The Foresters Arms, Melksham

Jumbo 70s estate pub. Noted a massive unused room in darkness on entering and the just-as-massive bar area has four (yes, four) pool tables as well as darts, pub carpet, uninspiring magnolia decor and distilled estate pub characters. Just Tribute on, surprisingly decent given the location and clientele base (all lager in here) and also gratifyingly cheap though the hapless yokel barmaid needed to be helped by a regular on the opposite side of the servery. Noted with delight the built-in crisp cupboard behind the bar with a frontal display. Euro 2016 flags, saw that Canada was subbed in for Germany. Overhearing our conversation, one of the locals piped up that “we’re not anti-Semitic!”. Tried to explain that anti-Semitism was being anti-Jewish rather than anti-German but not sure the concept was grasped. All-in-all I gleaned a fair bit of enjoyment from my 15 minutes in here and the locals were less ferocious than I expected. I’ve been to far worse places and I wish this pub every success in keeping going in its present guise, though a change of paint internally would be beneficial.