NORWICH
trail 3 - West End
Norwich is a city in East Anglia in the county of Norfolk. It was once second to London in size and importance with its heyday being prior to the industrial revolution. Important visitor attractions are Norwich Castle and Norwich Cathedral. Fun can be had with real life game play at Cryptic Escape and History Mystery Game. Arts activities include The Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts and the Theatre Royal. There is also the Strangers’ Hall Museum and The Museum of Norwich.
Norwich visitor guide Norfolk Guide Norwich Castle Norwich Cathedral
PUB CRAWLS
There are three PUBTRAILS for Norwich. One is in the city centre and two just outside the city centre:
1. UNTHANK ROAD (green icons) and environs taking in a lot of pubs in the Golden Triangle area of Norwich - starts below
2. A tour around THE LANES (red icons) in the city centre
3. Out to the WEST END (blue icons)
Trail 3 West End
Trail 3 West End
All trails can start at the roundabout on the A147 at Chappelfield gardens. Trail 2, which is in the city, can be started in the centre of the city.
Starting at The Temple Bar just off of the roundabout at the foot of the pedestrian bridge crossing the busy road. Leaving here walk down the road to the right of the RC cathedral opposite. Down Earlham Road you will find on the right The Earlham Arms and across on the left The Black Horse. Walk along the road and turn up Park Lane which is third on the left. Turn first right into Denbeigh Rd and The Garden House is on the next corner.
Leave here and return to Earlham Rd and cross over it shifting slightly right to walk up Alexandra Rd. At the next cross roads Stafford St, turn right and The Alexandra Tavern is on the next corner.
Leave here and retrace your steps to go up Stafford St and on the next corner, past Alexandra Rd, is The Belle Vue. Turn right after this and walk along St Phillip's Rd and cross over the next main road (Dereham Rd) again shifting to the right a little to walk up Nelson St where The Fat Cat is on the next corner. Return to Dereham Rd and turn left walking back to the city to reach The Reindeer just before the busy crossroads. Coming out of here and turning right will take you up to The Temple Bar again.
However, if you keep going along Dereham Rd you will reach St Benedict's St where you can join trail 2 at The Ten Bells.
Links to all Norwich Pubtrails
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Unthank Rd and off of it
The Georgian Town House
The Pear Tree (was No 27)
The Mulberry
Warwick St Social
The Eaton Cottage
The Unthank Arms
The York Tavern
The Rose tavern
The Coach & Horses
The Champions
The Coachmakers Arms
The Trowel & Hammer
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The Lanes
The Vine
The Belgium Monk
The Birdcage (closed)
CHICK Inn (was Micawber’s)
The Ten Bells
The Plough
The Mash Tun
The Rumsey Wells
Dt Andrews Brew House
Norwich Tap (closed)
The Wildman
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The West End
The Temple Bar
Earlham Arms
The Black Horse
The Garden House
The Alexandra Tavern
The Belle Veu
The Fat Cat
The Reindeer
PUB FACTS
It was said that Norwich had a church for each week of the year and a pub for each day.
The book Norwich Pubs and Breweries Past and present by Frances and Michael Holmes is highly recommended. Lovingly produced it maps current and former pubs and breweries in the city. See their website.
The vast majority of pubs are open all day and most serve food during this time.
Most pubs in the outskirts trails (1 and 3) have extensive gardens and often front patios. Many of these are corner pubs that were two large rooms and are now opened up.
Quite a few of the city centre pubs also have beer gardens through to the rear and some have seating outside the front of the building.
Staff are invariably friendly and helpful.
Prices are seldom outrageous though 'craft ales' are often more expensive than real ale.
Norfolkpubs.co.uk gives interesting historic detail about all Norwich pubs
The Temple Bar
The Temple Bar is triangular shaped building with an entrance to a small bar, with pool, at the apex. Up some steps to the left and the outsides seating (overlooking busy road) is to the left while a larger room with another bar counter is to the right. This room is split in two by a chimney wall. Basic wooden tables and benches.
Greater detail
Have a pint here
Real Ale: (by gravity) Ghost ship
Bitter: Caffrey’s Premium Ale; Guinness Golden Ale
Lager: Carsberg; San Miguel; Carling;1664;
Cider Aspall Suffolk Guinness
The Earlham Arms
The Earlham Arms is a large house with an extensive beer garden to the left of the building. Bar counter on back wall. Tall tables and stools opposite bar along window side. Beyond bar and round to right is further dining style seating. Tasteful modern makeover. Disabled access, meals and dog friendly
CAMRA Good Beer Guide --2016
greater details
Have a pint here
Rea Ale: Norwick Kiwi; Lighthouse (£2.90; Adnams); Bitter Old Bustard; Knot Another IPA; Ruby Ale; Mild (bothSt Peters); Snetterton Scary Tree (Elmtree); Black Panther Stout (Panther)
Bitter: Mosaic
Lager: Dry Hopped
Guinness
Pub Jukebox:
Alcohol themed music to listen to while you browse.
whisky makes you sweeter - Laura Cantrell
PLACES TO VISIT WITH PUBTRAILS
The towns and villages highlighted on this web site have a wide variety of pubs and beers in them. All of the places are great to visit, whether for a day or longer, and most have tourist attractions for all of the family.
There is a large variety of pubs throughout the different towns shown below. Some you may wish never to visit again but even discovering these can be interesting. There are pubs that you would not take your wife into. While some you could not take your girlfriend into. A few you would not take either into. However, most of the pubs are very pleasant.
