.4% of the current GBG. Two 'exciting' landmarks are approaching: 12 more pubs will mean I'm finally in credit, having been forced to decl

Here we are, the final countdown on my recent Shropshire (& N Wales) epic. And if you were wondering about my Air B&B welcoming basket above, I ate the flapjack on day four, gave the Bakewell one to Daddy BRAPA, and never touched the hot chocs, Madri or Aldi G&T mixer. The rug and property as a whole both scored an 8.5/10, and yes I would return. Chilly bathroom too close to front door my only gripe but I didn't mention it on my review cos it sounded petty in grand scheme o

We're hitting the fun stuff now. Seven pubs for your perusal. All worth a visit if you're in the area. Stonehouse Brewery & Distillery, Weston Fully aware that I'd missed the last bus back to Shrewsbury which was some lame time like 6pm (Salop hates bus services, pass it on), I left Oswestry centre on foot and I'm amazed how rural it becomes so quickly. Pot-holed puddled country lanes, the smell of manure in the air, a sheep bleats and a cow maybe mooed behind a hedge, so

Ready for our mid-table finishers? The Swansea, QPR and Bristol City of this countdown. I really know how to sell my blogs don't I? Right, let's get on with it. Station Hotel, Oakengates : Telford Olde Fighting Cocks, Crown Inn and now this. Are there three Good Beer Guide entries anywhere in the UK in closer proximity? I doubt it. All rough diamonds, befitting those Telfordian environs. Shame I needed to come back for this one, having done the other two when they appea

File our next seven pubs under the category 'what might have been'. Had circumstances been different, most could've finished higher. Though I can't imagine in any circs, they'd be in the running for any pub of the year awards. Let's try and find something interesting to say about them ..... Cromwell's Tap House, Shrewsbury In the shadow of one of Shrewsbury's snoozing spires comes this catch-all tap house, trying to evoke some kind of Tudor-esque atmosphere. I might be b

36 Good Beer Guide pubs ticked off on last week's little excursion to Shropshire, staying in an 8.75/10 Air B&B in the Frankwell area of Shrewsbury. 24 in Shropshire, 12 in Wales. I spent the train journey home ranking them in some kind of order of enjoyability. Don't sweat the outcome too much. I don't want any of your usual "Second from bottom Si? Disappointed in you! Me and the late wife enjoyed a lovely Chateaubriand and Liebfraumilch there back in the summer of '84".

Saturday 28th February 2026 Up at 5am, Daddy BRAPA knocks on my door at 5:50am, and aboard the 6:10am York to King's Cross train. You can't say we aren't committed to those 23rd place in the xG table Tigers! Spreading across an unreserved table for 4, because we can! I'd even remembered to do us an air fryer croissant, pork pie (with mustard) and Arctic coffee each just in case catering wasn't open at this ungodly hour. We'd enjoyed the solitude of this same train a month ag

Thursday 26th February Owlie didn't fully emerge from his bag on the journey down to King's Cross, a stereotypical small ginger haired Irish horse man was being far too serious, and it got inside his head. "In his head, in his head, Owlie, Owlie, Owlie-ie-ie" (to the tune of Zombie by The Cranberries). 28 ticks to do in Essex. How did that happen? Seems like only last week that I was celebrating 100% Essex completion in Bures Hamlet. In reality, it was 2021. An underrated

Happy March from my default position, in front of a pint of Fullers ESB in King's Cross Parcel Yard. Not that I'm in there now, I've never got along with their WiFi. Up to £7.15 a pint by the way, how cruel is that? The answer you are looking for is 'very'. With Spring hopefully sprung, I'm hoping to break the shackles of a discontented winter with a more Idey March. 41 Good Beer Guide ticks completed for the month of February (plus 5 speculative pre-emptives). It feels

Saturday 21st February 2026 Right, here we go. Knackering blog this, so sorry in advance. North Warwickshire - The Return : Unfinished Business. Lessons to learn from the last two Saturday trips. This time, there'd be no mistake! Phone fully charged. Check! Power bank fully charged and in my bag. Check! Back up plug packed. Check! Walking boots by the door ready to slip on at 6:40am. Check! This was me on Friday evening. You wouldn't think I'd been doing this BRA

Thursday 19th February 2026 Beds. I wouldn't let it lie. And I don't do duvets. Once again, I find myself climbing the wooden stairs to Bedfordshire, the original BRAPA county and some might say the best. If you were a contrary bastard. But I have a soft spot for it in much the same way you might have for the jaundice one-legged kid in the Sports Day egg and spoon race. Stuck behind a freight train, we're late into King's Cross so my connection from St Pancake to Luton fa