Egham United Services Club, Egham

Paid a return visit to the United Services Club last night, for the first time in a couple of years. The Club is situated in a residential area, within easy walking distance of the railway station and the town centre. It has a simple club layout, with a snooker table in one corner, a members only corner and a courtyard where most beers are racked for the regular beer festivals. TVs show live sport. Champions League football was on last night. Live music events are also fairly regular. The place is always busy for beer festivals and stocks a vast array of unusual cask ales. Breweries featured this week include Ascot, Black Jack, Church End, Constellation, Crafty, Durham, Fearless, Furnace Brook, Gilbert White's, Gyle 59, Kent, Leigh on Sea, Mallinson's, No Frills Joe, Only With Love, Park, Saviour, Sly Beast, Southwark, Thames Ditton & Three Acre. In addition, there were 8 real ciders to keep me happy. Staff, members and beer festival goers are all friendly. The latter set come from all of the country and often stay locally to visit on all days of the festival. Well worth a visit, especially for a festival.

Again one I've only visited on a beer festival occasion when it was busy but very welcoming. Free entry for card carrying CAMRA members on regular days, or you can show the GBG if you carry it round with you. The usual club entertainment staples of darts and pool, a stage for turns plus TV are present. An outdoor courtyard served the festival beers and I assume also smokers on non-festival days. The bar mounted handpumps clearly show that real ale is a year round fixture.

I have only been here on a beer festival day so can't really get a true view of it as a day to day venue, it seems to have all the components of a good club, snooker, pool, darts, live music and importantly a seemingly good beer policy outside of festival times as evidenced by its CAMRA awards. It seems a decent place and the beer festival was top notch.