1014989 Isabelles

I had to check my own map to remember what this place was even called, due to the repetitive naming convention of Press Up venues. Paddy McKillen Jr may have misplaced his 'little book of girl's names' recently, based on some of the more recent venues, but the naming regime was so strict I forgot which premises I was in.

A fairly standard Press Up premises, food driven, laid out like a restaurant but with a full pub licence and I don't think they'll turn away drinkers when its quiet. This was the first time the food actually met what the menu was promising (well, the embedded Wowburger branches in some also do this consistently) though, with well executed, restaurant style pizza.

Blue dot surrounded by green on my personal done/not done map changed over, reason to go here again dealt with. But as I'd tried to get in here twice before, to find it too busy, I don't think they need my trade!

N2211 Wrights Cafe Bar

I had never been here before, as they didn't let me - the one single time I ever tried. Which was after a 2006 Christmas party in the then pre-Wetherspoon'ing Old Borough across the road

In one of those cases where a bouncer might have just been trying to engage me in conversation to see if I was sober enough, a "have you had a few already?" question was enough for me to decide to bail back home, to where my local had much lower standards for regulars.

There were no bouncers on when I arrived this time, and with all of two pints taken I don't think I'd have had much trouble getting in anyway. 

Much to my surprise, they had arranged for me to experience that lost taste of 2006 inside, or at least of some year much in the past - two pints including an often 7.50+ Lagunitas came to 'only' 12.20, every track played was from the early 2000s and it was obvious from the stool and huge rolls of blue tissue in the toilets that they either still had, or pined for the days of having, a toilet attendant. 

The decor is a little dated, but in perfect condition; almost as if it's actually new and I *am* in 2006. I rapidly checked to see if my smartphone had similarly regressed or if my hair had re-dyed itself blond; but neither had happened. So no, I was still in 2022 - and a check of the prices for food would have confirmed this. Also I suspect that Lagunitas was not easily, if at all, available here on draught prior to Heineken investing in the 2010s

Coincidentally, the bus that turned up to bring us back to the city was also from 2006 - a rare enough sight now, with few buses of that age left in service. 

Revisited pubs - August 2022

August '22 provided many more new ticks than revisits:

N0082 McGraths - bus arriving just after a train had left, and a 29 minute wait

S3908 The Well - last visited as Dandelion, albeit I did once have to run an ISDN line from the shopping centre basement on the floor here when it was derelict.

N0302 The Arch

One of the few pubs I had left to do in Swords, this one evaded me on a previous mop-up visit as it had recently closed. This was when it was still called The Star, more of which later.

There were slightly more bouncers outside the pub than I'd normally be happy with at 6pm on a Friday, but they weren't doing anything in particular, nor did I see a reason to have them there yet - I'd guess they were just starting their shift. 

In its prior life as The Star, there was quite a varied audience here - a page on a local website mentions the extensive pool lounge, a (by then finished) Russian club and trad music nights; with a fairly traditional suburban bar and lounge.

The pub has been mildly modernised and is now quite food focused, but the front bar area is still designed for drinking first, and while you can get food here, nobody was being offered it first thing. I would think its still entirely normal to go in here for pints and never look at the menu, but as we were going there for dinner, we did.

One of the options on the menu is the "Star of the Arch" burger, which must surely be a reference to the pubs long standing but now former name?

The food met expectations and was priced at about what you'd expect these days - shockingly expensive in my mind that fondly remembers pubs having €10 burger-and-a-pint deals, but really not bad in the year it actually is.

September 2022 licence update

Two new licences this month - or is it three?

New (normal pub licences)

1018497 Six by Nico, Molesworth Street - restaurant with a pub licence

1019273 Big Mikes, Blackrock Shopping Centre - not yet open restaurant with a pub licence

New (taproom)

1016525 Stillgarden Distillery - the first Producers On licence to appear in Dublin. I'm going to list these categories, as they meet the duck test - at least during the limited operating hours.

N1597 Peacocks

When life gives you a conveniently early bus, make for the pub. Or something like that.

I was heading to Swords village to knock off two pubs that I hadn't done either when I worked there, in the distant past, or on previous ticking trips. But a 41C that didn't exist on RTPI arrived and gave me some extra time until company was arriving, and passed through River Valley anyway, so The Peacock got visited on the way. Swords Express's cheap local journey fare ensured I still made it to the next pub as expected.

A substantial suburban pub, this premises was not old (a 1988 build, originally and unimaginatively called The Millennium) when fully rebuilt in 2008; but that building had not aged well - being a red brick, flat roofed bunker of an estate pub that lacked any form of kerb appeal. 

The new building is really quite large - but has windows, a second floor, and something approaching a pitched roof; so all three of the potential 'don't drink in a pub with...' options are cut off. There's the usual bar and lounge, with a restaurant area; but also the now increasingly rare function room, in-pub off-licence; and also a coffee shop.

A reasonably priced pint was sinked relatively quickly, due to said need to actually get in to Swords village; but with the bus stop right outside, I could probably have taken some more time with it.

N1130 Foxhunter

One of the back-from-the-dead pubs, that Press Up seem to be doing a lot of now (this being their fourth in Dublin alone). 

I spent a lot of money here as a teenager, but not in a manner that qualifies it for an automatic tick - I (briefly) went to school in the nearby CBS and had friends living nearby, with this hosting a reasonable off-licence at the time. The licence number is even the same as it would have been back then - there's no case of this being a new licence on an old premises. But I never drank *on* the premises back then.

Sold for 17m in 2008 (long after I'd stopped going there!), it then rapidly ceased to be successful and closed in 2012 and was eventually sold to Press Up in ~2019. Lockdown affected reopening, and for quite some time the pubs extensive carpark was used to offer Wowburger and Elephant & Castle service from temporary buildings while building work continued slowly on the pub. 

And those brands are now still the main offering here, with the drinking specific sections of the pub being a little limited in comparison, and offering just the now normal Heineken Ireland monoculture of taps; at premium prices.

Meh. Its fairly nice looking inside, like most Press Up properties; but for once quite unappealing from outside - a massive wall blocking it from the road, presumably to make outdoor drinking/dining less obnoxiously noisy. It's expensive, it's limited, it's out of the way on foot for most of the town. It'll probably still do fine.

S0168 The Yacht

An oddly shaped pub (it looks quite small from the street, and while it isn't *big*, there is an area to the side that is behind another shop), this reminded me of some other seaside pubs in scale - The Glen Hotel's bar back on Arranmore (just this is in much better condition than that is), or the bar area of DG0500 Joe Mays for instance.

When knocking together the framework of these posts, I managed to just create the actual post entry for this pub - and not put any details in it. So my memory is now a little faded by time, so I may have imagined that there was a mini-library in the bar - a bookshelf of locally relevant books - but that'd be a rather odd thing to imagine.

A nice small pub, all told, and another case of why I should have crossed the river from my old job more often.