The memories I have of dogs in bars are not great. In my old local Wiltshire pub, a huge dog used to roam free. The word huge is an understatement. He was as big as Hagrid’s beast, Fang. It was terrifying the way he would charge at me to sniff my derrière. I knew I would never feel comfortable drinking in in that pub with that wolf guarding it.

That was, until I came across Dugs n’ Pubs. A bitchin website run by partners, Kevin and Rhian from Edinburgh. They have combined their two favourite loves together; Dugs (Scottish for dog) and Pubs. After the couple met, they decided to get a dog back in 2009, called Bailie Dug. As regular pub goers, they’d often take their new puppy with them. Then, after deciding to buy a campervan, they began a challenge to see how many places they could take their sweet pup into. They impressively made it from Orkney to Lands End, which would have been a pub crawl of Lord Of The Rings style proportions.

This sparked the creative doggy juices and they began an online directory. Rhian explain, “We started to talk to people locally on dog walks about places you could take your dogs. We soon realised that there was such a big dog community but it didn’t have a voice. I asked my partner (Kevin) to build me a website, something simple where we could list places that made us welcome and not just places that would tolerate our four-legged friends. Dugs n’ Pubs was born.”

Growing up, Rhian had always had dogs. Her family were publicans, who ran pubs that allowed furry friends to join them for a tipple. Though as they point out, people have been bringing their dogs with them to pubs since the dawning of time. Some even become the bar’s personal mascot like the mythical creature that lurked in my local. But rather than met with hostility such as my own, Kevin says it sparks off conversations with strangers rather than scare them away.

Though it’s hard to be frightened by their dog Bailie (pictured above). They tells us he is, “Quirky, loveable, a little bit crazy and the best friend you could wish for. But let’s not forget noisy, he’s a woofer is our Bailie.”

In fact, there’s nothing intimidating about these boozehounds at all. The debate around doggy danger always comes down to having bad owners who mistreat their dog, which enables them to become aggressive. People who care about their dogs, are their pals, who’ll take them out for a pint, so we really have nothing to fear.