No. 111 The Rectory

Visited on 27/10/11. This place is situated half way along Bell End Walk, right next to the cathedral and is one of Chester’s newer bar/restaurants. I’d love to see the business plan, as I’d have thought ‘customers’ were a sort of prerequisite. However, they seem to be operating quite happily without any. The place was completely empty and when we walked in the barmaid was visibly shocked. Ok, that might have been just because it was us. A hand pump was on the bar with a Flowers IPA pump-clip attached, so we ordered up a round of said beverage. “Oh, that’s not connected,” came the barmaid’s reply. We ordered a round of Bombardier instead (fizzy version), but as she opened the tap to pour the first pint, an empty keg blurted out a little CO2 wet fart. “Oh, (giggle giggle) that’s not working either,” she helpfully explained. “We’ve got cocktails though !” “Great, why didn’t you say ? Why are we messing about with ale ? Three pints of cocktails then please.” She looked a bit uncomfortable. “Only joking. We’ll have three bottles of your finest most Mexican beer.” Ten quid. Ten bleedin’ quid to drink supermarket ale in an empty building ! Setting fire to a tenner, filming it, staring at the camera, saying “I’m mad, me”, then putting it on You-tube would have been more fun. We repaired to the verandah in order to escape from the stifling lack of atmosphere. Surprisingly, it’s quite a nice spot. A gang of male ‘yoot’ then turned up (innit). They asked if there was a DJ on. We laughed and sent them back up the road to Missoulla (No. 110). “There’s deffo a DJ on there”, we assured them. “P-Diddy his name is. P-Diddy David Hamilton.” They looked perplexed as they walked away. Probably hadn’t heard of the great man. Probably wondered why those ‘old guys’ were more hip than they were. Probably.