BRAPA .... MONTH END REVIEW : MAY 2025

Greetings pub lovers,

66 new Good Beer Guide pubs visited in the month of May, smashing the previous record of 55. It takes me up to 70.16% of GBG completion, that is 3157/4500. I'm very happy with that.

With a quarter of my left eye (very specific!) already on the 2026 GBG, the big question is 'can I stay afloat?' i.e. remain above the 3,000 mark come September? Another #CruelChurn like last year and it may be tough. I reckon I'll need to be up above 3,300 to give myself a decent chance.

Thanks for bearing with me during the dreadful 'no photos / AI images' phase. Turns out Google were to blame, and Wix have given me a 'workaround' which will probably become my new way of uploading images.

My next mini tech project is creating a UK heatmap in Excel to show how I'm progressing by county. So far, it looks tiny and blue!

So let's now take a look at the ticking results from our regional juries .....

West Sussex (32 ticks / 21 to do / 67.19% complete)

No doubt about my highlight of the month. A week in gorgeous Chichester which is BRAPA town of the year so far, combined with my birthday & Hull City survival.

Beer quality was a touch below the national average (the heat for the first few days didn't help), but some of the pubs and in particular the locations were stunning. Areas like West Chiltington, Nutbourne, Elsted and Hooksway will live long in my memory. Nice people on the whole too.

I'm desperate now to book a week in Horsham and mop up the gaps, though no doubt new gaps will open up when the new GBG is published, hence why I'm not bothered about missing Selsey.

Pub of the month : Maypole, Yapton

Honourable mentions : Fox Felpham, Five Bells West Chiltington, Duke of Wellington, Shoreham, Three Horseshoes, Elsted.

Yap, yap, Yapton (beard man had a secret mint aero)

Greater Manchester (8 ticks / 2 to do / 98.74%% complete)

East Manc / Tameside done (special shout out to Alex Quosh for driving us around despite only two days notice, and Daddy BRAPA for lasting the pace despite #ManFlu).

A few Thursday ticks on the way back from Nth Derbys helped too. Down to just two, a rural Bolton outlier and a rural Wigan outlier. Not sure I've got appetite for either this year but never say never.

Pub of the month - Carlton Social & Bowling Club, Whalley Range

Honourable mentions - Snug, Droylsden, Harbord Harbord Middleton, Ostwich, Prestrich

Not drunk, honest. But which famous artwork was I trying to recreate?

West Midlands (7 ticks / 5 to do / 95.76%% complete)

That fertile Black Country corridor 'twixt Wolves-Stourbridge, rubbing against the legs of Dudley, delivered once more with a high class and suitably messy train day with Daddy B.

Leaves me with just five, easily by best WM year ever. Brownhills has become an outlier which I should've attempted when I was up in Lichfield. I've still got hopes for the others (two at Shirley) before mid-September hits. Oh, and sorry Coventry for cutting you off. Hasn't been their month!

Pub of the month - Brittania, Upper Gornal

Honourable mentions - Starving Rascal, Amblecote, Queen's Head (Stourbridge & Wordsley)

East Sussex (6 ticks / 27 to do / 57.14% complete)

Yesterday's trip to Hove/Portslade saw me break my E. Sussex duck for the year. Not a county I've really had a serious stab at although I did stay in delightful Rye a couple of years back, but even then, Kent was the Apple(dore) of my eye. I started straying Hastings-wards when I needed a change of scenery.

A week down in probably Brighton is high on my 2025/26 agenda as some of those pubs up nr Winnie the Pooh country ain't really suitable for a Saturday day trip without a car .....

Do YOU live in East Sussex? Do YOU have a car and a thirst for J20, coffee and Guinness Zero? And happy to pose for photos with a cauliflower / panda? Do you have a steady hand for wielding a green Staedtler highlighter? Do you have the patience to watch me spend an increasingly long 25-30 mins over a pint? Sympathetic of weak bladders? If the answer to all of these questions is "YES" or "UMMM, MAYBE" then don't delay, please report to BRAPA today. It is your National Service!

