Fodor's Expert Review The George

Not every pub is also a Grade I–listed, National Trust property, but this is London's last surviving galleried coaching inn. Dickens once frequented the inn's Coffee Room (now the Middle Bar) and name-checked The George in Little Dorrit. The gallery overlooks a cobblestone courtyard where plays may have been performed in Elizabethan times (galleried inns were frequently used as production venues), although the current building dates back only to 1677 after the original was destroyed in a fire. The interior is a maze of 18th-century low-ceilinged rooms replete with wood-paneled walls and period features. The cozy Parliament Bar, where passengers would have waited for the coach, is on the ground floor, while a restaurant is upstairs on the galleried level. Luckily the pub is not just a museum piece—it also has modern amenities like a beer garden and Wi-Fi.