Angel Vaults Inn (JD Wetherspoon), Hitchin

This is an interesting branch of the Wetherspoons chain located in a nice building in the historic part of the town. Arriving during the period of post-lockdown restriction easing, I was marshalled down a side alley by a cheery doorman who ensured track and trace details were completed before sending me down the alley to a rear entrance which leads directly into the modern rear part of the pub. This room is semi-partitioned by bare brick walls through the centre from front to back, creating distinct bar and seating areas. The right-hand side has herringbone flooring and a copper topped drinking ledge along the side wall, under windows that look out to the sizable patio garden that extends a surprisingly long way to the rear of the property. High tables and stools fill this side of the room, all jammed in between countless Covid partitioning screens that clatter and clang every time you move. Meanwhile, over in the left-hand side of the room, the servery dominates, occupying most of the end wall, with only a handful of additional high tables and stools opposite. The bar has a stylistic counter front and simple mirrored bar back which is dominated by a very large wicker angel that has been mounted high above on a bare brick wall. A few steps to the left of the servery take you up into the older part of the pub, which is now a single room seating area. This room is carpeted and has a brick fireplace at one end and some very nice looking banquette booths down either side, almost entirely filled with very young looking customers on my Thursday evening visit. From where I was sat in the main bar area, I could hear trap music playing quite clearly, but this may have been coming from the open kitchen, which also appeared to be populated by impossibly young looking people. Unlike other Wetherspoons I’ve visited since the pubs reopened, this place had a couple of guest ales on alongside the Ruddles, Doom Bar & Abbot Ale regulars. I ordered a pint of the Adnams Ghost Ship, which the waitress couldn’t find on her app and therefore didn’t believe was available until I asked her what guest ales were on, at which point she went to the bar, consulted some colleagues and returned with a pint of the Ghost Ship! The place was doing a good trade, with the front room and garden pretty much completely full and only seats in the bar area remaining available. There was a lot here that I thought worked well and set this place apart from your average town centre ‘Spoons. The modern bar area, plush front lounge and extensive garden meant that there was a good range of places to pull up a seat and enjoy some well-kept beer in comfortable surrounds. The age profile of the evening-time customer base makes me wonder if it might get a little rowdy at peak times, but there were no such problems during my extended stay here and I left feeling this really should be included on any crawl around Hitchin.

Very busy Identikit JDW, with a bar at the far end of a rambling building that takes a bit of finding. No need to describe, you could be anywhere in the land.

The Angel Vaults Inn is a Wetherspoons pub that is housed in a nice old looking building. Once inside the front area is carpeted and has normal tables and chairs and diner type seating,the bar is on the left side in a room to the rear and down some steps,there are tall tables and chairs and bench seating in this area,there is an open kitchen to the rear. There was a decent enough choice of guest beers on the bar,i had a drink of Farr Brew Golden,which was a decent drink,the other beers noted were Farr Brew Porter,one from Wild Weather,Doom Bar,GK IPA and GK Abbot. I thought this was a decent Wetherspoons to start my large Hitchin pub crawl in. Pub visited 17/6/2017