The Druids Head, Herne Bay

With 15 minutes to kill, I popped in for a quick Guinness at Saturday lunchtime. Decent enough Guinness. It's bright and clean. It's a Shepherd Neame boozer and standard Master Brew seemed the only non-lager lout offering. There were a few lager lots playing pool. One skinny specimen of around 40 had a definite "Wot you lookin' at?!" air. I imagine this place could be lively on Friday & Saturday nights. Barmaid looked as if she could handle herself.
The baize on the pool table is grey. There is a dartboard but it wasn't in action, with the pool players sitting underneath it.
No football on the first Saturday of August, though the ceiling is covered with football banners and flags that have been stapled up there. Great Britain losing to Argentina in the ladies' Olympic hockey was on one TV screen. It looks a punters' pub. The horseracing channels were on the other screens - even though it was well before the first race. There are prints of Desert Orchid and Kauto Star amongst the memorabilia on the walls.
OK for a swift half, but not a place I'd fancy on a busy night.

13 Aug 2024 08:12

Australian Arms, Ramsgate

Strewth! Beerintheevening's still going! Anyhow, I popped in here, largely because it's called The Australian Arms. On the train from London, I was following Footscray's surprise annihilation of Port Adelaide in the AFL Preliminary Final and the Bunnies' almost equally surprising win over Penrith in the opening weekend of the NRL Finals. Having imbibed much closer to the sea on past visits, I Googled the town's boozers for a watering hole closer to the station and this popped up.
I'm not a regular visitor to Ramsgate and had no idea this pub existed, tucked away as it is between the main A255 and Grange Road, which meanders down to the old ferry terminal.

Nothing amiss with the place at all.
It's a spacious boozer, with bits clearly added on over the years. Pool table with enough space to wield a cue. Two dartboards - one in a conservatory extension that seems designated as a child-friendly area. Impressive clean gents' bogs. One of the barmaids asked a regular to put a couple of small bets on the gee-gees for her, which is very old-school. (Obviously he did this on line, rather than nip out to Joe Coral, which isn't very old school.) One of the somewhat mature barmaids had a London drawl; the other a Renfrewshire or Lanarkshire accent.
This is just about the closest pub to the soccer ground. Ramsgate FC has had recent "investment" and they've started the season well, so a fair contingent of soccer fans traipsed in as Saturday afternoon wore on.
Allegedly, female convicts were kept in dungeon accommodation on the site before being escorted to the harbour and onwards to produce generations of Rugby League players for the Bunnies and 'Riff. I can't see that. Must've been a suitable holding pen near the harbour, out of sight of the Victorian nobility. The only thing remotely Australian was the Foster's, which might've gone down OK with celebrating Bulldogs fans, but wasn't much in demand with Bunnies & 'Riff fans when I was in Sydney - Toohey's being the brand of choice, regardless of Paul Hogan's amusing international advertising campaign.
Nothing in the "Olde Tyke Whippet Shoveller" poseurs category for the "Viz caricature" ale connoisseur, but several standard ales: Abbot, Timothy Taylor, Doom Bar. I unimaginatively stuck with as good a half-gallon of Doom Bar as you'll ever get, as I lobbed darts inaccurately at a board. Three pounds and 12 shillings isn't too steep, though this isn't Chelsea. Ramsgate remains a place with a high White Trash percentage, as the immense number of Chirpy L'il Cockney 'Ammers shirts indicates. The Australian Arms has the Ramsgate & District pub darts cup on the shelf. Former PDC World Championship finalist Kirk Shepherd hails from Ramsgate, as does 1970s News of the World Champion and 1980s runner-up, Mick Norris. No idea where Kirk Shepherd plays, but I checked Mick Norris's "King of Denmark" and it's the same Chinese takeaway it became in the mid-Noughties.
A good selection of the usual lager, cider & stout range was available.
No food, other than crisps & nuts, but there is a Domino's on the roundabout on the A255 at the end of the street, which does a great trade from the pissheads on weekend evenings.
Perfectly decent pub, worth an 8 out of 10.

12 Sep 2021 12:52

The Nag's Head, Macclesfield

In Macc last Saturday to watch Boreham Wood, who performed a more than passable impersonation of George Graham's Arsenal in despatching the high-flying Silkmen 2-0.
A short wait for the train back south, so I nipped in here. Ironic cheers as Ing-Ger-Lund eventually managed to breach the Maltese defence in a World Cup qualifier.
Just time for the one: a pint of Trooper's "Red & Black", which I hadn't had before. It might have been the best pint I've had this year.
Dizzy Blonde and Unicorn also on at the pumps nearest the door. Looked an OK pub.

15 Oct 2016 00:17