A travel company is offering Wetherspoons fans the trip of a lifetime – to visit six of the budget boozer’s most historic venues for a sum of £700.
Tour operator Crossways Travel, who work out of Dorchester, will take their customers to pubs in Derby, Kewsick, Blackpool, Liverpool and Harrogate later this year as part of a six-day cross-country tour.
The trip, which will run from August 26 to September 2, includes a five-night stay at Hollins Hall Hotel, Leeds, and is part of a wider fascination with the chain’s iconic venues such as old theatres, listed buildings, and former police stations.
Also included in the £699 price is a £50 Wetherspoons gift card and entry to the Royal Armories Museum where passengers can take a booze break and sample some military artifacts through the ages.
Crossways Travel Director, Matthew Crocker, 55, said the idea was entirely his own as he looks to try something ‘off-the-wall’ for his passengers.
The elderly cohort who make up his most frequent customers are said to be fascinated by history and have a penchant for a pint – making it a no-brainer.
‘We wanted to do something completely different,’ he told MailOnline.
‘A lot of our customers are elderly anyway and one of the first things they ask when they get off a coach is “where is the nearest Wetherspoons?”
Passengers will visit their first of five Wetherspoons pubs on Tuesday, August 26, The Standing Order in Derby; the pub was built in 1725 as the Crompton and Evans Union Bank, before later becoming a NatWest branch which closed in 1993
After breakfast the following day, the coach will then head to the market town of Keswick, where passengers will stop at The Chief Justice and Common Pleas; this pub began as a magistrates court and police station and still holds the original canopied witness stand and police cells
Later that Wednesday, the coach will head 30 minutes east on the A66 to The Dog Beck in Penrith which used to house Cumberland County Clinic – a dispensary that served the Victorian inhabitants of the town
‘Whatever your opinion on them, they are really good value and some of the buildings they use are really historic.
‘As a company we have a lot of tours that to go old properties through the National Trust and English heritage.
‘So we wanted to do something off the wall and different while including insightful talks and a historic hotel as part of our tour.
‘I have spoken to Wetherspoons about it and closer to the time we’re planning to contact a member of staff at each of the pubs who perhaps have worked there for a long time and is interested in the history of their building.
‘That way they can do an introduction talk to our passengers once we arrive.’
In the first two days of the tour, the coach will stop at The Standing Order in Derby, The Chief Justice and Common Pleas in Keswick and The Dog Beck in Penrith.
On Thursday, passengers will then go The Velvet Coaster in the seaside town of Blackpool, before wrapping the trip up with visits to The North Western in Liverpool and The Winter Gardens in Harrogate.
And with half of the seats on the coach already booked, Mr Crocker said he will be ‘chuffed’ if the trip can sell out.
On Thursday, The Velvet Coaster in Blackpool will be next up, which was recently voted the ‘nicest Wetherspoons’; sprawling across three floors, it is one of the UK’s largest pubs and sits near the seafront
Liverpool is next on the list as passengers visit The North Western, which is a a grade two listed building designed by the Liverpool-born Victorian architect Alfred Waterhouse
The final Wetherspoons of the tour is The Winter Gardens in Harrogate, which boasts Victorian architecture a glass roof, stone columns, and imperial marble
Tour operator Crossways Travel, who operate out of Dorchester, are organising the five-night, six-day, cross-country tour of Wetherspoons’ most iconic venues
Director Matthew Crocker (left) said the idea was entirely his own as he looks to try something ‘off-the-wall’ for his passengers; he co-owns Crossways Travel with his wife Kadi (right)
He says the average age of his customers has gone down post COVID to roughly 65-years-old, but his most elderly passenger, a lady aged 97 from Dorchester, will be on the trip to sample England’s most historic Wetherspoons.
‘There’s a huge amount of senior citizens who want to come because they perhaps live on their own,’ he said.
‘They just want to get out and meet new friends and not to be sat in home surrounded by four walls.
‘It’s a nice opportunity for them to get out of the house and do something different.’
A Wetherspoons spokesman told MailOnline: ‘We have more than two million customers every week in our pubs.
‘They are very popular and if people wish to enjoy a holiday through them then we wish them every bit of luck.
‘Our managers across our pubs are very knowledgeable so if they wish to chat to them about the history of the buildings then they will be very well informed.’
