Huddersfield & Linthwaite

Harold Wilson outside Huddersfield station

The group of CAMRA members from the South had split on Thursday 19 January with the majority on a visit to York, Knaresborough and Harrogate led by Tony Lea. 

Tim Thomas joined the smaller group of five on the 10.47 Transpennine Express slow service to Huddersfield from platform 13B of Leeds station.

On a cold day with blue skies, Huddersfield station forecourt, was frostier than on Tuesday's visit when it had been our first stop on the Transpennine Real Ale Trail.

Tim arranged to meet the group at the Sportsman later and headed to Huddersfield Library and Art Gallery while the others first revisited the King's Head. 

The Art Gallery with its permanent collection of 700 paintings was closed but a temporary exhibition space in the building opposite showed an impressive collection of artworks for 'Entwined' (plants in contemporary painting) and by Richard Baker, making a visit worthwhile.

It was noted that the Samuel Smith's pub - The Commercial Hotel - was closed with curtains drawn.

The Cherry Tree (Wetherspoon), near the station, was open but not visited on this occasion.

The Sportsman

There are two entrances to the Sportsman, one at the corner and one with a Bass barrel above the door.

At the corner entrance the floor has an Art Deco design and there is an inner door leading to the main bar.

Inside, the bar is in a corner position with a curved front topped with ten handpumps offering eight cask ales including a porter and a stout from Thornbridge Brewery. 

Standing at the bar you can see through to another room and in the other direction a stove in the fireplace and many CAMRA award certificates including Huddersfield CAMRA Pub of the Year 2011, 2012 & 2013.

Phil Wildsmith, Graham Porter, John Yeates and Denis Rahilly at the Sportsman

Tim found the group in a room to the left of the side entrance with another fireplace, two solid looking long tables and framed architectural plans on the wall.

A visit to the Gents on a quiet day provided the opportunity to photograph the colourful thematic tile panels without any embarrassment!

The Sportsman is listed in CAMRA's inventory of historic pub interiors.

Tim's beer choices in his new favourite Huddersfield pub: Brew York - X-Panda (£4 pint) and North Riding Brewery - Mosaic Pale (£2 half pint) which was full of flavour. An interesting selection of mellow music was played. 

The original plan had been to visit other pubs in Huddersfield but with several not opening until 4pm we decided instead to catch a bus to Slaithwaite and visit The Commercial, a pub on the Transpennine Real Ale trail and near Slaithwaite station. This required a careful walk on icy pavements back towards Huddersfield station, passing the statue of Harold Wilson, and then up St Georges Street to approach the bus station entrance. 

view towards Slaithwaite from 181 bus at Manchester Road, Linthwaite

After a frustrating wait for a driver, the 181 bus to Wilberlee pulled up to platform M. On the edge of town, the inexperienced driver exclaimed 'Where am I going' after taking a wrong turn to pass the Rat and Ratchet requiring a further delay before returning to the route via Manchester Road (A62). The passenger who had got up and walked forward to offer advice was loudly instructed to 'Sit down'.

A few miles before our destination on the 'high route' to Slaithwaite, Tim spotted a Linthwaite sign and remembered this as the location of the famed Sair Inn.

view from Slaithwaite bus stop with Huddersfield Narrow Canal

After our visit to The Commercial in Slaithwaite, described at the end of the Transpennine Real Ale Trail post, Tim caught a 181 bus back to Linthwaite church while the others walked to the Shoulder of Mutton and Hideaway Craft House in Slaithwaite. The Grove, near Huddersfield bus station, would be our rendezvous.

The Sair Inn

Tommy Lane, Linthwaite

Tim had been warned that the steep road to the Sair Inn might be too icy for safety but in fact Tommy Lane had been gritted and only a short stretch was still icy.

Now glad that he had ignored the warning, this would be Tim's first visit to the famed Sair Inn.

Inside, there was still an array of handpumps with many of the Linfit Brewery beers brewed in an outhouse of the pub. However, as there was a Sair Inn Facebook post on 7 December 2022 about the 'hopefully temporary' brewery closure of Linfit Brewery, these handpumps will be serving beers from other breweries in future.

The decoration includes an historic CAMRA mirror and there are unusual wall lamp fittings.

