Husk Beer Emporium opens

A new beer shop/bar has opened at 18A Kings Road in Harrogate. Apart from a large, and diverse, selection of bottled and canned beers for sale, Husk Beer Emporium also have a cask line installed. Their launch night on 10 August featured a cask of Northern Monk Eternal. They are open 6 days a week (hours vary). See their Facebook page for details.

Pub of the Year

Our branch award for 'Pub of the Year 2018-2019' has gone to The One Eyed Rat in Ripon.

Photo shows pub licensee and manager Dave Hamby (centre) receiving the award from former rugby International star Peter Squires (right) who was born and raised in Ripon, and our branch chairman Alan Pounder. The presentation took place on Monday 15th July. The pub has appeared in the Good Beer Guide for 29 consecutive years (so far).

Most Improved Pub of the Year

Our branch award for 'Most improved pub of the year 2018-2019' has gone to The Tap on Tower Street in Harrogate.

Photo shows branch chairman Alan Pounder presenting the award to pub manager Kayleigh Ann Thompson. The presentation took place on Monday 8th July. Well done to Kayleigh and her team!

The Harrogate and Ripon branch has 180 real ale establishments in its area which stretches from Pool and Otley in the south to Thornton Watlass in the north, Middlesmoor and Lofthouse in deepest Nidderdale in the west to the outskirts of York in the east.

Over half of those pubs and clubs are in the towns of Harrogate (50), Knaresborough (20), the city of Ripon (12), and Boroughbridge (9) whilst Masham has seven and Pateley Bridge just four.

Over 100 surveys have been undertaken in the last six months and their details updated on WhatPub. However that still leaves a lot of pubs which have either never been surveyed or where the survey needs updating. Many of these are in the more remote places only occasionally visited by our members.

If you find yourself out in the Dales this summer visiting the pubs in our area please take a moment to log into WhatPub and check the details online, specifically the 'Last surveyed on' date at the bottom of the page (ignore the 'Updated on' date, this can have a recent date following batch updates etc.). If the last survey is over a year old, or absent altogether (never surveyed), then please do your bit by going to 'Submit Updates' and submitting an update for the pub.  (Alternatively you can download and complete a survey form).

Ask the publican what are the regular beers and how many changing beers (with examples), and check that the opening hours of the pub and food hours are correct? Is it fully disabled friendly (including lavatory), dog friendly, child friendly, does it have wi-fi etc.? Importantly we also need to know whether or not a pub uses Autovac. Maybe you're reading this and you are a publican, in which case please check the details of your own pub and submit an update if anything at all is incorrect or missing.

Tip: If you use the desktop version of WhatPub instead of the mobile version, you will be prompted for most of the items to check.

Below is a map taken from WhatPub showing the north of our area where majority of the pubs outside of the main towns need surveying (P=Pub, C=Club, R=Restaurant). Below the map is a list of the pubs which we are targeting for surveys. Please help if you can by visiting any of these pubs this summer and carrying out a survey, and together let's get the remaining pubs surveyed and updated.

Also, importantly, if you think any pub is worthy of consideration for the Good Beer Guide next year, don't forget to submit beer scores too.

Thank you everyone in anticipation of your help.

You can download a survey form below. It's available in PDF or Microsoft Word format.