Category Archives: Mystery pub

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A single sentence on Mystery Pub in the Warradale

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Escaping today’s guerrilla heat spike (41 degrees at 4.50pm), Claire and I march like North Korean soldiers from the motor and then we’re inside the dead-eyed TAB-tomb and want to steal through to the beer garden but head-butting all the internal walls, we’re thwarted as the Warradale Hotel comprises two separate buildings so it’s actually dual, eerily competing pubs with distinctive demographics, and we reluctantly retreat outside to the hotness; subsequently re-entering through the gaming section during which I’m sure Claire wants to shout, supportively, to the glum zombie faces, ‘Save yourselves from this vampiric psychic awfulness and the free tea and instant coffee and colourless digestive biscuits which aren’t really free’ and arriving in the Garden Bar, despite my studiously booking a spot on Monday and now stepping purposely like mildly enraged librarians, we locate no sign gently announcing in a kindly font, ‘Michael 5 pm,’ and it’s personally deflating and sets a prickly, I suspect, unrecoverable tone for my relationship with this colossal concrete pub, but right now doesn’t matter, as we enclose a dappled table reserved later for the dedicated, undoubtedly oppressed folk of the dastardly Spotlight emporium (fabrics, craft and homewares) who, we collectively decide, are getting their Christmas function done early this year, a celebration certainly to be fraught and hilarious and teary and concluding messily with more unashamed tears and multiple snotty carpark wailings of, “I bloody love you’ and ‘I tell you, Jayden’s not bloody good enough for you, Honestee’; however, as the ceiling aperture is useless, it’s a marginally toxic room, and boxes in the fuggy smoke (both vape and traditional, like so much in our world we now have electronic and organic versions) shrouding us like a Scooby Doo phantom, so we flee inside with our cherished friends Michelle and Trish, who are today’s Mystery Pub special guests like Suzi Quatro when she was on Happy Days as Leather Tuscadero (even becoming a brief love interest for Ralph Malph) and each of us clasps a unique Friday drink: Claire opting for a turbo-charged brandy and coke, Michelle indulging in a zesty and luscious cocktail, Trish choosing an uplifting soda water adorned with mint leaves (an unparalleled scent, methinks) while I foolishly endure my twice-a-year Heineken in retelling myself that it’s not an exotic lager but really just European VB sans the sophistication; spinning our attention to Michelle’s trip to that continent next year, which arrives as ‘I’m going to Eurovision in Malmo’ while my question to her, ‘Are you looking forward to the irony of it?’ receives a positive reply, with Michelle also listing kitsch delight, outrageous music, and ridiculous Swedish fun as key anticipations then our conversation migrates to our vegetated backyards and our sometimes errant offspring, and the bi-weekly quiz nights, and our respective dreamy retirement visions then concluding with goodbyes a-fluttering, and we’re going, ‘to the places you will be from,’ as the band Semisonic sings in the rousing barroom anthem, ‘Closing Time’; nevertheless, the curious future tense of the lyric is true for blessed people in midnight bars sometimes chance across their momentous other, and fashion mutually enriching lives, and I wonder about our table in the Warradale, yes, this very durable table which another sign indicates will later vanish when the floor beneath us enjoys a twilight transmogrification into a space for disco, Nutbush, the military two-step but hopefully not line dancing, and I mention the short story conference I’m currently attending to which Trish says, ‘The Californian creative writing professor (from whom at a provoking but productive workshop I was inspired to attempt this literary technique) is a dancer too and I danced with him Wednesday night at a salsa social,’ but overall it’s been a buoyant hour, and the Mystery Pub excursion into minor pleasure and suburban surprise continues, while in our tandoor car, Claire pulls the seatbelt over her shoulder.

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Security! Security! Trouble at Mystery Pub

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‘I think they’re Russian mafia,’ I suggest, glancing again over at the table behind us.

Claire disagrees. ‘The accent’s not right. Could be Italian?’

There’s four huddled together in the bistro and the alpha male is lecturing incessantly. The other man nods, as do the two women. They’re youngish and it only encourages him. I say to Claire, ‘If it’s Italian you could probably understand it.’

‘True. No, I can’t. It could be Spanish.’

We agree that it’s likely Español and return to the blustery afternoon outside. White caps push onto the clean sand and the balcony’s blue and red flags are rippling.

Claire’s picked a close venue but a surprising one. The Somerton Bar and Bistro sits atop the surf lifesaving club. It’s happy hour and my James Squire One Fifty Lashes pale ale is decent although I’m not as enthusiastic about it as I was a decade ago. My wife’s white is affable. Both are only $5 each.

Down on the esplanade there’s a trickle of traffic. Some are lone walkers; others have dogs. From the south a woman in black leisure gear bursts into view, moving with pace. Just as suddenly, she stops. I’m unsure if she’s run ten miles, or ten steps.

Surveying the coast with her year 12 Geography lens, Claire considers. ‘There’s less visual pollution here at Somerton Park. No buoys, poles, lights.’

We’re often at Glenelg North and this provides a crowded, messy vista with the groyne running out by the marina and like Venice’s Grand Canal, various channel markers jut out of the ocean. For the purists these human interventions might ruin the aesthetic. I nod agreement at Claire like I probably did in year 12 Geography with Ms. Bogle down in the Matric Centre.

Our Spanish neighbours are still with us, and the alpha male continues to talk at a clip like an Andalusian dancing horse might do in a fever dream. He must be sharing hugely vital information, sensitive data, gripping intelligence. His colleagues constantly nod like they’re committing every word to memory.

