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Venue for Spring 2025 PuG crawl. with Tris39
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Detail Pages
The Foresters, Dartford
Dartford
DA1 1TJ
Reviews (Current Rating Average: 7 of 10) see review guidelines
Pub SignMan left this review about The Foresters
This is a simple backstreet boozer up the hill from the station, with a U-shaped interior that wraps around a centrally positioned servery. The room is carpeted throughout, with banquettes along the front and right-hand walls, mid-height tongue and groove panelling below plain uppers, and a tidy, tiled fireplace to the right with an old Courage Best mirror above. The bar has a very nice, dark wood, cantilevered counter with curved corners, an integrated, matching gantry and a chopped out, mirrored bar back. Entertainment options include a pool table and a TV screen showing live cricket with the commentary on to the right and a dartboard in a semi-screened rear room of sorts to the left. Decor is limited to a Liverpool Champions League winning photo montage and some uninteresting promotional posters, leaving lots of bare wall space, which makes the place feel a bit more devoid of character than it might otherwise have. I also noticed a beer garden to the rear, but didn't get around to properly exploring.
The pub tends to make it into the Good Beer Guide, and offered a modest choice between Wadworth 6X, Adnams Ghost Ship and Harveys Sussex Best (£4.50 a pint). A £5 minimum card spend meant that I ended up with some scratchings along with my nice pint of Sussex Best, and the barman was very friendly to a new face in amongst what was clearly a bunch of loyal, regular customers.
This felt like a proper backstreet boozer, busy minding it's own business by serving its locals some decent, well kept ale whilst looking after the occassional newcomer as and when required. The pub perhaps lacks a bit of character, but if you can look past the basic presentation, this is a decent place to seek out for a quiet pint or two.
Date of visit - 14th August 2024
On 21st December 2024
- rating: 6
[User has posted 3306 recommendations about 3306 pubs]
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
Just a quick pint, then I'm off left this review about The Foresters
Traditional, and quite basic, side-street local; opened-out at some stage to leave a U-shaped layout with a pool table in one branch and a dartboard in the other, and a gantried servery in between. Thankfully, as a Good Beer Guide pub, all three handpumps were operational, and my pint of Harvey's (£3.80) was in good form, and the other two real ales were Otter Bitter and Adnams Ghost Ship.
On 21st January 2022
- rating: 7
[User has posted 8540 recommendations about 8540 pubs]
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
Alan Winfield left this review about The Foresters
The Foresters is a nice looking pub that is on a side street off East Hill.
Once inside there is a single room with the bar facing,the room is carpeted and has comfy bench seating and chairs to the front,there is a pool table to the rear right and a darts board to the left,there is a small area up one step to the rear left,which has tables and small stools,the TV to the front right was showing sky sports football updates.
There were three real ales on,i had a drink of Harveys Bitter which went down very well,the other beers were Adnams Lighthouse and Youngs Bitter.
I thought this was a very pleasant pub to have a drink in.
Pub visited 22/10/2016
On 2nd January 2017
- rating: 8
[User has posted 6113 recommendations about 6113 pubs]
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
Roger Button left this review about The Foresters Arms
The Foresters was converted from 2 cottages in 1867 and further enlarged in the 1920’s. It is situated just off East Hill a few minutes walk from the town centre but is generally only a place that is used by locals and comes over as a sort of real life Queen Vic or Rovers Return with a good community spirit and boasting various darts and quiz teams, the trophies from which are perched above the bar canopy and on shelves around the pub.
The interior is largely knocked through U shape with a smaller room through an arch to the rear on one side. To the left of the main bar is a darts area and at the rear to the right, a pool table. A further dart board can be found in the smaller room and 3 well placed flat screen TVs cover most angles in the pub. On the whole the place is quite dated and bland with a small tiled fireplace, some old photos of the town and a small ornamental duck collection on the window sill.
Whilst I don’t use the pub very much, I was alerted by the local CAMRA rag that they have started to do local guest beers although on my recent couple of visits the regular Spitfire and Courage Best were supplemented one week by the not so local Theakstons Old Peculiar (£3.15) and the next week by Ringwood 49'er although the barmaid did tell me they do intend to get more local guest beers in over the coming months.
Overall, the pub is nothing special but it is worth the walk up the hill if you want to get away from the bustle of the town centre pubs and there are a couple of other pubs nearby to visit as part of a mini crawl, albeit you will probably find the Foresters is the best that the East Hill pubs have to offer.
On 17th May 2011
- rating: 6
[User has posted 1239 recommendations about 1233 pubs]