Three years ago I would have given this place five stars, as my first experience of Stanley and the pub was really one to remember. My friend and I, travelling through in a campervan, stopped overnight and got a bit tipsy in the public bar drinking delicious Boags Wizard Smith ales and meeting abalone divers next to the fire before having the meal of our lives (the chowder blew us away) in the bistro out the back.
A year ago, on my first return to Stanley since moving to Tasmania, I would have knocked the rating back to three stars. The pub didn't live up to the memory I'd been hanging onto. It was still tasty but the whimsy was gone, and I stayed upstairs at the pub overnight (I hadn't done so on my first visit), which was an interesting experience. I don't stay in a lot of pub accommodation but I reckon this was bang on for a standard pub room, so all good, but it's not an accommodation option I'd personally leap at.
My third visit was just a couple of weeks ago. I took my visiting BFF up to Stanley for the night because the north west is the Tasmania of my heart, my favourite corner of the state, and I'm still inexplicably drawn to Stanley. The accommodation we stayed in recommended the pub for our meal. It was... fine. Tasty food but nothing overwhelming. The bistro room itself smelled a bit weird, a little musty. The service was sweet. I have to stop ordering the seafood bisque (did it used to be a chowder? Has it changed? How's my memory?) because as tasty as it is, I don't think it'll ever live up to that first precious memory.
We also visited the bottle shop for the first time, and the range of Tassie wines was better than in the bistro! We grabbed a bottle of Blue Penguin Shiraz (which ended up being confusingly fruity for a Shiraz) and the public bar staff were good enough to pop the cork open for us as our accommodation's room didn't have a bottle opener (and we're so used to screw caps these days, we didn't even think to check).
So I'm gonna stick with three stars. My nostalgia for the pub is stronger than my present experience, but it's still a good spot for this little town. read more
