August would normally mean getting on a plane and flying somewhere, but it’s been a long time since we did that. Still there is plenty of places unexplored in the UK and Sheffield was somewhere with an interesting past that was only a little more than an hour away, so the city of steel would be our next stop on the Bryn Bus or the TransPennine Express as it’s also known. We didn’t really have an action plan, apart from hotel and restaurant bookings, we’d go with the flow just like the Queens of the Stone Age!
To be fair, it was a good job we didn’t make plans. “Oh, there is a pub on the platform” the humans said and that’s where we spent the next few hours! This wasn’t just any pub either. As their website states, The Sheffield Tap is housed within the former Edwardian Refreshment Room & Dining Rooms of Sheffield Station. It’s been restored to its former glory and pair that with the 11 traditional handpulls and 14 different keg beers, it’s a match made in heaven. And Dad was… they had one of his favourite beers, Weihenstephaner Dunkel (dark wheat beer) on tap! Such nice beer in such nice surroundings, so we were not moving any time soon.
When we finally dragged ourselves out of the bar, it was mid-afternoon. One of the things we had planned to do – between drinking and eating – was find as many of the Bears of Sheffield as possible. This was a public arts exhibition designed to celebrate everything that is wonderful about Sheffield. There are 100 little bears and 60 big bears to find around the city. The big bears have been designed by professional artists and sponsored by local businesses and individuals. The little bears have been designed, painted and fundraised for by some beary talented children and young people. The Bears of Sheffield will help fund a new Cancer Ward at Sheffield Children’s Hospital. Trail maps are available for just £1 and we had lots of fun exploring the city finding all my Sheffield cousins.
It was nearly time to check into the hotel, but before that Dad dragged Mum into one of the couple of Wetherspoons pubs in the centre of Sheffield. “What’s not to like about a Wetherspoons”, Dad says. Mum says, “Everything”. I don’t mind them myself! They’re cheap as chips after all! This one was in the old Waterworks Company headquarters, an imposing Victorian building from the outside, sticky tables and dirty carpet on the inside. A proper Wetherspoons! A few pints of Punk IPA later (how to they sell it for just over £3 when it’s over a fiver in BrewDog?) and time for the hotel. The less said about Jurys Inn Sheffield, the better. Disappointing to put it mildly. Rude staff, multiple things in the room not working, not particularly clean and in a very noisy part of town. We definitely wouldn’t recommend, although every other Jurys Inn we have stayed in has been nice, it’s just this one is well and truly below the standards of the others.
Anyway, let’s get back to the things about this trip. Dinner was booked at Sakushi Japanese Restaurant, winner of many awards including the best Japanese takeaway in the UK. You can read all about it, by following the link. Despite the grown ups complaints about the hotel, by the time we’d finished dinner, they were tired… so was this little bear to be fair. We stocked up on a few refreshments and “chilled” in the room. I say “chilled”, but the aircon didn’t work and the noise from the street below (which was still in full party mode at 3am), both made it difficult to relax.
Day two and we were out of the hotel first thing. Obviously first thing with a hangover is gone 10am, but it felt early to us. We headed to the centre on the hunt for something to cure our aching heads and what a find we made. Beres has had 50 years of making pork sandwiches for the people of Sheffield. They made the most awesome pork baps, with lots of succulent roast pork, apple sauce, stuffing and crackling if you wanted that as well. A “reet proper” way to start the day as they’d say in Yorkshire. Having hit the spot with that piggy feast, we were energised (slight exaggeration there) and Dad wanted to walk down to Kelham Island to see a bit more of Sheffield’s industrial past. It’s a really cool place and to keep Mum onside, there was plenty of street art there as well.
We had an hour so of exploring and then bang on midday, the award winning Fat Cat pub opened its doors and we sat ourselves down for the afternoon. You can read more about this Sheffield institution by clicking on the link. As well as a top quality selection of beers from which to choose, they did pretty nice pork pies as well, as if we hadn’t had enough pig already today!
The time had come to walk back to the station. Apart from the hotel, we had a pretty nice time in this historic and rather hilly part of South Yorkshire. The 21st century has seen extensive redevelopment in Sheffield, but there are still areas of the centre that are pretty run down. Almost totally destroyed during the blitz, it was clearly rebuilt without a lot of thought which has resulted in what can only be described as a mish-mash of buildings. It’s described as “a depressing place” on TripAdvisor, but that is really unfair. Sheffield’s industrious past is rich in history and its present is rich in culture.