Douglas Arms, Lerwick

A proper nice looking pub frontage building with a bit of colour on the exterior and frosted windows. Inside is a rather place too; two separate bars via a porch entrance with a lovely set of stained glass doors picking out the bar and lounge. The public bar is to the left and was fairly basic, but lively with plenty of noise via use of the darts board and pool table. The lounge is the right-hand side room and is really rather plush with tiled bar area, red wavy carpet, lots of high back maroon fabric padded perimeter seating, box wood panelling etc. Someone has also taken the trouble to paint the dado rail green and red. There are various framed prints of square-looking men (Shetland genetics?) in Up Helly Aa clobber plus some of musicians, presumably local. There's also a rather nice feature fireplace, which was lit. Sadly no cask, which a pub like this really should do. There was a token set of Norseman bottles in the fridge but I decided to sample a new one on me, the keg Youngers Tartan Special (once was enough). I really liked this one and it could be even better with a few bottles of local ale available and maybe try and shift a cask too. 7.5

Surprisingly named for this part of Scotland, as the Douglas family is mainly associated with the central lowlands, this is undoubtedly one of the best pubs in town and, indeed, the whole island chain. It consists of a separate bar and lounge, the latter lavishly decorated with lots of wood, maroon padded seating and sundry items of bric-a-brac lining the shelves and hanging from the bar top. A good selection of draught beers includes McEwan’s Export, Tartan Special, Belhaven Best, Guinness, Carling lager and Tennent’s lager, in addition to Strongbow cider. Tennent’s lager sells at £3.30 in the lounge and £3.25 in the bar, which is more basic but still attractive and welcoming, with a pool table, two darts boards, two games machines, a juke box and two TVs. Although it’s slightly out of the town centre, the Douglas is definitely worth paying a visit to if you’re on a pub tour of Lerwick.