Woodies Ale House

To be honest, a pub that serves a decent selection of real ales, including guest beers, has go to do a lot wrong for me to get less than four stars, but has to be something really special to get five. And for me that sums Woodies up — great real ale pub but lacking a special something that would earn that 5^th star.
Situated at the top end of Headingley. I nipped in there for a pint last night for the first time in ages with Mr MacDoo on our monthly Date Night. There was a decent range of ales on. I went for the lovely Golden Sheep by Balck Sheep Brewery.
We’re out of term time at the moment, but there was still a group of students in the customary fancy dress that comes with doing the Otley run (for those not familiar, this is a big pub crawl that starts at the top of Otley Road and takes you right down towards the city centre. If you stay standing that long!) Thankfully, Woodies is the first pub on the Otley run so the revellers weren’t too rowdy and things hadn’t got that messy yet!
Woodies has a pool table and a big screen tv for sports events, as well as smaller tvs dotted about the place. There are also a couple of nice little hidey spots when you can have a bit more privacy and enjoy a quieter drink.
The beer was lovely and the atmos nice. I’ll definitely return again.

Woodies Ale House first made it’s mark to me when I was taken there on an Otley run. It’s a fairly small pub with a nice, warm atmosphere and a friendly clientele.
We grabbed a comfy table and sat down with a few drinks. We were all happy to find that the drinks were actually quite cheap — I suppose this could be due to the fact that the pob is a main stop off as pat of the Otley run so they do get a lot of custom.
The bar staff were extremely friendly and chatted politely to us as we had our drinks.

Woodies Ale House is a lovely traditional pub, something which is actually harder to find than you’d think unless you travel a little further afield. Bars are two-​a-​penny here in Leeds but good old pubs are a little more scarce — and I mean ale, cosy furniture, more focus on live music than live sports kind of pubs.
A good deal of people will know this pub from the infamous Otley run — it is the first in a long party filled, fancy dressed, student stuffed list of venues. I know Woodies for the ale, being from the old South West and right on top of a local brewery — Uley Brewery for those who might be interested! — I love my local beers. I know Deuchars is a bit of a standard ale but it’s a good one to start with if you’re not sure. If not, go for a guest ale — you might be surprised! A lovely place to go for a drink and escape the standard gaggle in Headingley.

When I had finished my final exam at University, me and a friend decided to go to the pub and have a few pints to stop the heart pounding panicky post exam stress. Woodies was just over the road and so we wobbled into there and ordered some very strong pale ale. YUMM. I love ale. It’s so nice. The pub looks traditional in décor as opposed to swanky pubs and bars but I really like this. It had outdoor heated seating area, and was lovely warm and cosy.
The other punters in the pub where mainly men aged between 30 and 60 but this was fine as we didn’t fancy being surrounded by the flocks of rowdy Hollyoaks wannabes that are commonly found in Headingley. This however is not always the case due to it being part of a pub crawl.
We had about 3 or 4 pints and then proceeded to discuss something historical with a lovely old bloke at the bar that for some reason I found very sweet and amusing. Although I can’t remember what it was, funnily enough!

Woodies is probably most well known for being the start of the Otley run (although, traditionally, it should be started at the Lawnswood Arms in Adel), but there is much more to this place than merely a starting post for a pub crawl. As is is on the very edge of Headingley, it has as more locals than students, and as such feels more authentic than some of the drinking holes in Headingley, something that is evident by the fact that it still calls itself an ‘ale house’.
One of the best things about Woodies is this devotion to ale: it serves, for example, Deuchars, a fruity pale ale that you are unlikely to find anywhere else in Headingley (except maybe Arcadia). There is a pool table, a dart-​board and a huge projector screen for important sporting occasions, as well as a huge heated smoking area out the back. The food is good and cheap, like the drinks, and you never have to wait too long to get served. Woodies is undeniably a good place to start your evening, but it’s not a bad place to finish it either.