I amuse myself by thinking he’s the type of swarthy tourist who gets collared on Border Security for masterminding a massive drug operation. But in truth he’s probably a photocopier technician boring his colleagues rigid with an unbearable address on toner and ink cartridges and paper jams.

And Claire’s back with round dos! And she has chips (crisps for those from Blighty). And as has been my life habit I either eat none or as many as my greedy mitts can grab. Like a good punk rock song, the bag’s done in about a hundred seconds.

A clot of aggrieved, frowning diners suddenly looms over me.

The haggard, dirty blonde barks at me as if I’ve done something unspeakable in her cheap handbag. ‘You’re at our table.’ A foul crime. It’s not the Spaniards but a fresh crowd. I’m startled. Just like a pushy mum volunteering at Brayden and Jayden’s Sport Day as a raker at the long jump pit she continues.

‘This is table number four. We’ve booked it.’ She’s right. I’ve breached her territory and am now in my own hellish episode of Border Security and shit doesn’t appear good. I’ve no plausible story and my passport seems fake. In a back room, someone could be slipping on a glove with my name on it.

Eyes lowered, I scarper shamefully across to our correct table without knocking over chairs or spilling beverages.

Deep breaths taken, we speak of upcoming weekends away, theatre visits and Christmas. Heading to the stairs and the car, I should’ve nodded to the Spanish monologuist and said, ‘Feliz Navidad.’

But he was busy.

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Mystery Pub: Viva Las Vegas – The Peninsula, Taperoo

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Claire and I are back in the nation of Le Fevre at the accurately labelled Peninsula Hotel. Motoring there proved simple as we accessed the Northern and Port River Expressways with the metaphorical Friday breeze in our hair.

Taking in the hotel visage, I’m smitten as the 2019 renovations have aspired to a Vintage Vegas aesthetic. This evokes iconic buildings such as Circus Circus, the Tropicana, and the Flamingo.

It’s a genuine point of difference as both outside and in are devoid entirely of Port football iconography. It’s brazenly decontextualized and if you wish to drink up homegrown sporting nostalgia, there’s a dozen nearby pubs in which you can do this until you’re silly as a wheel.

This is an architectural delight and midcentury Americana tribute. With a rhetorical front and conventional behind, the Peninsula adopts the Stardust Showroom model of being a ‘decorated shed.’ It presents as a portal to an immersive world.

Most striking are the bright greens, pinks, reds, and blues on the external and internal windows. Lighting and colour are often poorly done by interior designers, so this sets an enticing tone and suggests risk and adventure and ageless excitement.

All in downtown Taperoo.

Vegas motels are styled as pleasure zones like the Alhambra, Disneyland, and Xanadu while the famous gambling strip is also neon in the Atomic Age and uses Miami Moroccan visuals. I mention to Claire that according to my reading, Vegas is situated in an ‘agoraphobic auto-scaled desert.’

But that’s enough psychosexual geography.

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5pm can be a curious, twilight time to descend upon a pub. The lunch and function crowd have (mostly) long left and omitting Queensland pensioners, it’s too early for those seeking dinner. Office types are still pretending to write outcomes-driven emails. But we’ve arrived and the emptiness aids critical appraisal and having the bar to ourselves is also helpful for conversation.

Like racehorses and heavy metal bands, modern beverages are prone to enchanting names that overpromise and underdeliver.

Claire requisitions a Shy Pig Sauvignon Blanc while I go for a local beer in the Big Shed Peninsula Proud. It’s a hazy pale ale, brewed in the neighbouring province of Royal Park. Both drinks deliver and my pint is hoppy and aromatic and pokes me in a late afternoon kinda way.

The movie set-like Peninsula isn’t an inexpressive cavern or processing plant but rather a place promising veiled and tempting nooks. Taking up residency we examine our week and encouraged by the setting, talk shifts naturally to the Rat Pack and the Chapel of Love and Elvis.

We consider visiting Vegas. Claire says, ‘I’d love to go. You’ve been there, right?’

Queue my Vegas blackjack story. I reply. ‘Yes, you know!’

Claire summarises neatly if a little eagerly. ‘That’s when you went to a casino at midnight and got to bed at 8am? When you were still winning at dawn and then gave all your money back?’

Ouch.

‘Correct,’ I affirm before offering a meek defence. ‘It was such good fun.’ I interrupt with an idea. ‘A trip there would have to include the Grand Canyon. It’s easy the best thing I’ve seen on the planet.’

Claire doesn’t say, ‘Make sure in Vegas we get a steak and Caesar salad.’

Returning barwards for our second and final refreshments, I note that the busiest section of the pub is the gaming room complete with carnivorous pokies.

But a picturesque, serene light streams in across our table and unlike the optical and aural assault of Vegas, it’s quiet and lounge standards from Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin drift through the languid interior like smoke.

And now we’re a very long way from Port Adelaide. Maybe that’s the seductive trick of the Peninsula: the escapism, the effortless time travel, the mirage.

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Mystery Pub: Stanley Tucci to play Greg Chappell in upcoming biopic

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The Britannia pub is by Adelaide’s most infamous roundabout. It was so unspeakably horrendous that its mere mention caused folks to shudder and shake. The final solution was, bizarrely, to build a second roundabout. This reminds me of the surgeon who says to a patient, ‘I’m sorry but the operation only has a fifty percent success rate.’

The patient replies, ‘Well just do it twice then.’

Twice a day for nearly eight years I drove through the Britannia roundabout.

In those 3,000 journeys I only saw one accident which is odd given back then it averaged a prang per day. There were plenty of near misses and times when motorists in front of me were paralysed by the challenge and didn’t enter the roundabout for what appeared as eternities. That one car headbutted a veranda post of the Britannia. The pub survived but I’m unsure about the vehicle.

