The Ship Inn, Weston Super Mare

A traditional, surprisingly spacious pub located just a couple of minutes walk from the beach. The interior has a very maroon feel to it, with maroon carpets, maroon bench seating, rather dated maroon wallpaper and maroon ceilings! Besides that there is some exposed brickwork which is a nice contrast. It’s a “U” shape on a couple of different levels. The main bar is pleasant enough albeit with quite a few TV’s showing the rugby as well as a large projection screen. The commentary from this was piped at a rather loud volume throughout the pub, which made it difficult to escape if you weren’t interested. There’s a few fruit machines and the like opposite the bar, and several model ships around as befits a pub of this name. To the left, you can go up a few steps in to a plusher lounge area with some leather sofa’s, or on again past this in to a decent looking restaurant area. Or you can go down a few steps to another bar with a pool table and darts board. Barman seemed friendly, and all in all it seems to be a decent local pub, albeit one that could maybe do with a little TLC – some of the seats were ripped with the foam spilling out and the carpet on the stairs was held together with duct tape. I am perhaps being a little harsh though, overall it’s fine, I don’t want to give the impression that it’s a tatty pub. There was a good selection of basic “pub grub” such as baguettes, light bites, jacket potatoes and burgers which seemed to be something of a speciality, including a 12oz cheese burger for a reasonable sounding £4.75. There was also a board with a small selection of special chalked up. Beers on tap were Otter Ale and Wickwar’s BOB. Ciders were well represented with Thatcher’s Gold, Blackthorn and Broadoak.