Christopher Hotel, Windsor

Located in a prime spot on Eton’s attractive high street, this is, as it’s name suggests, the bar for the attached Christopher Hotel, but is nonetheless open to non-residents. Rather oddly, when we arrived at around 9:30 on a Friday evening, it was completely deserted, not even a barman. After a short while someone wandered over from the reception desk, presumably having spotted us on CCTV. It's got the potential to be quite elegant internally, with high ceilings, large arched windows and some white wainscot panelling on the lower part of the walls, but look closer and it starts to look a little tired. Not decrepit by any means, but it could certainly do with a little TLC. The flooring was some type of rough wooden boards and there were a couple of pictures dotted around the walls, but little else of any note. By 9:45 the barmaid had reappeared and proceeded to lay up all the other tables for breakfast, and by the time we left, the only other people who had been in were hotel residents who got drinks and then swiftly retreated back to their rooms. Unfortunately, there were no real ales on tap, and in fact I’m not even sure there were any on keg. There was a pump for Eton & Windsor’s Guardsman, but the lady who served us “wasn’t sure if the taps were working”. The solitary cider, also possibly not working, was Sandford Orchard’s Devon Red. Overall, I can really see no reason to visit here unless you’re a hotel resident and can’t be bothered to go out. Which is a little odd, it’s in a prime spot and is surely a real missed opportunity for them to generate some additional income.

Public bar of the hotel has a bare boarded interior serving 1 real ale.