A Premier Inn where I can see the damn bar from the window, something I'm not so blessed with at the Georges Street one, which is why I've still not visited it.
A very limited number of taps, an English barman who 'corrected' me to Smith-wicks, and I also suspect I might have been asked if I was a hotel guest if I wasn't wearing an expensive pile of Louis Copeland's finest (after an interview); but it's done now and I don't have to go back. And they did specifically get a public licence, so...
I'm actually surprised I've not been back here since I started doing the revisited lists in 2019 - everywhere I have been back to is written up already, cause I did a sweep of that before.
Not sure what there is to say here. Avoid the front seats at a comedy gig unless you're up for being part of the show, I guess.
The history here may be more interesting than the current, in a few different ways.
Mainly, the name - O'Connors is a perfectly fine name for a pub. "Oil Can Harrys" is not. I'm not sure where the name came from, but I believe it held that name for two decades under the O'Connors ownership before they decided to put their own name above the door instead. Everyone wants to drink in a pub named after an evil cat, I'm sure. (Seriously, I have no idea if this is what the name refers to, but it is the only obvious option)
Prior to that, it had the inexplicable-unless-explained name of "Peppers", a reference to the Pepper Canister Church nearby; but a really bad reference - cause its not obvious. This was, somehow, the winner of a competition in the Evening Herald to rename the pub!
Separately, I've a note saying it was damaged by the UDA in 1976 but now cannot find any reference to this. There was a significant UDA campaign in Dublin in 1976, primarily incendiary devices but also a bomb at the Shelbourne Hotel, and this makes finding stuff even harder. I need better notes.
Anyway, this is a nice enough pub I've just never really had any reason to go in to before now - its a little away from other pubs, so never neatly slotted in alongside others when going out specifically on trips; and isn't near anything I'd normally be doing.
Is there much point giving you a writeup of my visits to the pool-hall-with-pints element of the old Camden Deluxe/Planet Murphys/etc setup here when every single element of it has changed, and its now a brewpub?
Probably not. I mean, last time I was in the Jimmy Rabbittes bar section of this place, it was half a hotel lobby, half a Belgian frites restaurant
But, it has been ticked regardless of what happened since.
I don't particularly like having to "find" the bar in a hotel, for instance when it isn't clearly in one of the front parts and visible from the road; and I'd cased out the Mespil to see if I could see its bar on at least two occasions before.
I never could, but with some Dutch - well, Irish, Canadian and wherever else I'd had half pints from at the RDS beer festival that afternoon - Courage in me, I just walked in and looked for it.
And found it relatively easily, as its basically just straight back from the front door, albeit well in to the hotel
Its quite a fancy hotel bar, but nothing incredibly special. I doubt many people ever go here just to drink, what with the Baggot Street and Haddington Road pubs nearby, but you *could*.
This is the stadium licence for the RDS, which may apply to other events here with alcohol sales... or may not. Its rather hard to tell.
Without getting in to the weeds of event licences, and potentially getting something very wrong; event bars at otherwise unlicenced premises get covered by a temporary extension on the pub licence of another licence holder in good standing.
The main players in this game are the Madigan Group, who have a number of pubs around Dublin; and are certainly involved in the running of bars at some events here - you'll see them on your card statements from the Beer Festival, for instance. Guinness used to do this also, but sold out of the business a long time ago.
National Sporting Arena licences on the other hand are a 'new' (2003) class of licence for major sporting arenas - GAA, rugby, football and boxing stadia have these but the Minister can decide on other types if they want to.
So what events have I been to in the RDS that were definitely on the RDS stadium licence? I suspect beer festivals are not; and are using a Madigan extension. But what about gigs?
They're held in the actual stadium bowl, most of the time - indoor ones are not - but are not sporting occasions. However, the legislation refers to events "whether of a sporting or non-sporting nature" that "involves the use of some or all of the playing area or pitch in the arena" - so Linkin Park on the pitch probably *did* use the licence.
The licence also covers "functions", defined as " a conference, exhibition, seminar or reception which is held at a designated national sporting arena but does not involve the use of the playing area or pitch". Does this cover the beer festivals? Almost certainly not, they're not in the stadium bit of the RDS. Can't see it covering a Simmonscourt gig either.
I'd drunk at a match here anyway, as well as some gigs on the pitch; so I'm sure I'm covered. But I'm also sure I shouldn't have put this on September's revisit list.
I've taken a few goes to tick off the Baggot Street area pubs, and yet somehow forgot that this hotel bar should have been considered as one of those - particularly as it has a reputation as a "rugby pub" despite not being a standalone pub.
