The Old Comical, Sandown

If you and the kids are lucky enough to stumble into one of the weekend summer events in the big garden, like I did last summer, you'll be glad you did - large bouncy castle, burger range, outside band, face painting, giant chalk board(!!)... Also, you can flip between the gardens of this pub and The Castle in the next road as their gardens are practically back to back. Two very different pubs a few meters from each other. Marvellous!

12 Jun 2013 15:51

The Copper Horse, Windsor

This was a favourite pub of mine years back. And like most pubs, there's always a mixture of different kinds of people and attitudes and moods. There's no point attacking individual staff in comments as pub staff are a) often temporary and b) a matter of personal taste. There have been several pubs that I've avoided on certain nights depending on who is working that night - and many more pubs that I've gone too on purpose because of who's working that night. If someone told me that Liam and Brenda were back in The Copper Horse, for example, I would take steps to move BACK to Windsor because they were fantastic. Perhaps people (punters) should try to be a little more open and engaging? That 'foreign sounding' barmaid might have a masters degree in engineering for all we know.

12 Jun 2013 15:10