When my ridiculous Nissan Exa was stricken with gearbox issues I rode my bike through the roundabout during peak hour on the way to and from Marryatville High. For nearly a week. It was a decent haul from Glenelg. The roundabout was exhilarating if fraught.

Friday nights in a pub should be fizzing with energy and promise and with the extra frisson of Mystery Pub they mostly are. But 5pm on Saturdays can be a lethargic, twilight zone. They’ve saluted in the last at Flemington so the sports bars are barren and it’s too early for dinner and the kids won’t hit the town for hours.  

The Britannia is mostly empty on Saturday for our Mystery Pub visit. Inside is stark and functional like a suburban café rather than seductive and intriguing and bursting with secret stories.

We claim a table with a Coopers Pale Ale (me) and a Padthaway white (Claire). I spy a brochure for the Repertory Theatre Company featuring the brilliant farce Noises Off. Unfortunately the performance dates and ours don’t align. Claire says, ‘Poo.’

Otherwise, it’s been a rewarding week as I saw Wes Anderson’s Asteroid City, which in its metatextuality includes a documentary about a play within the nested narrative of the film. The sense of mise-en-scène is tremendous. Claire and I enjoyed an episode of Julia Zemiro’s Great Australian Walks and I continue to read Room with a View (upwards of a page a night before sleep) which is partly set in Florence.

Friday night we dined with dear, old Kapunda types (thanks for the soup, Trish and nice to see you Trev and Eleni). We discussed Stanley Tucci and his excellent series, Searching for Italy. Not only does our lovely friend Stephen look like him but their families are from neighbouring Italian villages. As a host Stanley is witty, curious and grateful (so is Stephen).

We also speak of the episode set in Sicily and Palermo. What utter privilege to know Italy and compare travelling tales. As always, Stephen and I chat about the Beach Boys and tonight dissect their wonderful, haunted song, ‘Heroes and Villains.’ I reckon Stanley might also be a fan.

He’s also in the great film Margin Call which explores the origins of the Global Financial Crisis. In it he plays a quantitative analyst who formerly worked as an engineer. Clearly bitter about Wall Street he delivers a monologue about the real, human benefits of a bridge he once built.

“It went from Dilles Bottom, Ohio to Moundsville, West Virginia. It spanned nine hundred and twelve feet above the Ohio River. Twelve thousand people used this thing a day. And it cut out thirty-five miles of driving each way between Wheeling and New Martinsville. That’s a combined 847,000 miles of driving a day. Or 25,410,000 miles a month. And 304,920,000 miles a year. Saved. Now I completed that project in 1986, that’s twenty-two years ago. So, over the life of that one bridge, that’s 6,708,240,000 miles that haven’t had to be driven. At, what, let’s say fifty miles an hour. So that’s, what, 134,165,800 hours, or 559,020 days. So that one little bridge has saved the people of those communities a combined 1,531 years of their lives not wasted in a car. One thousand five hundred and thirty-one years.”

As you can see, the gubmint should’ve phoned Stanley to fix the roundabout. After less than an hour Claire and I leave the Britannia. It’s quiet on the roads.

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Mystery Pub: You right there Darl?

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Everybody in the front bar ends each sentence with, ‘Darl.’

‘Just another pint thanks, Darl.’

‘Here’s your change, Darl.’

‘Which Aristotelian concepts most influenced Western thought, Darl?’

It’s just prior to 5pm in the Henley Beach Hotel but many of the front bar punters give the distinct impression that they’ve been in here for much longer. It seems very lived in. There’s a steady clunking from the pool table.

I order us a drink. Roger, known to the bar staff variously as Roger or Darl leans past me like I don’t really belong and grabs a bottle of bitters. He shakes a few drops into his beer. One of the bar staff (the one without the visible neck tattoos) says to Roger, ‘You right there Darl?’ Roger explains how he generally shakes a few drops of bitters into his beer. She nods and replies, ‘No worries, Darl.’

We head next door into the Family Bistro, and I wonder who could eat an entire family. I usher Claire onto the front veranda where there’s darts on the TV and a good view of the beach and late-afternoon sky, either side of the esplanade’s squat toilet block. It’s a little brisk so we return to the Bistro where, near as I can tell, nobody’s yet ordered a medium-rare family.

Claire and I dissect our days during which my wife went to the Post Office. This is now usually a fraught exercise, and the almost imperceptible queue movement means that the package you’re sending to Europe gets there before you return to the car. We remember the days when all you could buy at a post office were stamps.

Having not been inoculated against the rampant front bar contagion I ask Claire, ‘What would you like now, Darl?’

‘A glass of red, thanks,’ comes her colloquial pronoun-free response.

The bar staff slips a couple of raffle tickets into my paw, and I slap these down on our table like a card shark in a Vegas casino.

‘No idea,’ I declare when Claire asks what the raffle prizes are. We then speak of that decidedly Aristotelian concept, the meat tray, and its various symbolic values.

‘I only ever won once,’ Claire confesses. ‘A chook when I was in primary school.’ Good to note the Catholics encouraging gambling I thought. St. Joseph, patron saint of chooks and trifectas.

‘Alive or not?’ I asked.

‘Dead.’

I was curious. ‘How did that go at home with a family of nine?’

Claire describes that her Mum made it work, as she always did.

A glance at the Family Bistro menu reveals that it’s ‘inspired by our surroundings’ but I can confirm I saw no cattle on the beach nor stray snags in the carpark. Perhaps the specials include a ‘hideously expensive gentleman’s bungalow’ with salad or veg.

The Family Bistro’s getting busy with folks kicking off their weekend with a nosebag at the boozer. It’s home time for us.

