The Royal Tour

This is it, the new exciting endeavour I teased in the last post.  It is one of the greater challenges to come out of a random 11:30pm beery conversation.  It will take years, but it will be done.  I will have a beer in every Royal Hotel in Australia.  It will be: The Royal Tour.

My cohort in this endeavour will be one John Weekes (of guest blogpost fame).  But we will undoubtedly be joined by many along the way for at least some legs of this journey.  Indeed, any and all are welcome to join us in as much or as little of this endeavour as they wish.  And while it may indeed take years, our progress will be charted on this very blog.

A few ground rules/basics:

• The pub must be called simply: Royal Hotel.  No Royal Mail, Royal Exchange, Royal Oak, etc.  Equally not “Rafferty’s Royal Hotel” or anything like that.  Just “Royal Hotel”.
• This may seem obvious, but the pubs must be open and operational.  We’re not going to be jumping fences to have clandestine beers in the beer garden of some long-abandoned or derelict Royal Hotel.  I’m not messing with any drunk ghosts.
• Given the above criteria, that total comes to 138 Royal Hotels nationwide.  I’ve done a fair bit of research on these, but if I’ve missed any, please do get in touch and let me know so I can happily add them to the quest.
• The most remote and difficult to get to of all the Royal Hotels (Thursday Island) will be saved for last.

I was surprised to learn in my research how east-coast-centric the distribution of Royal Hotels is, and thus the Royal Tour will be.  There are 3 in WA, 4 in SA, and the rest of the 138 in NSW, Queensland, and Victoria (with the vast majority in New South Wales).  The Northern Territory, ACT, and Tasmania don’t have a single one.  The exact breakdown is as per the below:

Queensland (22 Royal Hotels):

Gympie	Inglewood	Gatton
Murgon	Kalbar	Munduberra
Yarraman	Leyburn	Tiaro
Eromanga	Meandarra	Townsville
Harrisville	Rosedale	Mount Larcom
Herberton	Maryborough	Beenleigh
Hughendon	Mossman
Ingham	Thursday Island

New South Wales (88 Royal Hotels):

Sutherland	Armidale	Quirindi	Brewarrina	Euabalong	Manilla
Carlton	Coonabarabran	Corowa	Bungendore	Euston	Mendooran
Randwick	Taree	Bondi	Canowindra	Galong	Merriwa
Darlington	Moree	Spring Ridge	Capertee	Grong Grong	Ariah Park
Paddington	Tumut	Mandurama	Caragabal	Gurley	Mount Hope
Leichhardt	Dungog	Adelong	Carcoar	Guyra	Murrurundi
Granville	Singleton	Barham	Cassilis	Hill End	Narromine
Ryde	Parkes	Berrigan	Condobolin	Kew	Sofala
Orange	Wyong	Binnaway	Cudal	Lyndhurst	Springwood
Gilgandra	Warialda	Blayney	Dalton	Mandurama	Tambar Springs
Musswelbrook	Queanbeyan	Boggabri	Denman	Manildra	Temora
Redfern	Richmond	Bowral	West Wyalong	Casino	Grenfell
South Grafton	Wallerawang	Scone	Oberon	Tingha	Trangie
Wardell	Warren	Weethalle	Wee Waa	Wentworth	Woodstock
Yass	Yeoval	Camden	Tenterfield

Victoria (21 Royal Hotels)

Portland	Koo Wee Rup	Richmond
Snake Valley	Mornington	Sunbury
Seymour	Sea Lake	Footscray
Benalla	Queenscliff	Clifton Hill
Drouin	Daylesford	Rainbow
Dunolly	Kerang	Bacchus Marsh
Inglewood	St Arnaud	Horsham

South Australia (4 Royal Hotels)

Balaklava

Crystal Brook

Moonta

Torrensville

Western Australia (3 Royal Hotels)

Perth

Kojonup

East Perth

I’ve included those lists and breakdowns for 2 reasons:

1. If there are any inaccuracies (i.e. you know those towns don’t have a Royal or you know of one not on the list) please, very much let me know
2. If you are near one of those Royal’s or would like to join the tour for any of the legs, equally please let me know.

It’s hard to sum up how much I’m looking forward to working through this list over the next several years.  It combines two of my great loves: visiting off-the-beaten track parts of the country, and drinking beer.

The journey of 1,000 Royals (or 138 at lest) begins with a single beer.  And Weeksy and I have indeed already commenced this journey.  So in addition to the usual beer recommendations and brewery visits you can usually find here, keep an eye out for the periodic update of our progress through The Royal Tour.