An old-fashioned pub crawl through Hobart ... I’ll drink to that

Once found on nearly every Hobart street corner, many old English-style pubs are now just a fond memory, writes Charles Wooley

Tasmanian brewery workers in 1908 who featured in part five of a series on Hobart’s historic pubs and hotels titled Cheers! Hobart’s hotel culture is one of the oldest in Australia, and pubs have always been linked to the river city’s history.

It is always a sad day when a much-loved old pub closes down, burns to the ground or is repurposed.

Around the nation many of our estimated 6000 pubs took a hard knock during the Covid lockdown; some shut down and others are still struggling as some people prudently drink at home. You can manage a lot of activities wearing a mask, but apparently you can’t drink beer through one.

In the carpark of a local tavern, I thought of a quote attributed to the great English diarist, Samuel Pepys, about London tavern life during the Great Plague in 1665. Peering through the window he was tempted by the sight of “gadabouts making merry” but resisted the urge to join them.

“A dram in exchange for the pox is an ill bargain indeed.”

Covid isn’t quite the bubonic plague and the thousand-odd confirmed cases in Tasmania this month did not deter the many patrons at Cambridge’s Horseshoe Inn last Sunday. The restaurant had more than a hundred diners, the carpark was full, and the bar was cheerful. Well, as cheerful as things can be when you think your favourite watering hole might be about to vanish. It’s sad to see a big tough bloke tear up, but it’s understandable in the circumstances.

“Mate, I’ve been coming here forever, and I’ll miss it,” he told me. “It’s a good knockabout place where you don’t need to dress up for a beer. ”

Tasmanian brewery workers in 1908 who featured in part five of a series on Hobart’s historic pubs and hotels titled Cheers! Hobart’s hotel culture is one of the oldest in Australia, and pubs have always been linked to the river city’s history.

dress code was on the wall behind the Wild Turkey.

NO Bare Feet

NO Hoods

NO exceptions.

Which will no doubt change if the joint, which is soon to close for a renovation, becomes a trendy wine bar as some locals fear. They might then add the proscriptions I saw in a pub outside of Mt Isa, not too much fancier than the Horseshoe.

No singlets

No swearing

No spitting

A popular Cambridge tavern, the Horseshoe Inn looks like many typical Australian bush pubs. But these days it’s only 20 minutes from the city. Bypassed by new road development you might never know it’s there. Travelling west from Sorell I had to navigate the spaghetti of three roundabouts to find it. Driving from the city you will have less difficulty. But you should do it before it’s too late.

The Horseshoe Inn, at Cambridge Rd, Cambridge, which has been sold to new owners who have plans to revamp the site.

Although the Horseshoe doesn’t look like a heritage building, its history stretches back to the early colony. It was a coaching stop where horse teams could be changed and thirsty travellers refreshed and fed, before continuing the journey to Richmond, Sorell and the East Coast.

The unprepossessing appearance of this low-level white painted brick structure gives no indication of the warm-hearted welcome within. I’m sure over the years the pub has had many reincarnations and looks nothing like whatever was first built on Cambridge Rd in 1835. But the original intent continues and inside the good-natured service, good tucker and country jollity is unabated.

If the site is to be redeveloped, let’s just hope it doesn’t change as much as the locals fear.

The new owners who plan to spend $20m on a revamp have assured the community, through a recent article in the Mercury (May 16), that the inn will retain much of its character and the renovations will be respectful to its heritage values. I am just sorry that I’ve only discovered this pub. Because I’ve lost so many favourite watering holes over the years.

My first pub was the Traveller’s Rest on the Sandy Bay waterfront near Wrest Point. The “Travs” was eventually consumed by the burgeoning gambling industry. It had been a favourite university watering hole with a jetty where we dangled our under-age feet in the Derwent and drank Cascade Blue.

Now it’s a carpark.

Then there came worse. Not long ago my beloved Bronte Park pub, which I knew as a hydro-kid, burned to the ground, as so often happens with bush pubs.

I don’t enjoy the plateau nearly as much without the Bronte pub. Half the fun of fly fishing was complaining over a cold beer in front of the huge fireplace about the weather and the lack of trout.

The original Marquis of Hastings building which featured in part five of a series on Hobart’s historic pubs and hotels titled Cheers! The Marquis, which is still operating albeit as a revamped establishment, is one of the oldest public houses in Hobart.

I hear now from my old journo mates in recession-struck Britain that more than 150 pubs have closed in the first quarter of this year, including the colourful Britannia in Stepney.

Working in London I would take Australian visitors there to hear stories about that city’s most notorious gangsters, Ronnie and Reggie, the Kray twins. In the bar locals would provide ghoulish commentary: “That’s the very spot where the bruvvers nailed a geezer’s head to the floor.”

But alas the glamour has gone.

Apparently, the Britannia is now a fried chicken shop called “The Krays”.

Well, at least the Brits pay some respect to history.

In Hobart, with few exceptions, the beautiful old English-style pubs are just a memory, along with their names. Most were long gone before I ever darkened their doors, but I do remember the wonderful Man at the Wheel, the Wheatsheaf and that infamous home of small-time Hobart villainy, the Coronation. Better known as the “Corro”.

Back in 1835, Hobart, with a population of 14,000, had 89 pubs. Now there are about 41. Obviously, we don’t get out much anymore.

But if those colourful drinking holes on every street corner were still standing today, they would make our town famous. Imagine visiting pubs with names like The Help Me Through the World and the Labour in Vain (a good place to drown repeated electoral sorrows). We’ve long ago lost the Shakespeare and the Sir John Falstaff. The Cat and Fiddle lives on in name only. And who would know where to locate the Noah’s Ark or the Bull and Mouth?

Those vanished places, the Lame Horse, the Maid and Magpie, the Butchers Arms and the Spotted Cow make me want to time travel back 150 years.

How fascinating to join such a pub crawl. After stumbling across the long-lost Hen and Chickens, the Hammer in Hand and the Come in and See Wiggins, if we are still up for it, we might even row across the river and take a ride to the Horseshoe Inn.

I would know exactly where to find it.

Charles Wooley is a Tasmanian-based journalist.