As I have no doubt mentioned before, our daughter lives and works in Glasgow, so Mrs Ken & I had yet another trip to that city. Now the CAMRA AGM will be held in Dundee next month so I suggested a drive up one day from Glasgow, where we were staying for 2 nights.. I have driven round the city a few times on the way to and from Aberdeen, so was keen to see what the city had to offer.
Dundee is home the Beano and Dandy comics, the latter featuring Desperate Dan. There is a statue of him in the City Square
The first research was the Good Beer Guide and I found a suitable pub , The Phoenix, which is described as :-
One of Dundee's oldest pubs with sturdy wooden seats and tables and
green leather benches giving the place character, along with a rare
Ballingall Brewery mirror. Five ales on, and excellent pub food
at conservative prices. Traditional pub, warm and cosy with great
atmosphere and subdued lighting, like pubs used to be.
It was 5 minutes walk from the car park so that was our first port of call. One of the house beers was Deuchars IPA, fair enough...the other was Landlord. Why ? All those Scottish beers to chose from !
Anyhow, conscious of the drinking driving laws the Deuchars was the lowest ABV, so had a pint and lunch. I was hoping some Desperate Dan cow pie would be on the menu, had to make do with a chilli burger and chips (excellent).
While waiting for the food I asked mine host if I could leave some CAMRA Angle magazines.
"CAMRA ? Harumph" or something like that, "leave them over there on that table outside the ladies"
I thought it was a strange reply, considering the pub will be rammed with CAMRA members in about 2 weeks time.
Anyhow, left them next to some local CAMRA magazines, one of which I took to read.The first thing I noticed on the front was the advert for the AGM but with the date - Issue 2 2018 !
Now I am imagining the Magazine Editor taking delivery and grabbing a copy to proudly check his work, and seeing the misprint and saying " Oh Shit !"
Halfway through lunch, the landlord started collecting glasses and walked past us saying, " Now then CAMRA Boy ( I'm 67) hows the beer?"How could I not say it was fine.
After lunch, I was keen to find the statue so after a brief detour into a shopping centre, we found him.
If you look at the photograph I hope you agree he should be made an honorary CAMRA member, he has the shape !
Back in Glasgow that evening, we went for a meal in a Greek Restaurant then moved to the adjacent Drum and Monkey Pub. I said to the other two we had not been in before. "Yes we have, last year". I cannot remember it, so I checked my beer scoring on Whatpub , and sure enough we had, November last year!
Anyhow setting aside this alarming memory lapse, on the door of the pub was a sticker, "CAMRA Discount Here, ask at the bar". Ordering a couple of pints I flashed my card. The young lad wandered off to find a till, scratched his head and came back.
" How much is the discount?" he asked.
"I don't know mate , you work here !"
"Lets call it 20%" he offered. I should have replied 50% when he asked...bugger.
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