The Kent Pub Tour Continues

 

Sunday brought with it dull grey skies and persistent rain which would stay with us all day long as we continued pub explorations on the eastern side of Kent.
The rotten weather shortened my morning constitutional along the seafront at Margate - I only made it as far as the Gormley statue, just past the harbour arm.

We were happy to see our minibus pull up at 11:30, setting off to transport us the short distance to the town of Sandwich.
Our first stop of the day was at The Mermaid's Locker...

The Mermaid's Locker (8 Cattle Market, Sandwich, CT13 9AF)

From initial impressions outside - a handful of seats under a wet gazebo and a chunky wooden door which took some opening - I expected this to a be a tiny ramshackle micro.
So what a surprise to find it was something completely different. There were three distinct sections within, tables laid out for lunch with reserved signs on them, logs crackling away in an enormous fireplace, and an unusual collection of furniture and curios throughout.

Available on the bar were two brews from Canterbury Ales: 'Winter Gold' or 'The Pardoner's Ale'.  I took a tasty pint of the winter ale on a tour of the pub, checking out the collections of fossils, the trinkets in a display case by the door, and the wall-sized artwork in the back room, the sound-track provided by Jackson Browne playing on a retro hi-fi. 

I ended up settling for a spot stood by the roaring fire, straddling a fine line between drying my coat and setting it alight.

  

It was a short walk around the corner toward the Guildhall to reach our next port of call...

The Red Cow (12 Moat Sole, Sandwich, CT13 9AU)

The town cattle market was once located across the road from the Red Cow, making this the pub of choice for the farmers trading their wares.  The snug once doubled as the cash handling room where deals would be settled, presumably over a pint or two.

The Red Cow proved to be a fine, characterful place: big wooden beams, hops hanging overhead, the comforting smell of an open fire as soon as we opened the front door.

Two rooms either side of the entrance were open-plan with timber frames still in place from walls that would have divided them in the past.  The bar itself was to the rear of the pub, serving up Harvey's 'Sussex Best', Gadd's 'No.5' or Gadd's 'She Sells Shells'. 

I don't think I would have been very comfortable taking a seat in the front room where a couple had become very 'attached' on the sofa.  Their drinks were lasting a long time as they barely came up for air.

Our group drank their last drops of beer, returned glasses to the bar, and boarded the bus for the short trip along the A257 to Canterbury.
Where our first point of call was a brewpub in an impressive setting...

This time, the canoodling couple in my picture are a little less obvious!

Foundry Brewhouse (77 Stour Street, Canterbury, CT1 2NR)
Canterbury Brewers have set up home in part of what was once the Drury & Bigglestone Foundry, who shipped metalwork for railways, lampposts and torpedo's around the country from this site.
The brewery has been based here since 2011, winning awards and drawing in the crowds.

Personally I was put off by the 'Please Wait to be Seated' signs - I waited to be seated quite enough in 2020 and 2021, thank you very much.
I just wish there'd been a drinkers corner next to the bar, allowing me to peruse the pump clips and prop up an old beer barrel, rather than being led through to the barn-like building at the side and seated amongst the Sunday lunch crowd. 

That's not to say the beers weren't enjoyable though - at another time I may have come away with a completely different impression of the Foundry.
Some of our group hung around to eat, whilst a few of us paid our bills and wandered out in search of The Bell & Crown.

The Bell & Crown (10-11 Palace Street, Canterbury, CT1 2DZ)
A pub which looking marvellous outside, with an overhanging tiled second storey, old Trumans Brewery signage and lamps.
And it was wonderful inside too, with a wooden floored L-shaped room, the great feel of a 'proper pub' being helped by the Sunday afternoon folk session in full swing.

Ales on the bar offered a good local choice from Old Dairy, Longman, Canterbury Ales, and Tonbridge Brewery.
In hindsight I maybe should have picked the Old Dairy, whose future is now very uncertain - one of an alarming number of cost-of-living crisis brewery casualties.
As it was I opted for the Tonbridge 'Coppernob', a lovely very drinkable 3.8% session beer.

Darkness descended, the rain became heavier, and it was almost time for us to be homeward-bound.  Just time to get wet making a walk to one final pub of the weekend...

The New Inn (19 Havelock Street, Canterbury, CT1 1NP - web)
Canterbury's 2022 Pub of the Year is a charming small back-street terrace affair, which was somewhere I could have happily settled down for the evening: cosy, good beer, and a live band set up in one corner.

The main bar was as small as a fair few of the micro pubs that we'd visited the previous day, with a conservatory extension to the rear expanding the space.
The keg lines looked mighty tempting, next to Thornbridge, Oakham and Musket beers on cask.  I finished the trip on the dark stuff: Musket Brewery 'Powder Burn', a tasty Kentish stout to send me to sleep on the back seat of the bus on the journey home.

 

As usual big thanks go to those who organised the itinerary and to Tony ("5-minute warning folks - we're moving on") for driving a bunch of tipsy passengers around the pubs of East Kent.  
Cheers! 🍺🚌👍