The Mole Hole, Gravesend

A subterranean micropub accessed by way of a spiral staircase from the upper lobby area. For the second pub running I was the only customer though a group of four joined me a little while later. The downstairs room was bright and clean but there was a noticeable whiff of damp in the air upon entry.Iron Pier Mole Hole, Parkway Norwegian Blue, Kent Prohibition, St Austell Mena Dhu were on cask whilst on keg (presumably) was Hoffmeister Helles and Guinness West Indies Porter, my Prohibition was in good shape and enjoyed. The place seemed a bit subdued probably due to lack of bodies but certainly worth a visit.

This is another Gravesend micropub, this time located on the town’s main High Street in a basement property that used to be a tattoo parlour. You enter into a ground floor lobby, which was empty on my arrival, requiring me to ring a bell so that someone could come up and do the whole meet and greet thing. A spiral staircase leads you down into the pub’s main bar area, which occupies a decent sized room with a vaulted, whitewashed brick ceiling and modern tiled floor. The bar runs along the left-hand wall with an angular, timber fronted counter and simple bar back. The rest of the left-hand wall is given over to a drinking ledge and high stools, with a decent pump clip collection above. Elsewhere, the room is served by long banquette to the right and standard tables and chairs through the centre. The rear wall has been decorated with a highly elaborate looking clock, a series of maps, a caricature of the pub’s barman and a few other odds and ends. A door to the rear left leads out past the toilets to a second room which occupies half of the vault and has a decent mix of seating around a small heater, although the room was totally unoccupied on my visit, suggesting it acts mainly as overspill at peak times. Some chilled music was being piped through the pub, but the hard surfaces meant that the room was pretty noisy from the chat from a moderate sized crowd and the music quickly gets lost beneath the hubbub. My visit coincided with their first night of opening of 202, following the long Winter and Spring lockdown, so the ale range may have been slightly reduced as a result, but they still had three cask beers on – Iron Pier Mole Hole Pale, Kent Zingiber and Titsey Gower Wolf – as well as one craft keg option and a load of interesting bottles. The house beer was in excellent condition and worked well as a very tasty, lower strength session ale – I could quite happily have spent the remainder of my evening here drinking that beer. The staff seemed very friendly and the place had a nice, lively vibe befitting a reopening night. Overall, I liked this place although I thought it maybe lacked a bit of the character of the town’s other micropubs – something that may well resolve itself over time. As a town centre bolthole, it seemed ideal and this really should be on the itinerary of any Gravesend pub crawl.

Official site of The Mole Hole - www.moleholepub.co.uk

Official site of The Mole Hole - www.moleholepub.co.uk

New Micropub.