Archive for the 'Outside Ireland' Category

Our next stop on our honeymoon was Sydney. It is a fantastic city with so much to do and see. We had only four days here and that is certainly not enough to see and do even the main attractions. We stayed at the impressive Grace hotel that is steeped in history. It is very centrally located and the hotel pub is PJ O Briens. It is on King street. It is a big pub with an upstairs area available. The pub grub there is very good value and you get very generous portions. There are plenty of seating areas available and they were needed as the pub was very busy on the occasions that we headed in. The bar staff were generally efficient and friendly except one guy who found serving people a chore, or so it seemed. The drinks i tried in this pub were a pint of Guinness which wasn’t great, Stella Artois and Carlton beer. There appeared to be a lot of people heading here after work. There is plenty memorabilia on the walls for you to check out here. There are two entrances, one from the hotel and one from the street.

The toilets were a good size, in very good condition and had two cubicles available for use. They were located up stairs. It is a good pub to watch a match in. It was a very good overall experience visiting this pub and i would highly recommend it if in Sydney.

Toilet rating: 7.5/10
Pint rating: Varied but a good 7/10
Overall rating: 7.5/10

Final comment: PJ O Briens is a good city hotel bar.

This is a pub that was just across the road from our hotel on Exhibition/Bourke Street in Melbourne. It is a traditional English pub that is a hub of activity, especially at the weekends. There is seating available outside and heaters are on hand to keep you cosy while you sip your beer. It is a pub with loads of character. They show all the major sporting events which included the rugby world cup that was on when we were there. I was drinking pints of Erdinger and they were all fine. Jen was drinking white wine and she didn’t appear to have any complaints. There are some nice seating areas availabe and they serve very decent food from what we saw.

The toilets that we used were up stairs and were very clean and well kept. There is also another bar available upstairs but it was closed when we visited. All in all a very enjoyable pub to visit while in Melbourne. I noticed memorabilia around the pub including some Beatles pictures. The Elephant and Wheelbarrow is a good old fashioned English pub for the Australians and visitors to enjoy.

Toilet rating: 7/10
Pint rating: 7.5/10
Overall rating: 7.5/10

Final comment: Apparently they have a ‘Neighbours’ night on the first Monday of every month where you can meet some of the cast and hear Karl Kennedys band. Wahay!

Next on our Honeymoon we headed to the beautiful city of Melbourne. It is most certainly a place i could settle down and live in. We stayed at the rydges hotel which was nice and we were very central to all bars and restaurants in the city. I love singing and will as Ryan has said always find a karaoke bar where ever i go. We passed a sign that said Hollywood karaoke and that evening we decided to check it out. It is located up and stairs. When we got up we were charged 10 dollars each to sing a song and a drink was included in that aswell. This was possibly the weirdest pub i have ever been into. The guys running the pub were Chinese and there was about 5 other Australians inside. We both ordered a bottle of Budweiser and they brought us two whiskeys! We got some stares from the 5 others inside. They were most certainly off their heads on something. They didn’t make us feel welcome but we looked throught the song lists any way. We probably should have left when we got inside this pub but it was an experience!

The toilets were smaall and not very well kept. There was about two or three pages of English songs, the other 100 were Chinese. I sang a terrible song and we made a quick exit. You really would have had to have been there to understand how shocking this pub really was. I enjoyed the experience but i would definately not recommend anyone to visit here if in Melbourne.

Toilet rating: 3/10
Drink rating: 4/10
Overall rating: 4/10

Fianl Comment: I think i can truly say that this was the worst pub i have ever been into. Not because of the decor or the toilets but because everything was so weird about it.

When traveling, be it across the town, country or to a different country, Eoin will always be instinctively drawn to a karaoke bar. The trip to Liverpool for his stag weekend was no different, albeit except for this time having 11 fellas in tow. Jupiters is near the town hall (if I remember correctly), off a busy street down a suspiciously dimly lit alleyway. It seems to be behind and / or next to a couple more bars that were somewhat deserted when the 12 of us made our way to do some singing.

From the outset, Jupiters seemed a little on the ‘in need of TLC’ side of the spectrum. It is, for want of a more eloquent phrase, in need of sprucing up a bit. Nevertheless, we all crowded in amid various stares from the crowd already in there and found a spot next to the pool table big enough to accommodate our group. The bar staff were pleasant, very inquisitive as to exactly what kind of liquid was spilled on the pool table at one stage, but hugely pleasant.

Jupiters is more of a specialty bar than anything else. It caters for two specific types of people in todays modern society. Those that like karaoke, and those that chose the path of homosexuality. It was certainly a new experience; Perhaps the first and only ever gay karaoke bar I’d ever been in. At first the thought lingered somewhat, but it was eventually ‘rammed home’ that it was a gay karaoke bar two gentlemen positioned themselves at the corner of the pool area (that is, the area with the pool table) and proceeded to pay very close attention to a few members of our party that were engaged in a pool mini-tournament.

The owner of the bar, who made great strides to assure us of her heterosexuality for some reason, was a very pleasant woman whose patience it seemed has no boundaries. She gave us free disposable cameras and free condoms, both of which were in abundant supply in the pub. Best not to ask too many questions about that one I’d say…

Eoin, master of the faux pas, then went on to perform a stirring rendition of “Piano Man” with a silver foil wrapped packet of condoms peeking out from the top of his shirt pocket. It seemed to scream “Come get me”. The crowd applauded. Somewhere, in the corner of the room, 11 men were doubled over in pain from laughing. All the while it seemed he was blissfully unaware of the orientation of much of the clientèle. Lucky for him he’s not pretty.

Numerous fantastic photos and a few pints of John Smiths later, we said our goodbyes to the barmaids and were on our way. Jupiters was surely a fun place to visit but I don’t think I’ll be back anytime soon. One reason would be I don’t sing karaoke. Another would be I’m not in Liverpool. It could do with a lick of paint and maybe a contract cleaner for the pool table, but other than that, it’s fine. Not everyone’s cup of tea but a friendly place to croon along badly to some songs.

Finally, and something I’ll possibly never understand, is the group of lads that came in to play pool after we had finished with the table. The three of them began a game and midway through it one turned around to someone in our group and said “Ere mate, I ‘ope you’re not lookin’ at our aaaarses”. Now if you’re a homophobe, why ever would you play pool in a gay bar? The only table in Liverpool? I very much doubt it. So far back in the closet they’re in Narnia I reckon.

We visited this pub in Concert square in Liverpool on both nights of the stag weekend. Fos brought us all to concert square and it was buzzing with activity. There is a big seating area with bars surrounding it. We opted to head into this pub and to be fair everyone enjoyed the place. It is a pub set on two levels. It was very busy on both nights that we were there. People were drinking all sorts of concotions from jugs of ‘sex on the beach’ to pints of everything. I was intrigued by the how high the ceiling was in this place after a few drinks! The drinks were expensive but on a par with the cost of drinks in Ireland.

We managed to get very comfortable seats on the first night and there was loads of space for us to dance (fall) about. The toilets are up stairs and quite big and well maintained. There was an attendant there for the whole night and he had loads of deodarants and after shaves available if you so took the fancy. He charged for these of course. I know they do food although we didn’t sample any. The dj wouldn’t take any requests which i was disappointed with. We met some very nice people in this pub and if i was in Liverpool again i would most likely head back.

Toilet rating: 7/10
Drink rating: 7/10
Overall rating: 7/10

Final comment: The Walkabout provided us with the venue for two enjoyable nights.