Accessed directly from the carpark at the front of the hotel, the bar fills the not-very-underground basement level of the two townhouses that the hotel is formed from; and manages to feel a little bit more like a "normal" pub than a hotel bar, extensively due to never interacting with the hotel facilities. This is the case with most of the city centre hotel bars that people do not consider (or realise) to be hotel bars; and is why I do count hotel bars for ticking purposes.
By finally visiting the Lansdowne, I finish off the mini-chain of pubs owned by Mick Quinn, and formerly also his brother Frank - the others being Toners, The 51 and The Waterloo
Bit late remembering to do this one this month; but its all the same ones as usual, with one old regular reappearing, and one maybe new regular popping up:
1015462 Rubys, Point Village - back in the area ticking somewhere else that didn't have quite as appealing food, writeup to come.
N0002 Brew Dock, Amiens Street - on the way back to the train
N0083 McGraths, Drumcondra - beside the train station (different station)
N0063 Cumiskeys, Dominick Street - its on the Luas line back to my train (another different station)
S0077 Nearys, Chatham Street - my meeting that was moved from The Well closing is now trying here as its new location
S4236 RDS, Merrion Road - or was I? Considering the Dublin Beer Festival setup is run by Madigans from the bar/payment side of things, I think it may actually be an temporary event extension of one of their pub licences and not a use of the stadium licence... RetroReview writeup of the stadium is to come
N0084 The Black Sheep - I needed food after the awful new pub I'd ticked just before this, writeup to come soon
N0097 Underdog - well, it'd be rude not to when it's right there - I really need to do a new writeup here as the Beerhouse one is 8 years old!
This was the closest unvisited pin to work for ages, just because the opportunity never arose - but with a few hours to kill in North County Dublin, I popped in here for dinner.
Which wasn't great. Service was extremely polite but a tad under-trained/under-experienced too, so an upgrade is needed all around.
There aren't a lot of pubs in this area, and the hotel does advertise the bar to visitors; so I expect it does get a bit of trade from that; as well as from the hotel itself and its neighbouring Holiday Inn Express that I suspect doesn't have its own bar.
I once had to drag an English stag party I was meeting up with - I knew one of the group and was asked to basically be their tour guide - out of here, and make them get rid of their Carrolls purchased leprechaun wigs.
I'm not sure if that's the entire clientele here, but on the other visit (where I actually drank something, hence ticked), there was plenty of those too; and that was on a winter weeknight rather than a late summer weekend. They do specifically advertise for hen and stag parties, something many other premises balk at.
For the domestic customer, there's an sports focus here, with the "Buskers On The Ball" secondary branding specifically covering this part of the pub.
Just before going in here, I was told on Twitter that it has a local nickname - The Widows - and that under no circumstances am I to accidentally say it to any of the members of staff.
There was one member of staff who did seem a bit frosty (the titular Widow perhaps) but otherwise, all fine and I didn't let my tongue slip.
A 60s pub, possibly the first in the village - outer areas of Dublin are very hard to trace the pub history of, so I wouldn't be surprised if there had been other pubs that have since closed - O'Dwyers has been recently renovated and has a very large restaurant area alongside the main bar areas.
I had dinner here, and due to what I found out was an error rather than a food choice, was served a gravy boat of actual gravy with my burger and chips. And extremely good gravy it was too - presumably made with the juices from the carvery joints - but it was meant to be pepper sauce. I'm not sure if I'd have preferred it to have been a bold new frontier in taste.
I managed to leave a hoody behind here, one I wore a lot, but which was very much starting to show its age. Not worth going back for it, considering Portmarnock is actually a bit of a pain to get to; I've bought its replacement now - so for the next three years or so my pints ticking hoody will be light grey, not black-increasingly-fading-to-dark grey.
I've been here quite a few times, all over eight years ago and significantly before its big refit; so I can't tell you what it's like now at all. And I can barely remember much of what it was.
This was a semi-common going away party location in a previous job, one where the company would pay for an absolutely heap of drinks - the CEO, at my own one, pointed out that he did find this rather odd; which certainly won't have helped.
I also went to one of a number of the modern equivalents of "american wakes" that I had to attend from ~2008-14 here; that one for Australia. The couple in question are now back in Ireland, and owning a house by huge assistance of WFH allowing them to get away from Dublin; but unfortunately there's still a few friends that went to Australia or Canada back then that have not, and may not return... but anyway.
This is quite a big pub, although people sometimes seem to think its even bigger than it is. It was one of the first modern "superpubs" in Dublin, and also the first in an occasionally identified trend of "design pubs", or other similar terms; these being premises on which a significant amount of money had been spent on the fitout and theming.
The theme here was, as you might guess from the name, Parisian; 1920s initially - I'm not sure what it's like now, as mentioned in the first paragraph. Extensive theming like this is less common on new or refurbished pubs now; but expensive fitouts are now the norm - something I'm sure lots of publicans curse these 1990s superpubs for introducing!
