A night out on the town....In West Malling!...

Being as we live in the borough of Tonbridge and MALLING and I have an old pal who lives over at the King's Hill development, I thought, just for once, I'll have a night out in West Malling and why not! The truth is, partly anyway, it was my wife's turn to host her book club meeting and I couldn't face being a spare part in my own house all evening; and also it was high time my mate and I got together for a good old chat over a pint. I didn't mind being driver for the evening either as, in this hot weather, I often drink pints of ice cold weak lager shandy as I find they hit the spot perfectly and quench my thirst. So off I went to pick my mate up from his posh pad on the King's Hill Estate; I nearly bought a house there about ten years ago when it was still mostly a building site and sometimes wish I had since ME19, I learnt last night, is officially the most wealthy post code in the country. (Although how they worked that one out is a debate for another time.) Driving through the gates of the ME19 estate these days is like passing through into a parallel world; a world of Premier League footballers, and asset managers, golfers and squash players, stock brokers and business owners. I'm not saying it's exclusive there but even the Fire Station is ex-directory! We didn't go to the estate's only pub, The Spitfire, which on previous experience I remember as being pretty souless, choosing instead to go into the busy metropolis of West Malling! I'll be honest and say that although I was looking forward to spending some time with my old university buddy I was slightly dreading being stuck in a sleepy little boozer in the backwater of West Malling! How wrong could I have been! Maybe because it was a balmy summer evening, maybe because I need to get out more, but there seemed to me to be a fantastic atmosphere in the town centre of Tonbridge's step-sister town. Lads and lasses, young and old, many dressed up like they were on a night out in Southend, some, like me, wearing jeans and T-shirts spilled out in their hundreds onto the pavements outside the two oldy worldy inns on the High Street; I can't really comment on the quality of the beer or the price of it for that matter, since I was on the shandies all night, but what I do know is that I was very pleasantly surprised and will definitely go back for more. I couldn't help but make comparisons with going out in Tonbridge town centre with it's busy narrow road preventing any safe al fresco drinking, its blaring police and ambulance sirens disturbing the peaceful evening air. West Malling has the old fashioned village atmosphere of the Five Pointed Star and the Bull Inn, Tonbridge has the large-chain pub, plastic experience of The Slug and Lettuce and Weatherspoons that's about it. Rather sad really when you think how good it could be....