A Saturday in early October saw your editor out in the Hope Valley getting in some Beer Matters magazine deliveries before visiting Intrepid Brewery’s open day.
The afternoon started jumping on the local train from Dore & Totley station with an intention of heading to Edale, however the two car Northern train was seriously overcrowded so the decision was made to bail out at Hathersage and start deliveries at the Little John Hotel in Hathersage instead, where a beer from Red Willow brewery was enjoyed.
Following the earlier experience of the train service it was decided to use buses instead and the Peak Sightseer Blue route open top bus was utilised for a ride up the valley to Castleton for deliveries and quick halves in the Peak Hotel, Olde Nag’s Head and SwissTap.
That quick pub crawl matched the time it took for the open top bus to go up Winnats Pass to the Blue John Cavern and back and it was rejoined to head down the road to Hope for the Old Hall Hotel.
It was time to visit Intrepid Brewery next, located at Brough Mill which is on the road to Bradwell. Some buses on First’s route 272 go that way but not many and the one that was due failed to operate, however around the same time was the Hulleys bus 173 which runs once every 2 hours so that was boarded for the short run to the brewery!
The set up for the open day involved a pop up bar in the brewery whilst the yard outside had tables and seating along with Sunshine Pizza’s van. A pin was sat on the end of the bar containing a special imperial edition of the Stanage Stout so a half of this was tried, accompanied by a spicy/meaty pizza and both were enjoyed!
It was time to go home and the bus network provided another challenge as the 272 provides an hourly service towards Castleton but no service towards Sheffield for several hours, however it was proved possible to ride the Castleton bound bus to the main road by the Travellers Rest, quickly cross the road and join the Peak Sightseer feeder bus to Woodseats.
An open top bus ride at 6pm in October proved rather cold so the coat was zipped up as high as it would go and my lack of hat was regretted, however there was a reward as the bus climbed up into the hills above Hathersage as a beautiful sunset over the valley was witnessed!
This was pretty much end of season for the Peak Sightseer open top buses, with the last day of operation for 2024 being Saturday 26 October. It was obvious why of course, when I connected onto the regular Stagecoach number 25 to Bradway the existence of a roof and heating was appreciated!