This was my first trip to the Sugar Loaf, replacing plans to do a North-East-South-West pub crawl due to bad weather. I’m rarely over Easton way, but I enjoyed the Sugar Loaf so much I may have to make more time for it. There were three cask beers on tap, shown below. We started on the Landlord, one of my favourites when well kept which it was in the Sugar Loaf. The HPA, however, was exquisite. The plan was to go to a few pubs, but the HPA hit the spot so sweetly we stayed for three (although we did also manage a quick one at the Chelsea Inn).

The dartboard is in a small section off to the right of the bar. The lights were off when we arrived but the bar staff were happy to switch them on. The board is unbranded, and seemed to be a little moldy giving the white segments the appearance of an artisan cheese. That said, none of the beds were too worn out and it had a bladed construction meaning fewer bounce outs. The wire around the outer bull was more battered than I have seen before, although this doesn’t really affect play.

The oche left more to be desired; a small strip of gaffer tape about 30cm too far away from the board. The extra length is a guess, and maybe I was just having a bad day, but it has meant I’ve finally followed through on my threat to bring a measuring tape to future pub dartboard reviews. I have now added a length of string to my bag which is the correct bullseye to oche diagonal length (2.93m), with the horizontal distance (2.37m) sharpied on. At least the dart board was the right height, measured using nature’s measuing stick; me (plus a bit).

There was plenty of space for scoring, with a large chalkboard off to the right of the board. Although it was on a door that the staff would nip in and out of occasionally, not frequently enough to disrupt the game. The tables next to the oche were well thought out and clearly set aside for people playing darts.

All in all the Sugar Loaf has a great darts set-up largely let down by the oche. I will definitely be visiting in the not too distant future, if only to see if my statement about the oche length is true, or if I’m following in Mervyn King’s footsteps. He stopped a match midway through to get the oche measured, only for it to have been correct all along. Even if trying out my high-tech oche measuring device isn’t enough of a pull for a visit the HPA will be.