Hare & Hounds, Worthing

A nice trad pub, the beers from five handpumps were a bit run of the mill ,the pick of the bunch being a decent St Austel Proper Job, a good pub grub menu at sensible prices as well. It's worth a look.

A decent town pub serving both diners and drinkers, now one large U-shaped carpeted space around a central bar, wood panelled walls to the rear, black ceiling beams on a white background. There is a bit of a golf theme with wall mounted clubs, a list of the pub golf society members and a few related cartoons as well as a horse racing theme through a few framed articles. A fireplace has a few horse brasses on the mantle, otherwise the usual local scenes. Two banks of five handpumps front and rear are repeated, Harvey's Sussex Best, Wadworth 6X, London Pride, G Gale HSB and Exmoor Ale. A bit mainstream perhaps but the Exmoor Ale hit the spot. Of interest are the stills from the film "Quadrophenia" in the lobby to the gents, Brighton is just up the road. They do food which looks fine and is decently priced e.g. cottage pie with chips, peas and gravy for £6.95. We're not in London here. Decent spot.

Not too far from Worthing's main shopping street, the Hare and Hounds is a good traditional, two bar, back street boozer. The front bar has some nice obscured windows bearing the pub's name, standard tables and chairs throughout, a large wooden pillar which breaks the space up a bit, and a dark wood servery and bar back, which is sited midway into the pub on the left hand side. You pass the bar to the right in order to reach the carpeted lounge at the rear. Here you will find comfier banquette seating plus plenty more standard chairs. The servery has an attractive stained glass canopy and there are similar stained glass panes in some unusual ceiling panels, which were backlit to great effect. Tongue and grove panelling abounds and the walls are decorated with various blackboards detailing live music, a few old beer adverts and a number of paintings. A beam has 'Home of the Hare and Hounds Golf Society' painted on it, and as if to illustrate the point, a collection of golfing pictures and a set of clubs can be found on a wall near the door to the beer garden. The passageway to the toilets has a collection of stills from the movie 'Quadrophenia' which was famously set just down the road in Brighton, although the soundtrack playing during my stay was more 'easy listening' that 'mod' or 'rocker'. The garden to the rear looked like a bit of a suntrap and had some decent furniture which a number of people were taking advantage of on a bright late summer's day. Five rather mainstream ales were available at the bar - Harvey's Best, Fuller's London Pride and HSB, Young's Ordinary and Sharp's Doom Bar. The Harvey's was in excellent condition and slipped down nicely after walking here from Shoreham. The bar staff were polite, welcoming and seemed to have a good rapport with a number of customers who came and went during our short stay. This was a bit of a random choice for a brief pint on my way back to the station but I think I stumbled across a bit of a gem. Whilst the ale range might be regarded as a little pedestrian, I really enjoyed my pint and thought the place had a lot of character and a warm, welcoming feel to it. Definitely worth a look when in town.

The Hare and Hounds is a U shaped pub that was reasonably busy when I visited on a recent Saturday. I counted ten hand pumps that were in two banks of five and drawing Youngs Ordinary, Harveys best, Sharps Doom Bar, Fullers London Pride and HSB. There is also a standard draught selection and I found the service to be very friendly. There was some low background music playing and a large plasma screen at the front of the pub was showing muted F1 qualifying. This pub likes its music as Tuesday night is jazz and there is live music at the weekends. Even the quiz every Sunday is music based. At the rear of the pub is a paved beer garden that is full of patio furniture. I liked it in here and would return if in the area.