27/07/19 - Good Beer Guide Pubs of Llandudno

Pubs - 3
Good Beer Guide Ticks - 403 - 405


Basking in the heat of the hottest July day ever recorded, Mrs M books us a weekend away.   Weather reports are evaluated and North Wales promises "Wall to Wall Sunshine".

Here's the Albert, the First of three Good Beer Guide Pubs visited in Llandudno.

You cannot see the Great Orme, tomorrow's walk, for drizzle

The Albert is a functional Gastro Pub, which the bible states "has the beers on offer clearly marked on a Chalkboard".

Good job, as you cannot get near the pumps for the bar hangers - who are very protective of their front row seats.

I tried to put my head between the conversation, but this was met with disapproval

I found the chalk board - above the bar and with lettering that rendered it unreadable with or without my glasses.

There was nothing for it, I went to the end of the bar with space and where the serve the kegs. 

The man next to me had a lovely looking pint - dark, malty colour with a pefect 1/2 inch of creamy head.   I'll ask him what he's on.

How do you back away from John Smiths  :-) ?

Instead, I went LocALE for a Conwy brewery Beachcomber.   A refreshing Pale Ale that lived up to the Untappd review of "grapefruity notes".

Functional.... and we move over the road to Tapps - a Micropub.   I'm having to think which word before pub makes my heart sink the fastest.... Micro or Gastro.

To be fair, when they are done right, micros work well.   They either need a lot of variety of interesting Continental Bottles (a la the Beer Emporium, Kidderminster) or good music, played at a comfortable volume masking the hum of refrigerators in silent Micros (sadly lacking in the Bull Baiters, Worcester or  Little George, Stroud).

This fell into the good music category and with a healthy representation of clientele,  we were hard pressed to differentiate this from a regular pub.

And the Welsh Pride by Conwy Brewery was perfect.

No external shots of Tapps - Smokers in the Rain

After a lengthy walk along the prom and a couple of false starts finding restaurants that are both high on Tripadvisor and with Saturday night availability, we find ourselves walking past some horror shows of karaoke pubs, a Wetherspoons that surprisingly isn't in the bible (they usually are, I can only wonder what crime the Palladium has committed), arriving at the night's third tick and easily the best of the lot.

The Snowdon hotel has a lovely open covered terrace at the front, so the gentle noise of conversation filling the night air tempts the ardent pub tickers in.

But unfortunately makes for a poor photograph

A lovely looking bar, with plenty of choice that is not evaluated in the slightest when I see the Red Triangle.

I would be drummed out the pub tickers society, had I refused a Bass.

Mrs M's limb, checking in her diet coke into UnTappd.

A fine pub.   We walked past it again in the rain-light on Sunday's walk.  The only reasons not to revisit was to check into Llandudno's oldest and see how Tim's vision for turning a theatre into a boozer from the inside had worked out.

Snowdon in the Rain.