Torbay Inn, Paignton

A short walk from the town centre, through some unpromising looking residential backstreets, brings you to this fine two bar pub. The entrance porch offers a choice of doors – left for the well-appointed lounge bar or right for a simple public bar. I heard children in the lounge, so turned right for the square shaped public bar. This is a bare boarded room with dark beam cladding across the ceiling and much of the wall space. The centre of the room is unfortunately dominated by a pool table, which limits the seating to a few fixed benches, chairs and low stools around the perimeter, which in turn, sucks some of the life out of the room due to the disjointed positioning of the customers. The servery is to the rear and has a modern timber clad counter front with a matching bar back and large centrally positioned mirror. A couple of TV screens were dotted around the room, showing muted rolling news whilst some cool 70’s tunes played quietly in the background. The décor is a mix of traditional pub items, such as a shelf with a jug display, various old black and white photos and so on, and sport’s themed, with framed rugby shirts and a rugby glass along the right-hand wall. Sadly, it was only after popping to the outdoor toilet block prior to leaving, that I decided to check out the lounge bar as I exited. This turned out to be a very smart space with lots of comfy upholstered banquette seating, a pleasant servery to the right and a small band of musicians playing folk tunes to a small group of customers. I got a very friendly welcome on arrival from the old-school landlady and had a choice of four cask ales – Wye Valley HPA, Sharps Sea Fury, Wychwood Hobgoblin and St Austell Tribute. I took a pint of the HPA, which was in great shape and worthy of the pub’s entry in the Good Beer Guide. This is a welcoming backstreet alehouse that seems to serve a wide range of customers thanks to two sharply contrasting rooms and some very well-kept beer. I wish I’d spent my time in the comfier lounge, rather than the more spartan public bar, as I think I would’ve enjoyed the visit a bit more, but I still left with a very favourable impression of the place and would suggest it’s worth the short detour to check it out.

I popped into the left hand bar of the Torbay Inn on a recent Monday afternoon and found myself to be the only customer. The woman working behind the bar was friendly and served a decent pint of Tribute. Butcombe Bitter and Courage best were available from the two other hand pumps and there was also a standard draught selection. The interior is decked out in a traditional style giving a proper backstreet boozer feel, but the two plasma screens advertising upcoming events and drink deals are more suited to a high street chain bar. There was some low background music playing and I spotted a couple of posters that were advertising the weekly quiz that occurs every Sunday from 21:00 and the Friday meat raffle which starts at 19:00. I found myself passing here again a few hours later so decided to pop into the right hand public bar for an early evening pint. There were about ten locals at the bar having such a good time that none of them could see their way to move so that I could get to the bar. Thankfully I wasn’t completely invisible and the woman that had served me earlier was once again friendly when handing over a decent pint of Butcombe. In the centre of the room is a pool table and across from the entrance to the right is a dartboard. Sky Sports is advertised and there is a projector screen that was rolled up during my visit. The background music was a little louder than it was in the other bar, but it wasn’t over the top. There are signs pointing the way to a smoking area at the rear that I didn’t visit on this occasion. I thought that this was a decent enough pub and worth the walk from the town centre.

This is a great traditional community pub which is located away from the tourist area of the town therefore it is mainly used by locals. The building dates from the early 1600’s and records show that the English Civil War Hero, General Fairfax stayed here in 1646. The pub has two rooms, a lounge on the left and a public bar on the right. The lounge has a small bar counter in the back right of the room, a nice stone fire place with coal stove at the front on the left, a piano against the back left wall and old wooden settles. The décor is olde worlde black and white wood panel and beams with horse brasses and ink drawings on the walls although there were also two flat screen TV’s which I thought spoilt the look a tiny bit. The public bar has a small counter across the back wall with several stools, a pool table in the middle of the room and a dart board in the front right hand corner. Again the décor is traditional black and white wood panel and beams with old paintings and maps on the walls and a shelf displaying various sporting trophies. The two rooms are linked at the back of the building by a covered courtyard with a couple of benches. Regular ales are St. Austell Tribute, Butcombe Bitter and Courage Best Bitter with no changing guest beers. All three were tried and found to be in good condition. An excellent traditional pub with good character, this place was recommended to me by a local and I am very glad that I followed their advice as this is just my kind of pub. I did not notice any menus or a sign for food and no one was eating, it is a bit of a trek from the sea front and the main town centre but if you like traditional pubs then it is worth the effort, I would definitely like to return if possible.