My one visit here was to drop in to celebrate with two friends who had just got engaged the night before.
Oddly enough when I happened to mention this recently, on their 8th wedding anniversary (the visit was that long ago); they had no memory of it. Possibly a tad too much bubbly was had by all!
Close to nothing of interest in this months Revenue list itself:
Renumberings:
1021414 - Blue Bar, Skerries - formerly DG1127 (always a pity to see an oddity like a Dublin-located but Drogheda licence court number get replaced by the new system!)
However, this is the October list, so it's time to process the year-on-year changes, edit my spreadsheets - and suffer the hit in completion rate this always brings, as places I've visited drop off the register after closure. Some come back, of course.
Prior to the annual trim, my register was 1021 premises - 812 visited, 46 marked as some form of impossible and the rest pending a visit. Impossible means its either shut, or cannot be accessed without staying in a hotel, booking a ferry or a flight, etc.
Removed from my register due to non renewal for this year, are:
1003216 - National Library of Ireland. I believe the cafe is not current open. Not visited.
1009609 - Finnstown Castle Hotel, Lucan. Closed. Not visited.
1019163 - Twin Oaks, Castleknock. Closed in May. Visited.
N0029 - Goya Lounge (former Strand House), North Strand. Not visited.
N0062 - T O'Brennans, Dominick Street. Closed. Visited.
N1638 - Cardiff Inn, Finglas. Closed. Not visited.
S0178 - Kielys of Donnybrook. Demolished. Not visited
S0252 - Lamb Doyles, Sandyford. Closed. Not visited.
S0285 - Ramblers Rest, Ballybrack. Closed. Not visited.
S0836 - Hampton Hotel, Morehampton Road. Closed. Visited.
S1526 - Rosie O'Gradys, Harolds Cross. Demolished. Not visited.
S2410 - Furry Bog, Whitechurch. Closed. Not visited.
In addition, sometimes I ignore a pub being missing in the end of year list as I know, or assume, its still open. But checking against two years lists sometimes makes a quiet closure or change of status obvious. Removals due to this are:
1015429 - former Barts/Eden, South William Street. Replacement premises (Saba) holds restaurant licence only. Visited.
N0005 - O'Sheas, Talbot Street. Has only opened on about five days since 2020, recent planning appears to remove most or all of the bar. Visited.
N0022 - Hill 16, Gardiner Street. Has actually opened as recently as a year ago, but closed and not renewed this year. Visited.
N0197 - Soup2, North King Street. May reopen as something new soon. Visited.
N0305 - The Estuary, Swords. Closed, up for sale. Not visited.
N1195 - Clifton Court Hotel, Eden Quay. Closed, up for sale. Visited.
N2354 - 12th Lock Hotel, Castleknock. Closed. Visited.
N2538 - Jack O'Neills, Tyrrellstown. Long closed, only relisted briefly to sell the licence. Not visited.
N2649 - Movies@Swords. Cinema open, website no longer mentions bar. Not visited.
S4288 - Movies@Dundrum. Cinema open, website no longer mentions bar. Not visited (well, I've seen movies here - but never drank here)
S4542 - The Globe/RíRa, Georges Street - Theatre Licence only. Still has a Publicans licence, even though the bar is currently closed for redevelopment.
I also found that 1014863 The Yacht in Clontarf was on my list twice due to multiple licence number changes; and that N1099 Biddy Mulligans, Sackville Place had not been returned to the list when it reopened.
End result - a ridiculously perfect 1000 on the register - for now! - 803 visited, 37 impossibles; 160 pending.
This bar was near impossible to get in to. Not in a "not tonight" way, but in a "does not have a street entrance" way - you really need to drive to get in here; but you can enter one of the carparks from the beach pathway that runs near the hotel, and walk in from there.
The bar is very much a normal hotel bar, and has some signs of a golf club bar as well (which it basically is) - lots and lots of zero options available on draught.
It was still a nice night, and there's a range of outdoor seating options here; so I sat out - there did seem to be very few seats available inside.
One minorly humorous occurrence here was the barman being unable to find the card reader when I ordered - I suspect a lot of people order on their room and they may not need multiple units. I had cash, though, so didn't have to leave him hunting.
I visited this premises one rebuild and two rebrand ago - when it was the Arlington Hotel (yes, there were two Arlington Hotels, owned by the same person at the time) and it still had a nightclub - Copper Alley.
But virtually nobody ever knew what the nightclub was called, and it was best known as the long term (and I believe) original home of the gay clubnight Mother; the only thing I was ever aware of ever being held there.
Since those visits - there were many - the hotel rebranded as the Parliament; then shut for a refurb and reopened as the Hard Rock Hotel, then rebranded to Nyx. It has been about 15 years, but that's quite the set of changes for one hotel.
