The Lincoln Arms, Dorking

A handy pub for both Dorking and Dorking Deepdene stations, you enter into an unmanned reception area with doors leading off to the pub's accommodation before turning left, passing through a small lounge area into the main bar itself. This extends into a games area at the far end, where a pool table and the toilets can be found. Beyond that is an outdoor drinking area and a car park. Also, behind the bar, you can find another large room for drinkers. Staff were putting up Christmas decorations during my visit. There were also plenty of signs advertising the World Cup football tournament, including a notice stating that it would be a £10 entry fee with £10 worth of drinks vouchers for the next England game. So, there is clearly a strong focus on football here. Sharp's Doom Bar is a regular beer here. On my visit, it was accompanied by Timothy Taylor Landlord & Tillingbourne Falls Gold. My Falls Gold was quite insipid and not really my kind of beer.

Official site of The Lincoln Arms - lincolnarms.co.uk

Official site of The Lincoln Arms - lincolnarms.co.uk

As others have said, this is a standard station pub. It’s certainly not a destination pub, but when you’re at Dorking Station with nearly an hour to wait for your train this pub is a very welcome sight indeed. It still operates as a hotel, and is a large building as you would expect. The main entrance takes you into a corridor – the “lounge” bar is at the front on the left; there’s a meeting room on the right that is for hire; and a further large room is at the back; and a garden is at the back on the left. The room at the back is quite Spartan and contains a dartboard, as well as some basic furnishings. The room at the front is where we spent our visit, and is almost as Spartan as the back room. It contains a couple of pool tables, and is mainly furnished with tall tables and tall stools. I saw no features worthy of mention. However, their regular ales are Doom Bar, Surrey Hills Shere Drop (both off when we visited early Sunday evening) and Hogsback TEA, plus one guest ale. I guess we struck lucky as the guest ale was still on, and was a decent drop of Tillingbourne AONB (Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty – what a great name for a beer!). I didn’t see any sign of food, but we were definitely too late for Sunday lunch. I wouldn’t rate this as a good pub, but it was most certainly handily placed when we needed a pub, and did a decent pint of Tillingbourne AONB. I will definitely visit this one again if I’m waiting for a train at Dorking.