Napoleon Inn, Boscastle

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John Bonser left this review about Napoleon Inn

Situated high up in the village of Boscastle and a steep climb up from the picturesque harbour area, is The Napoleon Inn, an attractive looking small whitewashed building which describes itself as a 16th Century Free House.

It was alleged that the pub was once used as a recruiting centre for press gangs during the Napoleonic Wars.

The interior features whitewashed walls, low dark beams, flagstoned floors and a mixture of old settles and more ordinary commonplace tables and chairs. There’s several interconnected areas and a separate restaurant – Boney’s Bistro – up several steps. The walls are decorated with photographs of the local area and, perhaps not surprisingly, some of it is Napoleon related. Of particular interest is a Deed of Sale 1946 showing the pub being sold at auction – Lot 96 – for £ 35 as part of the Boscastle Manor Estate.

A separate entrance down the side leads into a separate bar evidently catering for locals. On the door, this room is referred to as “Fun’s Bar” and also “Bawdroom “, although there was certainly no signs of any inappropriate behaviour during my recent Sunday afternoon visit. This room has a smallish TV screen and is decorated with framed caricature drawings of locals. Somewhat inappropriately, toilets are denoted as “Boyz” and “Maids”.

The pub was very quiet during my visit, but place mats were being laid out for food and several phone calls booking tables for the evening were heard. I would imagine that diners very much dominate at normal meal times.

Perhaps unusually, live music features on Friday night.

It’s a St Austells pub and, notably, beer is served direct from barrels racked up behind the bar. HSD, Trelawny and Tribute were on with the latter, perhaps cheaper than might be expected at £ 2.90p, in reasonable form. The pub is in the 2011 CAMRA Good Beer Guide.

I quite enjoyed the visit, but be aware that it’s a bit of a stiff climb up hill from the harbour

On 12^th October 2011 - rating: 7
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