Royal Leamington Spa – Clarendon

This is the only verified venue on Untappd in Royal Leamington Spa, with the beer selection looking to be sufficiently interesting and it was also up-to-date. As an aside, there are a fair few venues which are verified and which promptly haven’t bothered to update their beer list in months, which isn’t an ideal situation. It’s a Victorian pub which seems to have grown in size over the years as it’s quite substantial now, and according to CAMRA it has recently gone through a series of pub names including the Jekyll and Hyde, Winstons and Oxygen.

Some interesting external decoration.

The beer options at the bar, there were a suitable range of styles available, along with some rather more mainstream products.

There’s a nice retro theme going on here in terms of the design.

The venue is spacious and has a number of different areas, including an area with pool tables. Sport is clearly important to the pub and I think that they have a younger demographic in general, so this probably fits the description of a sports bar.

A slightly bland choice of crisps, but these sufficed me. The beer is the Cafe Racer from Fierce Beer from Aberdeen, an interesting and rich porter that had rich coffee flavours. Smooth and with a suitable depth of taste.

This is a nice idea, for £10 someone can get unlimited hot and soft drinks, a lunch and access to power points, with an optional alcoholic drink upgrade as well. This is similar in concept from Desk Dog from Brewdog, a concept I think will continue to expand in pubs that would otherwise ne nearly empty during the day.

This pub isn’t listed in CAMRA’s Good Beer Guide, perhaps because they’re not content with the real ale options here, but I liked the selection of craft beer and there’s been some thought put into that. Clean, welcoming and reasonably priced, I’d happily recommend the pub although I imagine that it can get quite loud on weekend evenings and when sport is showing.