Wanted, brave pub owner – must be able to drive snow plough
THE LANDLADY of Britain’s highest pub has invited potential buyers to “try before they buy” by taking on the reins for a month to ensure they are hardy enough to see it through.
The Tan Hill Inn, famed for its isolation and winter storms, went up for sale last week with a price tag of £900,000.
At 1,732ft in the Yorkshire Dales, the pub is regularly snowed in, with landlady Louise Peace having spent up to 11 days inside.
Putting it up for sale, she said what was needed was someone with “stamina, eccentricity and love” and now, despite a flurry of interest on social media, she has said she is not sure there is anyone quite brave enough.
“We’ve had a lot of public interest – but I don’t know if there’s anyone mad enough out there,” she said. “It would be a lifestyle change certainly.
“I’ve learned to be a generator fitter, electrician. I can drive a snow plough. There’s not many people out there who will have that kind of dedication.
“If anybody wants to, they can try before they buy. Come and run it for a month – see if you can do better. I know they can. It just needs someone dedicated to the property.”
In November 2016, pop band Scouting For Girls were trapped in the pub by snow after a gig to raise money for Children In Need and around 60 guests were forced to spend three days there in January 2010 after being stranded on New Year’s Eve. Mrs Peace says she has been snowed in about 50 times, for between three and 11 days at a time.
She was “foolhardy” rather than hardy when she bought the pub 12 years ago in a moment of madness, she added, but has grown immensely fond of it and she will miss the business when she leaves to join her husband, Mike, in retirement at their home in Somerset.
“I was just foolhardy,” she said. “I said I don’t do Yorkshire, and I don’t do pubs. Twelve years later, we’re still doing both.
“It’s an absolutely wonderful place. It’s a bit like a child – but instead of the child flying the nest, it’s me. It’s time to let someone else take it on.”