Royal Hotel Tenterfield

After saying goodbye to Tracy and Paul in Casino, we hit the road and headed for our next stop on the Tour, the Royal Hotel Tenterfield.

Before getting to Tenterfield, we did make a cheeky stop in at the Lunatic Hotel in the town of Drake. I would highly recommend it to anyone taking the same route. Multiple fire places, colourful and friendly locals, good pool tables, and cold beer. But this is the Royal Tour, not the Lunatic Tour (although sometimes I do wonder…). So on to Tenterfield!

I had been to the Royal Hotel Tenterfield years ago. And I definitely remembered it being a little bit rough. But things had definitely changed. This was a nice pub. It had been really well done up. But more on those details later.

We were actually booked in to stay at this particular Royal. So we pulled around the back, parked at the fairly generic motel-style units around the back.

But that was about the last thing about the Royal Hotel Tenterfield that I would describe as ‘fairly generic’. We walked into the pub itself to check in and were greeted by an ornate lobby with old timey staircase and a lounge with leather couches, stone walls, and wood panelling everywhere. This was definitely not the rough place I remembered.

And even better, when we actually checked in, we were offered a freshly baked ANZAC biscuit and a glass of milk. I think the milk was intended for use with tea or coffee. But that’s still the first Royal where we’ve been given milk and cookies on arrival. And I have a sneaking suspicion it’ll probably be the last too.

After dropping our bags in the rooms, we headed into the main bar. And once again, the Royal Hotel Tenterfield impressed.

The wood paneling and stone from the lounge was all over the main bar too. There was also a great pool table, big TV’s for sport viewing, and a fire place.

Even better, when we got to the bar to order up some beers, we discovered an awesome taplist. In addition to the normal country pub beers on tap, there were also multiple beers from Brewdog, Two Mates Brewing from Lismore, and our new favourite Deepwater Brewing (and again, that Deepwater Brewing blog post will be forthcoming). I mostly stuck to the India Red Ale from Deepwater. It’s a great beer for a session on a chilly arvo/evening. But the stouts on offer were pretty darn good for that scenario as well.

So with schooners of great craft beer in hand, we set up once again around the pool table. I genuinely don’t remember how the pool went, but I’m going to confidently go out on a limb and say John didn’t win. Dinner was also every bit as good as I expected given how impressive the pub was.

It was just after dinner that we got to chatting to one half of the couple that owned the hotel. She told us that they did much of the significant pub upgrades over the COVID years. They were keen to maintain and enhance the character of the pub (mission accomplished there). So amongst the overall facelift of the pub, they did things like getting rid of the beer-sponsored signage. But they were careful to keep things like the pillar featuring all of the brands from local cattle properties.

The overall result is an absolute gem of a pub. Good feed, craft beer, really classy interior, and classic facade. They just knocked it out of the park. The Royal Hotel Tenterfield ticks all of the boxes. So it was only right that we got maximum appreciation of the pub by having beers late into the night.

Royal Stats

• Town/Suburb: Tenterfield, NSW
• Population: 4,066
• Date Visited: Saturday, August 9, 2025
• Visited By: Cory, John, Bert, Turner, and Big Al
• Beer Sponsorship on Sign: None
• Beer Consumed at Pub: Deepwater India Red Ale
• Price of Schooner of Said Beer: $10.00
• Unique Award: Best Milk and Cookies Upon Arrival
• Tour Progress: 71.1% (96/135)