One more to complete the Good Beer Guide for Kent. But will it be for the final time ?
Even the hedges were celebrating as I approached the Laughing Barrel.
Depending on your proclivities, this is Thanet, or Margate, or Cliftonville, or Botany Bay.
But the reality is, it’s in a little bit of suburbia all its own, with just a Co-op and Nel’s Carpet Cleaning for company. I had no carpet to clean, but bought a sparkling water for the journey back in 32 degree heat.
Even while I was doing that, the pub had opened 5 minutes earlier than the promised 6pm (my bedtime and it was almost full; it was as if the sign was laughing at me.
A year ago, there’s some micros that would have refused entry due to Covid and that.
But luckily there was space to squeeze in at the bar and patiently wait my turn; nod of acknowledgement of the middle-aged bloke noted.
Interesting place, very much the village pub revived rather than a micro competing with anything else. A simple affair, a beer drinkers pub.
Genuinely interesting seating, though everyone was at the bar.
Cracking atmosphere, a back and forth of abuse between locals and landlord/lady, and a nice smile to accompany the Wantsum Porter which was surviving the heat better than I was (NBSS 3.5).
By law, the last pub and beer in the county HAS to be good.
retiredmartin 
I’d sit at the bar too rather than on those primary school chairs.
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Much as I like porter, I’m not sure I’d want to be drinking it in the extremes of heat we’ve experienced lately.
Congratulations on completing Kent.
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I had a 10.5 % imperial stout on Friday !
It’s all beer !
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The social divide between alternative/hipster Cliftonville High street with the multi occupied former guest houses in the side streets accommodating people on benefits and asylum seekers and the mostly pensioner occupied bungalows a quarter of a mile south is very stark
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That’s a good analysis, Alan. Is that craft place in Cliftonville still open ?
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That would be the Tap Room.
It opened in 2015 as a traditional “old geezers “micropub but the owner had health problems and gave it up during lockdown and it was taken over by new owners who changed it to its current incarnation
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More Thanet news the Northern Belle has been refurbished opened up and now serving Cambodian food
Building i think still owned by Shepperd Neume but real ale no longer available just the SN Keg range. A prime location opposite the Tate was obviously no longer profitable as a rather musty pub width a semi alcoholic and rapidly aging clientele
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