Glasgow Sites

There are 14 replies in this Thread which has previously been viewed 921 times. The latest Post () was by GlasgowJohn.

    Actor Sam Heughan, who plays Highland Warrior Jamie Fraser on Outlander, names some of his favorite spots in Glasgow:

    1) The Ben Nevis Bar (live Scottish music)

    2) Kelvingrove Park (with a secret bar, Inn Deep,    under the bridge)

    3) The Dakota Hotel (and restaurant)

    4) I. J. Mellis (local cheeses and food items)

    5) Crabshakk Finnieston (restaurant featuring amazing Scottish seafood)


    I’m wondering what @GlasgowJohn and @UK Man  think of the actor’s choices?


    https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/12/travel/sam-heughan-glasgow.html?campaign_id=24&emc=edit_tl_20230916&instance_id=102897&nl=travel-dispatch&regi_id=35167394&segment_id=144926&te=1&user_id=a2fb33817777ac551a264ffa642c8bd4

    I think both myself and UK Man have been away for such a long time, our comments would not be totally useful.



    But here goes…



    The Ben Nevis Bar is a decent bar. I have had a few beers here a few years back. Glasgow has lots of bars. I imagine Sam has picked this one because its close to where he stays normally or where family live. Glasgow has plenty of decent bars. I tend to drink where my friends are.


    Kelvingrove Park is a beautiful park. I am tempted to say, one of the most beautiful inner city parks in the UK - Inn Deep is a fairly new pub. But I have drunk here . As recently as June last year. Great selection of beers and if it is sunny, a great terrace.


    The Hotel Dakota is another fairly new opening, in 2016 I think. Never stayed there (with three sisters with big houses , if I stayed in a hotel , I would be hung , drawn and quartered)


    I hear favourable commentaries from people who have stayed there.


    IJ Mellis is a modern cheesemonger…. He opened his first store in Edinburgh in 1993, just after I left there in 1990. I think he has another 5 or 6 shops in Scotland now. I have been in the Edinburgh one a couple of times. Cheese can be a hassle to bring back to Argentina and sometimes customs can get funny. I won’t risk it although I do sometimes smuggle some Spanish Manchego between my papers and books.


    Crabshakk opened back in 2009. Long after I left the city . But my family and friends who eat fish tell me it is a bloody good restaurant. The first one is in the Finnieston area of town and they have just opened a second one close to the Botanic Gardens.

    I imagine most of the pubs I used to frequent are long gone or have gone upmarket. My favourte for a pint in the centre of the city was The Horseshoe Bar....a pub frequented regularly by journalists. My local in the south side where I lived was The Corona Bar. Used to be a working class type pub but it's one that's definitely gone a bit posh.


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    Quote from Rice

    The Corona looks very inviting. Why did so many pubs go posh? Everyone loved them the way they used to be.

    I can only guess the privately owned pubs were taken over by the brewers who had the money to refurbish the ones in prime locations. The less popular ones probably just closed down.

    GJ will know better. I wasn't much of a drinker when I lived in Glasgow to be honest.

    Cash from the brewers was responsible for the gentrification of many pubs in Glasgow. In recent years , there has also been growth from small indpendent chains.


    Yip , The Horseshoe is a decent bar. At one time it had the longest bar counter in Europe, at just over 104ft . Not sure if that is still true.. It was my luch time bar in the mid eighties as I worked just around the corner.


    My favourite of the old style bars was the Press Bar in Albion Street , next to the the Daily Express printing plant which became the plant for the Herald and the Evening Times when the Express stopped printing in Scotland.This was my bar at University . The satff were tremendous . About ten years after University , I was in that part of time and decided to go in for a refreshment. The owner Des looked up and said , " Hello John , how are you doing?. Been away for a bit?"

    Quote from GlasgowJohn

    Cash from the brewers was responsible for the gentrification of many pubs in Glasgow.

    I suppose its like everything else, things have moved on for the better. The state of some of the pub toilets back in the 60's/70's were a downright disgrace. Food in a pub was a bag of crisps or nuts and if you ordered a coffee you'd be marked down as a weirdo. :D

    Or be forced to “liberate” the men’s.


    I’m very surprised that in the 70’s there were many pubs in Scotland without a Ladies’ Room. During that time I was in many pubs in England (ahem. But drinking just a lemonade or a shandy, of course), and they all accommodated both women and men.

    Parts of Scotland were quite uncivilized and ladies did not frequent public bars.


    UK Man mentions the "lounge" - this term indicated that there were facilities for ladies.....when the law changed and pubs were required to have facilities for both sexes, I recall there was demonstrations in some towns.

    I’m still not understanding. “Uncivilized” in that way in the 1870’s, yes. And probably 50 years later in the 1920’s. But in the 1970’s there were still demonstrations against women being in a public house?


    And legislation forcing the change didn’t happen until the second half of the 20th century?


    Wow.