retiredmartin
retiredmartin
Martin
Retired NHS, doing long walks around UK and the world to record the great bits. Focused on Good Beer Guide pubs and live music.
Latest Posts
March 2026. Cologne. Our lads had headed down to the banks of the Rhine on our last afternoon in Cologne, and while joining them for a Kolsch at Martinswinkel (stop it) seemed appealing, those familiar outside seats at Pfaffen looking on...
Yes, it’s edited March 2026. The Belgisches Viertel. Cologne. Our last day in Cologne, a day carrying our luggage around, but that’s OK because I follow Mrs RM’s packing guidance. I should stop promoting her blog; she’s getting a...
No, the bloke with the sword waver isn’t a famous American real ale drinker you might know. March 2026. Cologne. Germany. You left me and our lads in Kupferhut in the Cologne suburb of Mülheim, finishing our second Gaffel and deciding...
March 2026. Mulheim. Cologne. Our last night of three in Cologne, time for a gig out in the slightly edgier suburb of Mülheim, the only place we’d see much “diversity” (most of it in Turkish kebab shops). Seven minutes on the train, 25...
March 2026. Cologne. Germany. Back from Bonn on our last night with the lads in Germany, with a BIG indie gig (not Nicole) to come in Cologne. Indie gigs don’t start till late, so no rush; I walked Mrs RM back to our ring-road hotel and...
March 2026. Bonn. Germany. More highlights from our half day in Bonn, which seems to have stolen the Pied Piper from Hamelin for its pedestrian crossing. Apart from schnitzel and a beer, the essential activity in Bonn is a visit to Haus...
March 2026. Bonn. Germany. You can’t really claim to have visited a German city till you’ve bought a pastry in Rewe, misunderstood the local transport system, and checked in a beer on Untappd. At Brauhaus Bonnsch you go for the cloudy...
March 2026. Bonn. Germany. 3 nights in Cologne, 1 new city (Wuppertal), 3 revisits. The only memory I had of former West German capital Bonn, 11 years ago on a post-exam (his, not mine) trip was a long closed kneipe, and the Haribo shop....
March 2026. Cologne. Germany. With mild alarm I realised that our two lads had actually been to nearly all the Old Town pubs, having arrived a day earlier and stayed out after Monday’s Proper Kolsch Day Out. Never seen them drunk. They...
March 2026. Cologne. Germany. Back in Cologne from Dusseldorf, an early night we admired the Dom, then persuaded Mrs RM that despite our exertions, another tick in the 2006 German Beer Guide was required. Perhaps it’s the name, but I’d...
March 2026. Dusseldorf. Germany. You can’t come to Dusseldorf and just do one Braurei, even if that one is Uerige. I’d made a list, I was checking it twice. But I already knew I had to pop in Schlussel on the Bolkerstraße, one of the...
March 2026. Dusseldorf. Germany. I realise some of you have never been to Uerige, one of my Top 5 pubs in the world*. So I may struggle to explain the appeal of standing at an outside bench by the Rhine, drinking endless 0,25l measures...
March 2026. Dusseldorf. Germany. Day 2 of our German mini-break (ugh); time to leave Wuppertal‘s anarchism, and head to the teutonic order of Dusseldorf, where the boys would no doubt have enjoyed a cultural afternoon. The DBahn website...
March 2026. Wuppertal. Germany. We’re following the self-guided tour map for Elberfeld, centre of the nascent tourist trade for Wuppertal. I guess you’ll be wanting to see a pub. Sadly there isn’t a pub guide for Wuppertal, perhaps Mrs...
March 2026. Wuppertal. Germany. And as you’ll know I have a very precise definition of my “top 100s“. But certainly this suspended monorail in the industrial Ruhr would be in there. Wuppertal, then, “founded in 1929 by the merger of...