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Glasgow Live
Glasgow Live
National
Carla Jenkins

Glasgow pensioners go on 40-year-long pub crawl around the west end

There is nothing better going back to the simple things in life that make us happy.

A natter with friends or family, a tour of a museum, a nice pint in a local pub. These are the things that life is made up of.

No one knows this better than Clydebank local Owen McGuigan.

Owen has been meeting up with his nephew Davie for a pint every Wednesday for the last 40 years, with one of them taking it in turns to drive every week so the other could have a drink and alternating things around.

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When Davie retired last July, and had the time to go for a drink during the day, the pair embarked what they can now call a year-long 'pub tour' around the west end with bus passes in hand- documenting it as they go.

Owen told Glasgow Live: "We stopped calling it a pub crawl and started calling it a tour, because we'll only really go to one or two pubs every week.

"We've been like brothers since he was born, and Davie came up with the idea. Now we both have a wee pint and a blether.

"The plan was we started Partick, did all the pubs on the main streets and the side streets and made our way up to Byres road.

"So far we've made it to 17 pubs in six months, just going once a week. On the first Wednesday we'll have our lunch. We even went into the art galleries around Partick too.

"After Byres Road we’ll continue into town and do the trendy pubs. The closer you get to town the dearer the pints get".

Among their favourites is the Tennent's pub on Byres Road (they quite like the lunch deals in there) and Bag O'Nails pub in Partick. The Arragon is good too with pints of their own bitters only costing £3.

During lockdown last year when the pubs were closed, the two weren't phased and had a wee 'virtual' pint instead.

They even had to do the same with the recent storms - but Owen says it wasn't "quite the same".

And since they started posting pictures of their escapades online, they have a good following of people in various Facebook groups who love to catch up on the drinking duo.

"There's a lot of people that like it, some old guys haven’t been for 60 years and they miss out. A lot of people live abroad, and you don’t get pubs like that abroad."

And after 40 years of trying out the boozers in an unofficial capacity, Owen is now somewhat a pub aficionado. He's whittled it down to a limit of only three pints, as he says four "does damage".

"Some are better than others" he said. "A good pub is the design of it. Even if it's modern, it's comfortable and has background music that's not too loud - that's what we go for, a chat anyways.

"Some we only stay for a pint as it's not quite right, but on those days it's technically a pub crawl if we're going to two.

"A good pub is all about the characters that come in too. Glasgow has a fantastic atmosphere, people will talk to anyone."

Quite right there, Owen. If you ever spot him and Davie out having a pint on a Wednesday in the future, give them a wee wave!

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