Riverhead Brewery Tap, Huddersfield

Recently refurbished such that the layout has changed significantly but not the style. This is more of an alehouse than a boozer with pale wood floors and furniture and a large area outside for the alfresco slurp. On a warm Tuesday evening the draw of a drink outside was pulling in the punters in their numbers and this is clearly something of a local institution. The wide range of ales consisted of: Riverhead Redbrook Premium, March Haigh, Butterfly Bitter, Happy Valley and Black Moss Stout in addition to Osset Silver King and Yorkshire Blonde, Milestone Black Pearl, Small World Long Moor Pale and Wimbledon Common. The Happy Valley whistled down and the other Riverhead beers tried were also good. My first stop if in Marsden.

Marsden is a lovely Pennine town and was as far East as I travelled on my day trip to Manchester. I had managed to avoid the Ale Trailers on my early Saturday afternoon visit as the only people in the pub were locals and a group of walkers. The ten hand pumps had four Riverhead beers, three Ossett beers, two RAT beers and Butcombe Rare Breed. I had a pint of Riverhead March Haigh (£2.90) which was in excellent nick. I have to say I much preferred this rural pub to the more towny ones on the way back to Stalybridge.