Tim sat at the bar end of the main room with a coal fire and a photo of the 'Late but very great' Ron Crabtree, the 'pioneer' of Linfit brewery, on the wall. The occupant of the next table, facing the fire, sat quietly there until his pint and a packet of crisps were finished before leaving.

While the pub wasn't busy the opportunity was taken to photograph other areas of the pub. The grandfather clock in the darts room is also seen reflected in the mirror above the fireplace. John Lennon and Jimi Hendrix are on the wall to the right of the clock and a local connection is that Jimi is also featured in the pub sign for the King's Head at Huddersfield station.

The Sair Inn has won many CAMRA awards over the years including National Pub of the Year 1997.

Arriving at 4pm and leaving after 5pm in mid January and sitting in a north-west facing room in an elevated position provided a nice sequence of changing views as the sun went down.

The sound quality from the jukebox system was noticeably better than music heard in most pubs. It may have been on free play but to hear 5 songs played for £1 still seemed good value. After some page turning, the tracks selected included some favourite classics: Deacon Blue - Dignity; Tom Petty - American Girl; Van Morrison - Brown Eyed Girl; Kinks - Autumn Almanac; James Taylor - Sweet Baby James and Beautiful South - A Little Time.

The Sair Inn joins Tim's list of favourite pubs that more than repay the effort to visit them. In his own local area, The Bell Inn, Aldworth is another of these favourites which benefits from a microbrewery run by the son of the landlord in an outhouse - Aldworth Brewing Company. The Bell Inn is also a past CAMRA National Pub of the Year winner.

Tim's beer choices: (after recommendation from the bar as a popular choice) Linfit Brewery - Gold Medal (£3.50 pint) & Linfit Brewery - Citra (£1.65 half pint).

Before catching the (late) 181 bus for Huddersfield, Tim stopped to take a photo of the north west evening sky which shows faintly the red lights on the twin 158 metre high steel towers of Moorside Edge transmitting station at Pole Moor, north of Slaithwaite, which are used for medium wave broadcasts of BBC Radio 5 Live (909 kHz). 

Due to a traffic accident closing the road at nearby Cowlersley, the 181 bus was significantly delayed while an alternative route was authorised.

The Grove

It would not be until 6.30pm when Tim finally spotted the illuminated green signs for The Grove, when passing the older (1848) of the two circular brick ventilation shafts for Springwood Tunnel. The parallel railway tunnels run south west from Huddersfield railway station, almost directly underneath the Grove.

There are a total of 20 handpumps on two counters of the central bar which serves the two rooms closest to the corner entrance to the pub. However, not all were in use as 'only 11' cask ales were listed on the boards!

Tim rejoined the group in a room towards the back of the pub with luxurious seating and adjacent historic gig posters on a white wall. Otherwise the decoration is as quirky as in other areas with the animal theme extending to skulls, antlers and skins as well as a padlocked cupboard of taxidermy. This decor and the bright green walls in other areas may not appeal to everyone but makes the Grove unique and memorable.

A low table has CAMRA magazines next to shelves with board games and the range was expanded with the addition of some recent Ullage magazines from West Berkshire.

There have certainly been a lot of changes at The Grove since Tim's previous visit. Tim's Huddersfield, Batley and Leeds visit post includes photos of The Grove, The Sportsman and the King's Head in January 2013.

Tim's beer choice (recommended by the group): Vocation Brewery - Naughty & Nice Coconut Milk & Chocolate Stout (£2.35 half pint).

John and Phil discussed a possible visit to their favourite Indian restaurant near Huddersfield station -  Lala's but when a check was made to find details of trains back to Leeds it revealed that many Transpennine Express trains had been cancelled and to avoid being stranded in Huddersfield later, it was decided to catch a stopping train back to Leeds originating from Huddersfield that would not be overcrowded in these circumstances, arriving back in Leeds about 9pm.

John and Phil went for an Indian meal to newly opened Delhi Wala, in a railway arch on Bishopsgate Street, just outside the station and a stone's throw from the Head of Steam at the foot of Mill Hill. Tim and Denis went to Beckett's Bank in Park Row, a short walk from the north exit from Leeds station. Unfortunately, somehow we had lost Graham en route.