We recklessly abandon our free raffle tickets and scarper to the motor, confident that the winner of the neck chops was a front bar resident likely called, ‘Darl.’

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Mystery Pub Madness: The Olivia Hotel and the General Havelock!

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With her now traditional misdirection Claire drives me up and down and around Hutt Street.

We circle many hotels and bars and so my uncertainty regarding tonight’s Mystery Pub is happily heightened.

Wife – 1, your correspondent – 0.

Parking on Carrington Street we then walk past the snug terrace homes and accountancy and law firms with their wintry windows all aglow.

The Olivia Hotel is new, but the interior design is deliberately shabby with intimate, living room atmospherics. Among former functions it was an Asian restaurant, and I can see it. Ambling in, we hear Feist’s excellent song called ‘1234.’

Given our Formula One bladders, we race at the loos through the courtyard. It’s compelling in a Mediterranean, film-set way, and we note that it’d be a decent garden for a summer’s evening. A century-old grapevine is the defiant, gnarly centerpiece.

A staircase spirals heavenwardly into the rooftop bar. I love the idea of these elevated areas but wonder if we’ll look back at some of them as our boozers’ skinny leather ties.

With hopping orange flames there’s two fireplaces, and these create an alluring mise-en-scène.

I order ale while Claire has a chardonnay and we get a table by a bookshelf, loaded with games like Scrabble and weighty, ancient cookbooks. Margaret Fulton’s surely in the ghostly pile.

Claire asks, ‘Do you think anyone actually plays these games?’ I reply that I don’t think it matters for their aesthetic value is symbolic. Rather than engaging in a boisterous bout of Monopoly, folks are comforted by knowing they could play. Ah, the sanctuary of proximate boardgames.

And then, dear readers, our afternoon took a curious turn.

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Always capable of a sun-drenched surprise Claire declares, ‘After this we’re heading next door to the General Havelock.’ Such boldness, such cheerful extravagance. Two Mystery Pubs!

What a time to be alive on Hutt Street.

So, we decamp to the Havey and it’s quiet but still before six bells.

Standing at the bar I recall being here late last century and mulleted men in chambray shirts and women wearing rugby tops with upturned collars and Gumbo Ya Ya playing New Orleans rhythm and blues.

Above the fireplace there’s a topographic map of Adelaide in 1876 and Claire and I peer and point and examine in our almost superannuated way.

‘Where’s Adelaide oval?’

‘Do you think that’s Norwood?’

‘Why so many churches?’

Even for a June 30, Friday evening it’s fun.

Our geographical ponderings are disturbed when a loud conga line of young, drunk things evidently celebrating the end of the financial year (EOFY) bursts into the pub and wobbles out towards the beer garden.

Oh.

Partying to honour fiscal milestones is as mystifying as throwing a bash because you’ve just bought three cheap tyres for the Corolla. It may be brash and inappropriate, but I was reminded of this.

What do accountants use for contraception?

Their personality.

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Mystery Pub: Brickmakers Arms

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Mine host lent over and set the candle aflame. A small vase of fresh flowers smiled up at us from the table too.

Claire said to the proprietor, ‘Thanks for that. It’s rare to see candles in Adelaide pubs.’

‘Yes,’ I agreed thinking of Fitzroy, Carlton and Collingwood. ‘Melbourne does this well. We could learn a thing or two.’

The innkeeper then hoiked some blue gum into the fire, and we shared our approval of this with him too. What a sunny relationship we were forming with the proximate staff of the former Gaslight Tavern. Each of us now looked our glowing best in the candlelight.

Out on the footpath, the autumn leaves swirled along Chief Street. A couple punters sat in the fading day, nursing their beers. The working week was done for many. We were among this fortunate set.

One of life’s tiny joys is scanning the Friday beer taps, deliberating and finally choosing.

Mystery Pub silently demands some bravery, so I order beyond my usual home lagers. Claire selects an Alpha Box and Dice white from Mclaren Vale. I go local with a hazy ale from Findon’s Shapeshifter Brewery. It’s called Party Shirt. At 5pm on a Friday, I have no beer enemies. I save my disagreeability for the worksite.

The renovations are thoughtful. There’s considered use of timber to offset the white walls and a Scandi theme is clear. Happily, for us, no blonde, steely blue-eyed serial killers are in the house. The candles are burning brightly now.

In a quiet Mystery Pub revolution, I leap up to get us our second and final drink. Claire declares, ‘I’ll get these.’

Immediately, I retort, ‘No. As Mystery Pub host tonight, I think I should sort them.’ In June when I’m the guest I’ll just sit in my chair for the duration. Like Chuck at his coronation but with smaller ears, a reassuring ale, and fewer billions.

I return moments later with bounty. Another Alpha Box and Dice wine for Claire. This time a red while I escort a glass of Tiny Fish Pale Ale to our secluded spot. Both are adequate but not nearly as impressive as the candlelight about which during writing I seem to have developed a curious, unprecedented fascination.

In the Brickmakers (sic) Arms we continue to decant our week.

Leaving, we discuss how lovely it is to visit a pub where you wouldn’t expect to find one. Chief Street is sinking into the dark now.

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Mystery Pub: The Joiners Arms

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Mystery Pub tonight saw the inclusion of four old friends Mozz and Kath, and Paul and Ali.

As such they’re special guest stars. Just like Jonathan Harris on Lost in Space when he played the outrageous villain Dr Smith. Pleasingly during our time at the pub, nobody is called a ‘bubble-headed booby.’ We all share an ancient Kimba connection. Claire, of course, was a star of the TV show Cartoon Connection.

