Bay Hop, Colwyn Bay

Easily the pick of the Colwyn Bay Pubs.... as sketchy a place (town) as we have been but this was an oasis of calm. A smart shop conversion in a pedestrianised road. Some outdoor seating and for a time, we caught the last of the 2024 sunshine. Before admitting defeat and moving into the single roomer. What micros lack in comfort, history and interest they can counter with beer choice and this place gets it perfectly. Something for everyone with great cask, interesting keg, bottles and cans. International offerings a forte. Three different fruit beers. Friendly owner. Decent music piped in.

The Bay Hop is a micropub in Colwyn Bay's town centre that wasn't around the last time I visited the town. It is a typical micropub with a single room, which is actually fairly large and a small outdoor seating area on the pavement at the front. There are real ales, real ciders and also craft beers. The owner was friendly and knowledgeable about the beer range, whilst the customers who gradually increased in number whilst I was there, were also friendly. In no time at all, the whole pub of strangers was in full conversation with one another about multiple subjects. Real ales on were Burning Sky Plateau, Oakham Black Magic, Chapter Parabola & Brew Foundation A Little Bitter That. Ciders were Rosie's Black Bart & Continental, Dorset Nectar Old Harry Rocks & Farmer Jim's Farmyard Perry, whilst craft beers included Full Circle x Heist Annual Service Plan, Verdant One More PSI & Fierce Beer Bourbon VBM (12.5%). I chose the Black Magic, which I would describe as a typical Oakham beer and the Continental cider, a brand new Welsh medium cider only currently stocked on draft here and in the Grapes in Liverpool. I really enjoyed my visit here. It is almost certainly the best pub in Colwyn Bay these days and rivalled the Albion in Conwy as the best pub in my North Wales trip.

This is a proper micropub with no TVs or other distractions. Although it also bills itself as a bottle shop this is very much a side-line as it's much more micropub than off licence. It's slightly on the larger size as these places go consisting of a wider rectangular room with some low furnishings to the left and a fair bit of floor space to the right where there is also some shelving for tins and bottles. Unusually this building has a cellar which has had cooling added and is where the draught beers and presumably the empties are kept. There are a couple of chilled cabinets behind the bar, one with boxes of cider and the other with soft drinks and the odd wine plus tins and bottles of beers. I saw no evidence of any spirits. There is a bar with five hand pumps plus a few keg options that I didn't really take much notice of. The five beers were Mobberley 1924, Purple Moose Chocolate Moose, Great Orme Welsh Black, Conwy Kodiak and Spitting Feathers Repetitive Strain Injury. I went for the 1924 (£3.20), Chocolate Moose (£3.40), Kodiak (£3.40) and Repetitive Strain Injury (£3.60), all prices prior to discount and all in first class condition. I thought this was an excellent micropub. It's GBG 2018 listed.

The Bay Hop micro pub was a very welcome addition to the Colwyn Bay Real Ale scene with just a Wetherspoons and one other pub selling cask beer in the immediate central area. Four to five ales are usually on sale, with a mix of local ales and those from further afield. It is also a bottle shop with many ales on view in the large glass fronted fridge behind the bar.