Star Hotel, Moffat

Apparently this hotel is acknowledged by the Guinness Book of Records as the narrowest such building, and it is certainly an extraordinary sight. There is a public bar at the rear, with an entrance in the side road, but I got only as far as the door before being driven back by a wall of noise. The front door of the hotel was more peaceful, with a small board advertising the available real ale, which is a nice touch. The bar counter in the lounge has no hand pumps, though there is one on a kind of shelf behind but seemingly just for the purpose of displaying the pump clip: the beer had to be poured and brought through from the other bar. (There are often two beers on, I was told, but just one on this occasion.) This was from a local brewery, Sulwath Brewers of Castle Douglas, and the beer was Criffel 4.6% (named after a local hill), a very good IPA with well-defined flavours and great drinkability - which is just as well, as it gave me something to come back to after what was going to be my last pub of the evening, the nearby Black Bull, turned out to have closed early.

This is as good as it gets in Moffat the bar is down the side street behind the hotel sports bar very noisy place glad the coach was just here for an hour