Pub of the month - Neptune Inn, Hove

Honourable mention - Stanley Arms, Portslade

Nottinghamshire (5 ticks / 6 to do / 91.78% complete)

A sunny Saturday with Daddy B. (blog coming soon) helped me tidy up the pubs I needed in and around Nottingham itself .... if you ignore Mapperley's Blues Dawg which was randomly shut, so I crossed it out in a fit of rage. LOOK, if it keeps its place for 2026, I'll have another go, but until then, 'uh-huh, not today girlfriend!'

As for the others, I have a #ThirstyThursday booked in to tick off the Mansfield trio. And Daddy BRAPA's car (well technically Mummy BRAPA's car) is helping me with Cromwell and Misson (which is nice).

Pub of the month - Pottle, Beeston

Honourable mention - Samuel Hall, Sherwood

In a word, 'stoic'

BRAPA probable 11 pints of the month

1. Thornbridge Jaipur, Hatter's Inn, Bognor Regis

2. Thornbridge Jaipur, Harbord Harbord, Middleton

3. Thornbridge Jaipur, Samuel Hall, Sherwood

4. Thornbridge Jaipur, Three Fishes, Worthing

5. North Riding Chocolate Orange Porter, York Tap, York

6. Volks ESB, Piston Broke, Shoreham-by-Sea

7. bigly tarriffs Downlands, Inglenook Hotel, Pagham

8. Downton Oatmeal Stout, Maypole, Yapton

9. Oakham Citra, Queens Head, Stourbridge

10. Harveys Old Ale, Egremont, Worthing

11. Hip Hop Langham, Royal Oak, Hooksway

    
    

    BRAPA ropiest pint of the month winner

    Thornbridge Jaipur, Dolphin & Anchor, Chichester

Winner!

Hampshire (4 ticks /37 to do / 68.91% complete)

I did once have 100% completion of Hampshire, one of my proudest BRAPA moments. That was only 3 years back, but I've already lost 30%+, which feels cruel.

I was going to say I have very little appetite for Hants at the moment or I'd be on the blower to my old mate Mick Citra who lives in that 'inset' section like 'helllppp!'

But having said that next season we'll be away to both Pompey AND Saints. Ticks in each, and plenty others not far away. Makes you think, as Matt le Tissier once said.

And the key question is, 'now that Will Still is Southampton manager, will still & west remain in the GBG under Portsmouth?'

Pub of the month - Robin Hood, Havant

Honourable mention - Old House at Home, Havant / Square Brewery, Petersfield

Northumberland (2 ticks / 6 left to do / 85% complete)

A brilliant two pub Thursday had me walking that Seahouses / Bamburgh coastline and the millions of people who told me it was amazing didn't lie, despite some rain and wind, and a bit of rushing about due to the sparsity of buses.

Daddy B is gonna help me with Greenhaugh and my outer Hexham pain in t'arse, and I might need some pre or post emptives to help pad it out.

Holy Island I keep checking tide and bus times to find a compatible day but it ain't easy.

Rothbury is doable from Morpeth but ideally I'd like more to pair it with. Slainsfield, more like Painsfield, hardly ever open but at least there's a (rare) bus route somewhere nearby.

Pub of the month - Olde Ship Inn, Seahouses

... and probably my overall Pub of the Month

Derbyshire (2 ticks / 1 left to do / 98.94% complete)

Oh look, I'm left with the exact same pub I was left with a year ago ... what a silly sausage.

But fear not, despite Rosliston living renfrew in my head for nearly two years, I have booked a July Thursday ticket to Burton, so I WILL get it done before the new GBG is released. Watch them be shut for a wake.

Pub of the month - Olde Cheshire Cheese, Castleton

June will start painfully slowly but explode joyfully towards the end.

75 ticks last June, and I'm not sure that can be matched but I'm making 50 the minimum.

Thirsty Thursday's all booked, but I have two blank Saturdays as a result of (a) a beer festival hangover and (b) a day out with old friends in a town I have no ticks in. There will be a Daddy BRAPA Sunday Car day though to take the edge off.

From July, I'll have to start limiting #ThirstyThursdays to every two weeks due to the cost of trains to increasingly awkward places, but that's no bad thing in terms of catching up on my blogs which by then will be really behind! Plus, who doesn't love a bit of red wine, wotsits and a western?

Thanks for reading, I'll leave you with my re-visit of the month.

Si

Marble Arch, Manchester