Yet again, Claire has done a tremendous job in organising Mystery Pub. Here are some, but not all, of this episode’s key decision-making criteria:

  1. Close to my work given I was travelling back from the Barossa
  2. Accessible by public transport for Mozz and Kath who are staying on King William Street
  3. Proximate to the Northern Expressway for Paul and Ali
  4. Near the tram stop for Claire, who works by Light Square
  5. An open and trading pub, unlike the Land of Promise which given its current boarded-up status is particularly unpromising
  6. A front bar free of wandering livestock, given an undisclosed number of our entourage may suffer from capraphobia, or fear of goats
  7. Beer.

Paul is nervous that we might break a number of the rules governing Mystery Pub. He states, anxiously ‘Your one-hour limit rule could be ignored.’

Channelling Meatloaf, I reply, ‘I’ll do anything for love, but I won’t do that.’

Today’s our last opportunity to see Mozz and Kath as they’re going overseas for six months to visit New Jersey (lots of turnpike action), Canada, the UK, Scandinavia, and continental Europe (inexplicably not Wank Mountain in the Bavarian Alps) among other varied destinations. They’re only avoiding Abyssinia, Persia, and the Ottoman Empire as these all, sadly, no longer exist.

Upon arrival I duck out to check the beer garden. It’s a big and functional space entirely devoid of any living plant or vegetable which in my book makes it not a garden but an ode to cement. There is a group at a table and they’re overseen by an odd-shaped and silvery helium balloon and this screams, ‘Private function. Stay away.’

We do.

Inside the pub is warm and charismatic. Exposed bricks, beautiful stain-glassed windows, a range of curious craft beers on tap. A point of difference is their Happy Hour runs from 3 to 5. With mere seconds remaining, we sneak in a couple quick refreshments so as not to embarrass ourselves (spiritually and fiscally) and settle into our table’s compelling Friday rhythm.

Outside it’s Hindmarsh.

The pub appears to the world as modest, reserved, and almost a little shy. Across the road is the soccer stadium where Adelaide United play while it’s also a drama and music hub with the Entertainment Centre, live music mecca The Gov and the always fun Holden Street Theatres all nearby.  

We have known each other for decades but haven’t assembled since our dear, absent friends Annie and Bazz (currently perspiring profusely in Darwin) had their Adelaide retirement party at the Broady on a wintry November afternoon last year.

We used to share tales of footy and golf and cricket and associated late night exploits. Now we provide retirement visions and medical updates (executive summaries only).

Once upon a time this could evolve into a elongated evening. But Paul and Ali are off to a McLaren Vale wedding tomorrow, Mozz and Kath are heading home to sort things ahead of their vast international odyssey, and Claire and I have Escape to the Country obligations. Will that hugely self-pleased couple from Canary Wharf buy a six-bedroom property in Shropshire?

It’s been a lovely, affirming time with friends. We see the very best versions of each other.

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Mystery Pub: Getting Metaphysical at the Morphett Arms

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Glen Campbell gave us ‘Rhinestone Cowboy’ and failed contestants of the ancient quiz show Sale of the Century were gifted a diamond encrusted stick pin by host Glenn Ridge. So what jewel does Glengowrie offer us?

Why, of course, the muscular boozer that is the Morphett Arms.

It was an act of bravery but also necessity. The pub is large, aggressively functional and a shrine for disciples of the Friday Meat Tray. None of these generally hold much appeal for Claire, but it’s seven minutes from home, and it would be a snobbish oversight to not swing by at least once as curious locals. Mystery Pub, as you well know, is underpinned by egalitarian principals and a dedication to exploration, geopolitics and post-modern art.

It’s not just a shameless monthly excuse to get on the gargle for an escapist hour.

The courtyard is a fine place to nurse, or if required, attack an end of week refreshment. The sole maple tree offers shade, beauty and a certain conspiratorial atmosphere, enhanced by us having the space almost entirely to ourselves.

There’s a decent range of tap beer but my Coopers XPA lacks punch. I suspect I’m the first to have one for the afternoon and so the keg’s still asleep. On occasion, being a beer pioneer comes at significant personal cost and if I weren’t of a buoyant mood this might have represented an existential crisis. Fatigued ale claims many a hapless victim. Don’t be next.

Claire’s white wine is white and winey in her etched and apparently complimentary glass.

We debrief our week and anticipate the next which with the Fringe now underway includes many Auslan interpreting gigs for Claire at the Holden Street Theatre and in town for various comedians such as Lloyd Langford, our funniest Welsh import. He could read from a phone book (explain this to the kids) and it’d be amusing.

I discuss going to Kapunda for work in a few days’ time and how this’ll be a euphoric treat despite the continuing sadness of the 2022 fire in Eringa. I love going home.

We sit happily at our elevated table and a few groups of post-work folk now drift in. Behind me on the large screen the cricket’s on in Delhi and local boy Travis Head comes and goes without me noticing. I’m probably more disappointed that the next Test has been moved from Dharamsala. It’s the most spectacular setting for a cricket ground with the snowy Himalayas looming just beyond the grandstands.

Our barkeep has a name badge with Rourke on it so when I return for round two of cuppage that’s what I call him. ‘Can I have a Pirate Life thanks, Rourke?’ His badge must be vaguely accurate as he replies, ‘Sure.’ My wife opts for a gin which is fair enough in mid-February. We have a funny conversation about Rourke, and the often-surprising helpfulness of a clearly visible nametag.

On our way to the motor, we duck into the front bar and the meat tray raffle’s away. Despite his microphone and a decent PA system, the spruiker’s a shouty chap and he barks, ‘That’s it for the pink tickets.’ I note a rise in the pub hub-bub, probably that of the singular discontent generated by the sudden pang of knowing you’re not going home with a pack of neck chops, chicken snags and lumpen rissoles.

