Hey, a person can dream, can’t they? Heck, yes!!! I picked up this book on line just for the fun of it. Although I have done a decent bit of running around the UK, I have not had a chance to run around the County of Kent. I have flown over it a million time, on the way down to the continent, but never on the ground. And, even when I get a chance to travel through Kent, since this book was published back in 1982, I wonder how much many of these pubs are still serving a pint of fine ale. Still, it is an interesting piece of history. The public houses listed in this book number well over one thousand, 1,326 pubs in all. Wow! Although I know differently, one could hope that all of these pubs still exist today.
As with all of the CAMRA guide, there is a certain criteria that must be met for a pub to be included. A decent, cask conditioned ale, preferably locally brewed, should be on tap. Fair enough. This book was produced locally, by the folks who know the territory - none of whom were paid for their efforts. These folks use their local expertise to update the reader on the brewing scene in the county. Each pub is detailed - beer, food, music, games, etc…
One kind of neat thing about this book, which I did not know when I bought it, was that a previous owner seems to have been keeping track of the pubs he or she had the pleasure of visiting. Take Tunbridge Wells, for example. The previous owner had marked eight of the pubs in the village. There are at least that many more pubs in the town that he or she did not mark. Perhaps these pubs were on the schedule, but something intervened to prevent a visit. Who knows?