The Royal Arch, Dundee

Official site of The Royal Arch - ocrpubs.camra.org.uk

Official site of The Royal Arch - ocrpubs.camra.org.uk

Railway bar, a little old fashioned but in a good way, worth a try

This is a cosy single room town centre pub with a bit of a local's feel to it and a reputation for good ale that has seen it make recent editions of the Good Beer Guide. You enter into a wide but quite shallow main bar with a tiled floor strip running from the entrance to the bar and carpets elsewhere. The servery has a lovely bar counter with curved ends , bold front panels, decorative pillars and some brass plaques. The bar back sports etched glass mirrors with floral patterns and there are a couple of great old brass taps on the bar which seemed to still be in use. Some nice banquette seating runs along the front wall and down either side of the room, supported by lots of nicely decorated chairs. The walls are decorated with old brewery mirrors and a selection of local black and white photos. The pub's most striking facet has to be the fine stained glass windows along the front wall which appear to depict Broughty Castle. The ceiling is wood panelled and has been covered with framed maps and drawings that look like they've been up there for aeons. A couple of TV screens at either end of the room were showing a repeat of a football fixture from the previous evening, which prompted the very friendly barman into a long chat about the match and Scottish football in general. A door to the right is marked 'Staff Only', but appears to lead into some sort of side room that looked very much like a restaurant area, although it was unclear if this room ever gets opened up - either way, it certainly didn't look like it would offer a more promising space to drink than the main bar area. An unusual sliding door to the side of the bar takes you through to a corridor lined with photos of various famous sportsmen and leads on to the toilets. There are three handpulls but one of these was out of action on my visit, so the choice was limited to either Caledonian Deuchars IPA or Redcastle Crusader. The later was a pretty good pint and I found the staff to be extremely friendly and welcoming and had there been something else that caught my eye at the bar I would've most certainly stayed for another. I liked this place, which I felt was cosy, had an interesting interior and welcoming staff. The limited ale range may prohibit longer visits but I can imagine settling down here if there is something god on the bar. A good way to round out a successful mini-crawl around Broughty Ferry.