Still, all blue ticketholders are alive and well. They might be in carnivorous luck yet.

Claire and I had also been in luck having just spent a lovely hour chatting beneath an unexpected maple tree. The tree is spectacular and although trees are not unknown in beer gardens, its green canopy made our occasion snug, and invested the visit with gratitude for our good fortune and mostly easy city and Glengowrie. At all of this I felt a tiny whiff of wonder.

This, my friends, is what Mystery Pub is really about.

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Mystery Pub: The Guardsman

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Trainspotters such as your good self will be intimate with the LMS Royal Scot Class 6115 Guardsman.

This celebrated British steam locomotive was built by the London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) in Glasgow and has innumerable global fans.

However, if I’m honest my sole interest is it giving its name to the boozer in the Adelaide railway station. Although it could be argued that it’s actually resident in the casino, it opened in 2020, just in time for the bonkers pandemic.

Ever-observant and alert to Mystery Pub possibilities, Claire noted my curiosity in one day visiting The Guardsman. I’m sure this happened on New Year’s Eve as we cut through the station on our way to the cricket at Adelaide Oval.

And, of course, the prime function of a marriage is to constantly monitor the environment for new and compelling pub experiences which might interest your spouse.

Thank you, wife.

Railway stations are frequently exciting places, that are grand and dignified and once inside, regal and startlingly vast. I love airports for their utility, but train terminals are romantic repositories of hope and boundless promise. In April we’ll visit stations in Milan, Florence and Pisa among others. Doubtless, these will be intoxicating and buzzing and Italian.

Rogue casino operators, SkyCity, invested about six million in The Guardsman so we were pleased to hop into subsidised $4 beer and wine. I’m vaguely confident that the last chance I had for this was in 1992 at the Buckleboo Club. My colleague also had a double gin for $8, because she could and largely as the bar staff urged her so to do.

Claire asked, ‘Shall we sit inside or out?’ It’s an eternally good question and giving this profound life matter the requisite introspection, like a modern-day René Descartes I said, ‘Let’s do both.’

While inside architecture is our focus and then later outside it’s people, and this is always a neat principal. The interior is spacious and intimate.

My previous pub experience in the railway station was in 1983, during Year 12. Pre-Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Festival Theatre saw Chrisso, Davo, Stephen and I rushed to get to the theatre on time, but with country boy enthusiasms, somehow managed to slip into the Overland Tavern for a brisk jug of West End Draught before the curtain went up.

While some may have found the kitchen aromas suggestive of exotic Asian destinations and the Orient Express and tropical evenings beneath slowly turning ceiling fans while monkeys and tigers provide a fascinating if faintly troubling soundtrack, we took a table on the far side as we just found it stinky.

Our second, and as tradition now dictates, final refreshment was enjoyed overlooking the station concourse. We could now hear music and Supertramp was received well by your correspondent, as was a tune by The Beach Boys. Claire said, ‘We must remember to watch the movie about the Beach Boys.’ I replied with uncommon expansiveness in saying, ‘Yes.’

Scurrying folk on their way to Womma or Noarlunga or Belair or North Haven made for enlivening viewing as we sipped our Sauvignon Blanc (Claire) and Pirate Life (me). Between 5 and 6pm on a Friday is the captivating time to park oneself in a railway station and speculate on the inner lives of anonymous commuters.

And we had garlic bread! What a time to be alive.

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Mystery Pub: The Sailmaster

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Turning right off Port Road just west of my work in Hindmarsh we’re immediately whizzed along by the vast volume of traffic on the bland if instructively named Northern Expressway.

We’d completed twenty-six instalments of Mystery Pub but not previously used this motorway and Claire was captivated. ‘I wonder where we’re going?’ she asked, not unfairly. ‘Surely, not the Hamley Bridge pub?’ I’d recently learnt that this old country boozer had reopened, and this might’ve caught her attention too. ‘No,’ I reassured Claire, kindly, if monosyllabically.

It’s always good when Mystery Pub generates a sense of mystery.

We drive on.

*

The Lefevre Peninsula is Adelaide’s most intriguing locality.

A narrow sand-spit in the city’s north, there’s abundant charm and fascination. Just as the good folk of the Lone Star State are Texans first and Americans second, I imagine Peninsula people are also ferociously loyal.

The Sailmaster, North Haven’s stylish and airy pub, sits by and over the marina. After a dismal, constantly windy and cold spring, our bright and warm afternoon is glorious. It’s a big tavern with generous spaces, and the breeze moves through it like the East Egg mansion of Tom and Daisy Buchanan, as featured in The Great Gatsby.

On the deck we claim a table and the marina’s a festive sight with yachts and their denuded masts, bobbing in the exquisite, wafting day. I’m not a boatie but like sometimes to be proximate to watercraft, to feel their unhurried symbolism while carefree gulls wheel above.

The effervescent bar-keep counsels me into changing Claire’s wine to a Squealing Pig Sauvignon Blanc. I consent, as Friday afternoon’s no time for petty squabbles, and his priestly guidance is compelling.

In the Cargo Bar a big screen shows the Adelaide Test catapulting towards its unavoidable conclusion. Again, I don’t need to be there, but it reassures me that if I wanted to, I could. It’s a privilege to be met with abundant choice in our modest, isolated city.

The beer menu is daring and encouraging. Beyond the robust stalwarts, there’s some craft brews from emerging producers, and I settle upon a Barossa Blonde from Lyndoch’s Ministry of Beer.

