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Beer lover Rob Cocker has been on a bar crawl for nearly 50 years – and has just visited his 11,000th pub.
Rob, 68, who has sunk an ale in every city in England, travels by train to areas he has not visited and samples the booze in up to 16 hostelries per day.
He said: “Drinking in the same place all the time didn’t appeal to me. I’ve always been a bit of a ‘statto’ and I used to write down the name of the pubs I drank in on the back of a fag packet, and I kept a diary.
“So I started looking for pubs I had not been into before. Probably 98 or 99% of them are CAMRA pubs.”
Rob, who supports his hometown club Stoke City, added: “My pub-hopping season starts in March. If Stoke have not got a game and I’m on an all-dayer, I will do 14 to 16 different pubs... I usually have a half and then on to the next one.”
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Truro in Cornwall was the last of the 51 cities in England he visited for a drink.
His 11,000th pub was The Albion Ale House in Standish, Greater Manchester.
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The retired payroll officer added: “I said to the landlord, ‘it’s a bit strange, but do you mind if I take your photo? You are my 11,000th pub’. People looked at me as if to say I was insane... I’ve met so many brilliant people. I have had landlords end up driving me around pubs.”
The dad-of-one’s favourite boozers include York Tap at York train station.
Wife Lynn, 63, said: “It’s been a lifelong crusade for him. I’m used to it now.”
