The Who'd Ha Thought It, Rochester

Official site of The Who'd Ha Thought It - whodha.com

Official site of The Who'd Ha Thought It - whodha.com

A good 10-15 minute walk from the town centre, this is a nice welcoming back street boozer with a reputation for good cask ale. You enter to a U-shaped main bar area with dark floorboards and wall panels. The servery has a beautiful counter with an unusual sloping wood panel front, squared at one end and rounded at the other, with a matching (original?) bar back. The windows along the front and side walls have lovely old etched panes denoting the ‘Public Bar’, ‘Jug & Bottle’ and so on. Serating comes in the form of low stools and benches the the front and longer banquettes down the left-hand side, where the room extends back into a nice space dominated by a large TV screen showing live rugby union to a noisy crowd of locals. A second TV screen, over to the right of the bar, was showing muted Formula One racing. The room has been decorated with an eclectic mix of old photos, maps, CAMRA certificates, notice boards for local services and events and a few bits of wall mounted sporting equipment including a golf club and hurling stick. A door to the right of the bar leads into a nicely furnished rear lounge with a mix of simple tables and chairs and comfy sofas. This room, which was apparently part of the pub’s living quarters until the 1990’s, has classic alehouse stylings, including a large pump clip collection and various brewery mirrors. There were three cask ales on the bar when we arrived - Kent Prohibition, St Austell Tribute and Fyne Ales Jarl - and the latter was in great shape, with lots of the locals seemingly opting for an ale option. There was a great atmosphere in the pub, with all age ranges catered for and a real community hub feel to the place. The well-kept beer and lively atmosphere made this a memorable visit and there are enough original features and comfy seating options to appeal to a wide customer base. Rochester seems to do pretty well on the backstreet alehouse front and this is another place that merits a stroll through the suburbs to check out.

The Who'd Ha Thought it is a back street pub that is well away from the middle of the town centre. Once inside there is an L shaped room to the front which is bare boarded,the bar faces on entry,there are small tables and chairs to the front and comfy bench seating in two bays to the left,there is full size ordnance survey map of Kent which is framed on the left wall,there was a TV to the right which was showing tennis,there is an area to the rear right which had a few leather settees. There were three real ales on the bar,i had a drink of Gadds Seasider which went down very well,the other beers were Wadworth 6X and beer from Skinners. Decent background music was playing. This is a very pleasant pub to have a drink in,well worth the walk out. Pub visited 6/6/2015

Large Victorian corner pub, the three small bars knocked into the single L-shaped bar. Etched windows indicate where the public, saloon and jug-and-bottle outlets were originally. Gaming machines and tv screens showing sports events are at each end, and there's an open fire at one end. The staff are very friendly and welcoming, the locals are relaxed and they collect a lot of money for local causes. There's a terraced garden at the back. Two ales on, Olde Trip and Reverend James, both in excellent condition, justifying its inclusion in GBG13. A great local pub, well worth finding and including in a crawl.

The Who’d Ha Thought It has an L shaped bar area with a large plasma screen that was off at one end and a smaller screen at the other that was showing a muted premier league football match via Sky Sports. Maybe the larger screen only gets turned on when there is a big game or, looking at all of the football scarves, when Southampton are playing. There was some background music playing from the jukebox on my Monday night visit and the events board listed local things like an upcoming birthday party. A corridor to the left of the bar that leads to the toilets is covered with pictures of past pub antics. This pub can be lively at times! Standard draught is available from the bar that also supports three hand pumps. These were drawing Dark Star APA, Mauldon’s Silver Adder and Greene King’s Olde Trip. I’d have no problem returning here as I found it to be a friendly enough place.