The Hope & Anchor, Alnwick

This pub has undergone quite a change since the previous review. The first thing is that it is a lot more attractive from the outside now with a green and red colour theme (to be in keeping with the Italian restaurant, more of that coming..), and lots of floral troughs and baskets. Internally it is now more a smart bar and restaurant. The area to the left is still the pub bar but the area to the right, which you can get to from the pub, but has its own entrance, is a separate Italian restaurant called “The Italia”. Didn’t venture into the Italian but had a drink in the bar area. I cannot comment on what it was like before, but if it was traditional before, it isn’t now and all character seems to have been removed and it’s more like drinking in a bright cafe. There are four modern chrome real ale pumps on the bar which do not have traditional pump clips but oval spaces where the name of the beer is written in crayon. Not sure if this is their attempt to be smart but it backfired on me and I thought it was just amateurish especially when combined with the interaction with the barmaid that followed. For the record, Wylam Gold Tankard and Hadrian Border Farne Island Pale Ale are the house beers, but both of these were off for my evening visit. This left two Marstons brews in the shape of Pedigree New World Pale Ale and Banks Brewery Sunbeam. Although the pumps were marked “New World Pale Ale” and “ Sunbeam”. So when I asked if that was Sunbeam from the Banks Brewery the reply was “ Oh I dunno, but I think it’s from somewhere near Wolverhampton.” Now technically Milton Keynes is somewhere near Wolverhampton when looking from this part of Northumberland, but I took that to be a yes. Dogs and cyclists are welcome in the pub and as it provides safe storage facilities for cycles, it is very popular with cyclists. So the only way I see that I will be returning to here is if I catch the road biking craze and turn into an elder version of Chris Frome and decide to cycle the entire Northumberland coastal path. Yep, you guessed it, I’m not likely to be returning here then.

Official site of The Hope & Anchor - www.hopeandanchorholidays.co.uk