The White Hart Inn, Exeter

The White Hart Inn is a 500 or so year old coaching inn that is now a substantial hotel. A central cobbled courtyard allows access to the pubs amenities, the right hand side was closed during a recent Wednesday afternoon visit, but I didn’t mind because I was more interested in the pub to the left. In this left-hand side is a bar area with a flagstone floor and at the rear steps lead down to a wooden floored seating area. Premium keg was available alongside Neck Oil and the two hand pumps were drawing Pedigree and Hobgoblin. The service was polite and the pub certainly has some historic character, but they could do with a more interesting ale range that I’m sure would be popular in a place like this.

I was amazed at the interior here, proper old style coaching inn, with a labyrinth of rooms descending back from the bar area. To add to this illusion someone had the idea to stick mirrors at the ends of partition walls, which was a bit too much. The front small lounge area overlooking the street was a decent spot to relax. However the downside on our visit, was they only had one beer on handpump, which was a Marston's Pedigree.

The White Hart Inn is approached by a passageway with gnarled old trees and a statue (a cherub, as I recall). There are bars either side of the passageway. I headed for what appeared to be the main bar on the left-hand side. The bar has 4 handpulls. Pedigree is the regular beer. Guests were Directors & Forty Niner, whilst the fourth handpull was unclipped. Neck Oil was the most adventurous beer amongst the keg selection, whilst cider got no better than Inch's & Thatcher's Gold. The main bar room descends to a lower section and then to a corridor leading off left to a secret garden, which was where most punters could be found on my Thursday evening visit. Others were in the bar itself, whilst there were also a handful in the passageway. This is a really nice pub and could easily become one of the highlights amongst Exeter pubs if only it wasn't operated by Marston's.

Very traditional coaching inn and now a Marston's pub / restaurant / hotel. The slightly split-level bar, accessed by non-residents via the courtyard, has been refurbished but in a reasonably sympathetic way. Disappointingly, though, just Pedigree (£6.20 with a packet of salted peanuts) available from the four handpumps.

This is a very large, rambling old pub and hotel with a vast, confusing interior that probably required multiple visits to properly take in. Entering via a narrow cobbled courtyard which separates the pub and hotel parts of the building, I found myself reaching the main bar area from the lower courtyard entrance. This is a bare boarded room with the servery down the left wall, directly opposite the front door. The bar has an unusual counter front with lots of drawers built into it, and a nice exposed stonework bar back. Some chairs and tub chairs stand opposite the bar and in a small space to the right of the counter, but this isn’t really much of a seating area, so most punters will move elsewhere. Steps up to the front take you into a cosy, olde worlde feeling dining room with pre-set tables, lots of dark wood and decent views of the street outside. Moving towards the rear from the bar area, you drop down some steps onto a landing with a few more tables and chairs in a fairly unremarkable plain painted area. There are lots of mirrors here, which make the space feel quite deceptive and a little ‘hall of mirrors’-esque on your first visit. A door here leads out to a so-called ‘Secret Garden’, which looked a bit uninspiring compared to the pleasant courtyard with its palm trees and views of the old building. Moving on a little further, through a mirrored passage, you emerge into a large rear room with rows of tables and chairs in a bare brick walled space which had a bit of a cellar bar feel to it. In addition to all this, there appear to be several more rooms in the hotel side of the building, to the right of the courtyard, but they all appeared empty, so I didn’t wander through. Modern pop music was playing in the background throughout my visit and there was a modest crowd, mainly older folk popping in for some lunch, when I arrived on a Monday afternoon. A friendly old-school barmaid greeted me on arrival and I was faced with a choice of Marston beers on the row on handpulls, with options extending to Ringwood Razorback, Wychwood Hobgoblin and Dirty Tackle and Banks’s Sunbeam, with the latter coming in at £1.85 for a well conditioned half. This place definitely has a lot of character, thanks to its multiple room interior, pleasant courtyard and period appropriate decor, making it worth a visit for a bit of exploration. The beer, whilst in good nick, is nothing you won’t have encountered many times before, so ultimately, enjoyment of this pub will likely come down to your enjoyment of such brews or perhaps whether you intend to come here for some food as well. A good wildcard option for any city centre crawl.

An old coaching inn, opposite Neverspoons. You pay your money, you take your chance. A Marstons house and the sunbeam was better than I could have hoped for.