HOME MAP of places visited
Alnwick Ambleside Anstruther Bakewell Bamburgh Barnard Castle Bath Berwick upon Tweed Birnam & Dunkeld Bourton on the Water Bowness on Windermere Bridge of Allan Chester Chichester Dunblane Dunoon Edinburgh Ely Fort William Glasgow Gourock Greenock Helensburgh Inverness Kelso Keswick Knaresborough Largs Linlithgow Lyme Regis Melrose Montrose Newton Stewart North Berwick Norwich Oban Pebbles Penzance Portree Pitlochry Quorn Richmond Rothesay St Andrews Seahouses Seend Shrewsbury Skipton Stirling Stratford-upon-Avon Stockton Heath Whitby Windemere Whitstable York
The Black Horse
The Black Horse (Punch Taverns) is a food based large pub with an extensive beer garden including outside sheltered area. Indoors there are three main areas; first just after the entrance, then opposite the bar and a more formal looking dining area beyond this. Seating is mainly tables for four. A £1 difference between real ale and craft ale. Real ale is even cheaper on Tuesdays. Meals all day and dog friendly.
Greater details
Have a pint here
Real ale: - Lighthouse Adnams); Atlantic (Sharp); Hophead
Craft Ale: – East Coast IPA; Coast to Coast (Caledonian)
Bitter Mosaic (Adnams)
Lager: Birra Moretti; Estrella; Heineken; Amstel
Cider: Aspall Suffolk
The Garden House
The Garden House is one of several excellent pubs taking up a corner position in a residential area. The entrance brings to an L-shaped counter serving a large L- shaped room with banquette seating around the room. To the right is a smaller room and entrance to beer garden. Disabled access and dog friendly.
Greater detail
CAMRA Good Beer Guide 2024, 2025
Have a pint here
Real ale: Golden Pippin ( Copper Dragon); Cumberland (Jennings); Hereford PA; Horizon Golden Ale
Lager: Kosel; Hop House 13 Lager; 1664; Becks
Cider: Hogan’s; Aspall Suffolk Guinness
The Alexandra Tavern
The Alexandra Tavern is one of several excellent pubs taking up a corner position in a residential area. The corner entrance takes you to a small curved servery. To the left of this is a large lounge area and bar. While beyond the curved counter, displaying the real ale, the pub extends further up a longer room going down the long side of the pub with tables beyond the counter end. Disabled access, meals and dog friendly.
Greater detail
CAMRA Good Beer Guide regular including 2023, 2024
Have a pint here
Real ale: Gold; CHB; Brewery Tap (all Chalk Hill Brewery ); Summer Lightning; Liquid Sunshine (St Austell)
Lager: Carling; Amstel; 1664; Carlsberg; San Miguel
Cider Magners Golden Guinness
PUB QUIZ
In which month does Beaujolais Nouveau arrive?
Answer at foot of page
The Belle Vue
The Belle Vue (Enterprise Inns) is one of several excellent pubs taking up a corner position in a residential area. This is a very bright and airy pub due to large windows. The corner entrance has the bar along the wall to the centre. There is a seating are to the left of the bar down the outside windows. Beyond the bar the pub sweeps round to the left. there is lots of light-coloured furniture in this area culminating in a pool table at the far end. Lunch and evening meals.
Greater detail
Have a pint here
Real ale: Humming Bird; Harvest; Ghost Ship (Adnams); Golden Jackel (Wolf); Atlantic (Sharp)
Bitter: John Smith
Lager: Three Hop Lager (Caledonian) Fosters; 1664
Cider: Hogan’s Guinness
The Fat Cat
The Fat Cat is one of the best known real ale pubs having won CAMRA pub of the year on twice and The Good Pub Guide Pub of the Year six times. There is outdoor seating and sheltered area to the right of the entrance. The corner entrance takes you to a seating area to the right and a further room beyond this. Ahead and slightly to the left, along the back wall, is the serving counter with stools on a black and white chequered floor. Opposite the counter are small areas with tall stools and shelves separated by stained class partitions. Walls have lots of beer memorabilia. Dog friendly
CAMRA Good Beer Guide regular including 2023, 2024, 2025
Featured in The Pub by Pete Brown
Greater detail
Must have a few pints here.
Real ale: Juniper Saison; Loadstar; Southwold Bitter (all Adnams); Landlord; Hop Till You Drop; Inferno (Oakham);
Bitter; Rio Gold; Honey Ale (all three Fat Cat); Golden Delicious (Burton Bridge); Yakima Gold ( Crouch Vale)
Craft: Anchor steam beer
Lager: Leffe; Becks; Three Hop; Palm Special Belgium beer
Alcohol free: Bitburger (Adnams)
Reindeer
Reindeer (Elgood’s)
The entrance takes you to a large room running to the right with a long serving counter on the back wall. There is a smaller curved window area to the left of entrance and straight ahead from the entrance is a smaller seating area with a small attractive room available for hire. Also, off from here is the large beer garden and sheltered area for smokers. The main area has seating along the window wall with the far end of the room set more for dining. Disabled access, meals and dog friendly.
Closed Tuesday and Wednesday; open 4pm Monday & Thursday
Greater details
CAMRA Good Beer Guide --2023
Have a pint here
Real ale: AHAB stout (Errant ); Session Ale (Tickety Boo); Golden Shock; Guierilla (Blue Monkey); Now In A Minute (Mad Dog)
Lager: Freedom Lager; Amstel; Kwak; Koolsh (Flemish); Bacchus Kriek; Jever Pils; Erdinger; Redwell Norwich Pils; Brooklyn
“Drinking beer doesn't make you fat, It makes you lean....
Against bars, tables, chairs, and poles.
.”
ANSWER: November