Every country town in our nation will one day host both a distillery and a craft brewer. How fantastic to be in the steel vat business? Could you keep up with demand? Should I get one for my shed?

*

The central concept driving Mystery Pub, you might be surprised to read, is not just a monthly Friday during which we drop our snouts in the trough. No, really.

It’s a shared enterprise and an unbroken series of bids from one to the significant other. It’s an invitation to be immersed. Hopefully, the pub deck doesn’t give way and we are suddenly immersed in the Gulf St Vincent.

But this is about locating a novel nook among new-found and engaging surrounds, alongside the person with whom, on the weekend’s cusp, you most want to invest a lazy, nautical hour.

So much of life should be about conversation, and Mystery Pub is an occasion for this. It’s a twinkling hour to dissect the immediate past and anticipate our joyous onward march. Either way I love surrendering to my wife’s delightful orbit, when the context of the pub vanishes, and we could be anywhere across our elongated capital.

*

Steering south from The Sailmaster, the maritime suburbs materialise and then dissolve, their flat contentment a merry vista.

Osbourne, Taperoo. Largs. Semaphore.

Military Road moves us along and the blue light slants in through the windows. Peering at townhouses and bluestone villas, we ask each other if we could live here or there and ponder the possibilities while projecting our looming selves into these communities. All have their attendant attractions and distractions.

There’s a heartening intimacy in the speculation, an enlightening probing of each other’s thinking, and some of Claire’s responses surprise me, and some don’t but this, of course, is a towering triumph. How lucky are we to be right here, right now driving along this prosperous esplanade? The moments are both stretched like a slow dawn and as difficult to snare as mosquitos.  

And then West Beach becomes Glenelg North, and our garage door climbs up, so we finish off Friday and wave in the weekend.

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Mystery Pub: The Hilton

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The bar was empty.

No, there were three bar staff in there.

This was a worry. Can I help you? asked one of the three.

Claire patiently explained that we were here for a drink (possibly predictable for a bar) to which another of the three replied that they were closed for a private law firm function. My heart was gladdened. Law firms need a leg up.

Claire further explained that she had phoned the day before and was told that our brief and good-natured visit would be fine. Be great to see you, they said.

With that we all decided it would be best if Claire and I departed. So, we left the Treasury  bar that will remain nameless. Afterall, in there they know lawyers.

*

The Hilton Hotel has sat by Victoria Square for forty years. Last I checked its bar was called Charlie’s, but the name seems to have disappeared.

The bar is not so much a dedicated room within the hotel but rather a commandeered chunk of the lobby. It’s spacious and host to big and low chairs and a large light fitting that, like all large light fittings, wants to be interesting and a conversation piece. Sadly, for it, it’s only functional and dull (in aesthetic heft, not wattage).

One of the beer taps is labelled 1837 which is a pale ale from Tanunda’s Rehn Bier. Being permanently beer-curious, I order one. Veering across the brown carpet (a tragic phrase, even in 1977) we claim a spot.

I then learn that at this precise moment friends are at the Rehn Brewery in Tanunda and Mozz is also sampling the 1837. I announce to Claire that this is surely another Pina Colada moment. Of course, it’s not but I’m addicted to the song and applying this malapropism whenever there’s a vague coincidence.

Tellingly, I’m not into yoga and I have half a brain.

We then spend time, as we often do, speculating upon the backstory of Kath Day-Knight. Did she ever have a job? If her first husband Gary Poole was such a rogue, how did she end up with a house? What is it with the speed reading?

I have a second 1837 (does this make 3674?) and Claire has a glass of red. We speak of other matters, not including: Japanese constitutional law, Schrödinger’s cat, the discography of Pink.

The year’s penultimate Mystery Pub clocks in under an hour, but is a vibrant affair, what with the estimable atmosphere of the CBD.

At no point do we wonder how the legal firm private function is going just up the road at the Treasury.

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Mystery Pub: Silver Brewing

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Claire indicated (always the preferred option) and swung our car into a narrow park next to that most generic of suburban motors, the Barina. We were on Gouger Street but on the western side of that boisterous, gastronomically-celebrated thoroughfare.

I had no idea where we were heading for winter’s final instalment (spring commences on September 22 as per the astronomical seasons) of Mystery Pub which, of course, is central to the concept. There was more puzzlement than an episode of Scooby Doo, set in an abandoned amusement park.

The bar/brewery/distillery/restaurant etc is located in a former warehouse with multiple rooms and an outdoor area. Despite the cavernous interior there was a cosiness. Adjacent to the bar is a Millard caravan and Claire and I spoke of this being Glenn McGrath’s first and best nickname, given to him when he lived in one as an aspiring young cricketer, down from the bush. The caravan was clearly a successful conversation starter and I anticipated circumnavigating the continent in our retirement and every single night for two years setting up our van in say, Wollongong, and without fail, telling Claire this cricketing factoid.

Claire had a pinot noir served in the now compulsory giant glass. If these continue to expand in volume Friday’s plonk will need to come with a yellow-shirted lifeguard. I had the pilsner and being five o’clock on a Friday, my enthusiasm compensated for its lack of crispness. A kindly man gave us his chair so we moved camp away from the door and the pesky (like the kids of the aforementioned Scooby Doo and especially Velma) late afternoon sun.

A generous crowd was assembling and they appeared to be in buoyant attitude. They matched our demographic and I wondered where the young folk were. And almost immediately, I didn’t care.

We dissected our days and spoke of our weekend. I was eager to get home and play my new (old) Jose Feliciano vinyl featuring the greatest cover of all time (alright, top 43) in ‘Light My Fire.’

