The Bear Inn, Bognor Regis

Another pub in the village that was visited twice over the weekend. On each visit I drank the HSB which for every pint was on good form. Not as busy on Friday afternoon between 2pm and 4pm as it was on Saturday evening at 6.30pm. I guess this was mainly due to the England rugby game being live on the television. Spent most of our time in the room playing pool and the fruit machines. Decent enough locals, got a little rowdier after 7.30pm on Saturday night. Nice pub and still in my opinion the one more for the locals in the village as it’s certainly not as foodie even though there is a large restaurant the other side of the bar.

There are some picnic tables outside the attractive front of the Bear. Across the road is a car park for the use of Bear patrons only. The interior consists of a ‘public bar’ type area to the right where there is a pool table, dartboard and plasma screen that was airing Sky Sports Soccer Saturday. There is another plasma screen in a seating area by the front windows that is faced by the central bar. To the left is more formal seating and at the rear is a large dining area that was closed off during my Saturday afternoon visit. There is a quiz every Wednesday and DJ Phil was advertised for the following Saturday. Out the back is an advertised beer garden that I did not visit on this occasion. A standard and premium keg range was available from the bar that supports five hand pumps. The cask range was Sharp’s Doom Bar (x2), Shepherd Neame’s Spitfire, Fuller’s pride and Old Rosie Cider. I found the service to be friendly and the atmosphere to be what I would expect from a pub with Sky Sports on a Saturday afternoon.

A recorded pub since the 1800’s the current building dates from 1930 when the old smaller cottage was knocked down and replaced with the current roadside pub. Like many others in this area it now functions as a pub / restaurant with the internal space housing a smaller bar section and then a larger dining section. It looked like the pub had undergone a recent makeover, part of which was the addition of a decent side decking area to complement the rear garden and front patio area, and this pub scores as a good spot for an alfresco pint. But in that respect, although the bar supports five hand pumps, these were dispensing Courage Best, Doombar, Spitfire and Fullers London Pride and HSB, the least exciting choice of the three outlets I tried in Pagham.