The Eagle, Eastbourne

Redone in an alehouse style, this seems to be a popular pub for customers of all ages. The newly dark exterior may look a bit foreboding, but the mixed furniture and decor inside the rectangular bar works quite well. There is also a pool table at the far end and live music is advertised. Two of the six handpumps dispense ciders, with the seasonal Wychwood Bah Humbug and Butcombe Chris Moose (£3.35) available in addition to Ringwood Forty Niner and the regular Harvey's being the beer choice.

Atmospheric opened up pub with wood board floor, deifferent seating areas & beer badges on the wall. Big screens, some sofas, a pool table at one end & 3 well kept real ales.

Occupying a prominent street corner position in the Little Chelsea area of Eastbourne is The Eagle, a large brick built building that retains branding high up of its former days as a Kemptown Brewery pub. More recently, it had been a Whitbread pub. Inside, we find a number of adjoining different areas. The largest room is at the near end and features half height boarded wood panelling. It’s quite a dark room with subdued lighting, gas lamps and a dark green colour scheme. There’s a mixture of seating, with several sofas in one corner, but largely traditional seats and tables. At the opposite end of the pub is a much smaller public bar area, dominated by a billiards table and with a fine collection of beermats on the walls. The bar servery is in the middle room and features some unusual curved coloured glass behind the bar and some attractive cornicing featuring grapes and leaves. There’s plenty of TV screens dotted about and, on my Sunday afternoon visit in April, a lively good humoured crowd of regulars and holidaymakers were watching the West Ham v Liverpool match. This did rather dominate proceedings, although, on a decent day, refuge would have been available on an upstairs roof terrace. According to a small leaflet which I happened to come across in the local Tourist Information Office, the pub is one of five pubs that participates in the “South Street Shuffle Ale Trail” in which, you get a stamp when you buy a real ale. All five stamps entitles you to a £ 5 food voucher, redeemable in any of the participating pubs. Notably, I didn’t recall seeing this leaflet displayed in the pub itself. On the real ale front, there’s 6 pumps which were serving the ubiquitous Harveys Best, plus beers from Moorhouses and 360 degrees. The latter brewery, I later learnt, is based at Sheffield Park, near the terminus of the Bluebell Railway. A 10p discount for CAMRA members is prominently advertised. Beer was in good nick and the pub often appears in the CAMRA Good Beer Guide. Despite the Little Chelsea location, it’s a relatively unpretentious, likeable place, and I’d be happy to revisit, but preferably at a quieter time

The Eagle has changed a bit since my last visit in 2008 and I’m glad to report that things have vastly improved. The friendly barmaid informed me that this pub is now run by the same team that run the decent Dew Drop around the corner. My visit was on Friday afternoon when all of the ale was £2 a pint as they tried to clear out the stocks to make way for a jubilee beer festival which was due to take place in both of the pubs over the weekend. The six hand pumps were drawing Harvey’s Best, Arundel’s Black Stallion and Jubilee, Rother Valley’s Honey Fuzzzzzzzzzzzz, Dark Star’s Old Chestnut and Old Rosie cider. There is also a standard draught selection and I saw someone eating a pasta bake dish so basic food is available. The interior is L shaped with the main body of seating in the left hand side of the pub where there is a large projector screen that was rolled up during my visit. Sky Sports is shown when something worthwhile is being played and this pub gets very busy when a premier league football match is on. The bar is to the right and beyond there is a small room that houses a plasma screen, pool table and dartboard. Often at the weekends there is a DJ that draws a younger crowd, but during my stay the music was courtesy of a local radio station complete with annoying advertisements. The roof terrace is still in use and I’ve still not had reason to venture up there for a look. This is one of the better pubs in Eastbourne and more than worthy of a visit if in town.