On finding this pub we were all very pleased. It was a very hot spring Sunday and we had been walking by the river for well over an hour. As we crossed the bridge to the pub's large and busy outdoor seating area and then through to the very nice looking building, we expected great things. Sadly, The Anglers lived up to very little of this expectation.
Firstly, the wait at the bar was tiresome to say the least. It was a hot weekend that had followed a hot week. If I were managing a riverside pub, I'd certainly make sure it was well staffed on a predictably sunny Sunday afternoon. The manager of The Anglers obviously doesn't have the same staffing ideas as most. Two staff ran around like crazy while a crowd of maybe a hundred gathered around the bar. I actually caught sight of the manager, standing over at the end of the bar just looking on, not looking phased at all.... obviously he's grown to accept this sort of madness as "normal".
The pub offers quite a variety of continental and speciality beers, but after our almost half hour wait at the bar (somewhat due to the method whereby the barman would only serve the person directly infront of him at his end of the bar) most of us had to settle for our second choice of drink (sadly, my second choice was also off, so I had to go for my third). It wasn’t long into the afternoon but food was also off… This was quite strange, as I saw food still coming out of the kitchen a good forty five minutes later. Presumably being served to hungry punters who’d been waiting over an hour for it.
As I hit on before, the building is nice. Quaint and grand at the same time, it has lots of little areas hidden away inside, and a huge area outside, including an area for parents to dine with children. I obviously expected the toilets to be as well-kept and clean as most of the rest of the building. I was wrong. The flooding in the gents toilets was not pleasant to say the least. Neither was the stench. I almost re-evaluated just how desperate for a release I was when I swung back the loo door into what could only be described as an unnatural disaster site.
All in all, The Anglers is a sad place. Sad as it had so much opportunity but misses it on pretty much every count.