Claire ordered another pinot noir and purchased me a pale ale, made on premises and cooked in one of the copper vats I saw near the caravan. Although there was initial disappointment that there were no chips (crisps for those playing along in the UK) we knew this was actually a good thing. The menu advertised ‘Viking Burgers’ but a recent blood test and medical discussion suggested I needed to reduce my consumption of Scandinavian seafaring warriors, so we declined.

A window behind us revealed a large room with DJ decks out the front. I imagined a late-night rave with impossibly youthful types dancing their evenings (and mornings) away whilst temporarily forgetting the global housing crisis.

Back at our car on Gouger Street the Barina had fled.

We did too.

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Mystery Pub: The Largs Pier

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‘After an afternoon on Brighton Pier they’d all race off for a feed of scampi,’ I remarked to my wife. We were discussing Brighton, the East Sussex version. Not the Adelaide or even the Melbourne suburb.

‘What is scampi?’ she asked, not unreasonably.

I paused and considered. ‘Fishy stuff. Crumbed.’ Piscatorial insights have never been in my (fishing boat) wheelhouse.

Claire was not about to accept such an enfeebled reply. ‘Right, but what is it exactly?’

‘Err,’ I mumbled. ‘Dunno. Scampi is just scampi.’

I gave up and opened my phone. Dublin Bay Prawn or Norway Lobster. Not only these but it’s also a ‘seafood delicacy,’ I volunteered.

The Largs Pier is a place to ponder big questions such as this. Even non-gastronomic ones. My wife, Claire and I were here for our monthly Mystery Pub excursion. It was my choice. I had an aged Sparkling Ale in front of me and Claire had a brandy.

We had wandered through the pub. It’s regal and opulent with high ceilings and views out into the flat gulf. There’s a restaurant and another bar named Dixon’s (being the middle name of Jimmy Barnes, the main screamer for Cold Chisel). It’s a popular wedding venue too.

Big question #2 then emerged as contemplating our current context I took my turn to quiz Claire. ‘What’s the difference between a jetty and a pier?’ Our relaxing hour in the pub was transmogrifying into an episode of It’s Academic. We should’ve worn our Kapunda High School blazers. That may have prompted comment from strangers.

I explored the question. ‘So, why isn’t this the Largs Jetty Hotel? And why isn’t the Glenelg pub called the Pier?’

Claire had an answer. ‘I think a pier has entertainments on it like rides and stalls and assorted amusements.’ I’m unsure why she responded in a grammatical style reminiscent of a Wikipedia entry.

‘Right,’ I nodded. Who knew that going to the pub could be so instructive? I vowed to do this again soon. Perhaps I should keep the drinks receipts and use them at tax time as a self-education deduction.

The wintry sunset slanted in across our table and outside under the wide veranda, some young tradies were making an enthusiastic start to their weekend. Dotted about the pub, faux 1920’s artworks gave the place an appropriately jaunty, seaside atmosphere.

Our second and final round of drinks included a Pirate Life South Coast Pale Ale or PLSCPA, as nobody abbreviates it. It was crisp and confident, while Claire had a white wine of indeterminant variety and style but she didn’t seem to mind. We didn’t want our visit to suffer from too much information.

The Largs Pier (Jetty) Hotel is an arresting, grand old esplanade boozer. It has mobs of beers on tap and offers a wide menu.

There’s no immediate plans to serve scampi.

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Mystery Pub: El Cheeky Flamingo

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‘As your attorney I advise you to have a beer,’ said Claire.

No she didn’t, but I just wanted to insert a Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas reference given that I’m re-reading Hunter S. Thompson’s gonzo journalism classic. Gonzo denotes an exaggerated and crazy and proudly subjective style. But you knew this already.

It’s a text that celebrates excess and ridiculousness and decadence which, of course, is entirely unrepresentative of the ideals we hold dear regarding the monthly excursion of Mystery Pub.

Parking at Claire’s CBD worksite we then galloped a mile or so to the East End. I had no insight into our destination and arriving at Vardon Street there were tables and chairs and fire pits all stocked and awaiting ignition. It was another episode in their Winter Weekends event.

Having secured a chardonnay and a draught beer we sat by a gas heater as event staff set the redgum ablaze. Microphones and amps were connected under a marquee.

Meanwhile music played and the acoustics meant we could only hear the bass. The vocals were terribly muddy. We thought one song the Shawn Mullins’ tune ‘Lullaby.’ You know the one that begins with an almost spoken-word style that’s a bit Jack Nicholson in tenor-

She grew up with the children of the stars
In the Hollywood hills and the boulevards.
Her parents threw big parties. Everyone was there.
They hung out with folks like Dennis Hopper and Bob Seger and
Sonny and Cher.

And then the chorus goes-

Everything’s gonna be all right.
Rock-a-bye, rock-a-bye.
Everything’s gonna be all right.
Rock-a-bye, rock-a-bye, rock-a-bye.

A one-hit wonder from 1998, we agree that it’s a good song.

But it wasn’t the one we heard. I don’t know what it was. Something with a similar bass guitar line. Good for the mystery to continue on Mystery Pub night.

Meanwhile a man cooked meat with Spanish aromas. None of that for us as we had some equally evil charcuterie treats home in the Frigidaire. Is there anything better than Friday night cheese?

I had a Balter XPA and Claire had an approachable merlot blend. All wine should be approachable. I’ve no truck with haughty plonk.

We made our way back to the car via the Illuminate Festival on North Terrace. A giant queue of kids and parents stretched outside the museum. Like blackheads on a teenager there were inky puffer jackets everywhere.

Inside was a Lego event. A gonzo occasion of tremendous proportions. We left them to it.