Co. Derry

Draperstown is Co. Derry's gateway to the Sperrin Mountains, and the Market Inn is the all-time favourite hostelry of writer, broadcaster and journalist Owen Kelly, a native of the town.

The Market Inn began life as a farmers' pub back in the days of the spirit grocer, and the talk of stock prices and good deals seems to have evolved, according to Kelly.

"The Market Inn is a place where slightly surreal conversations take place constantly," he says. "My milieu is the public bar where I'll meet the man who is refusing to join the income tax scheme, or the one who knows every line Robert Service ever wrote, or the character who achieved fame of a sort by seeing little men six inches high dancing in the mist one morning while stone cold sober."

St Patrick Street, Draperstown

From the Appletree Press title: The Irish Pub Guide.
Also from Appletree: Irish Pub Songs.