It’s the largest expanse of shingle in the world, the wind will blow you off your feet and the landscape looks like the end of the world - but there are still two pubs competing for your custom.

So, I’m delivering an early Christmas present and going double bubble this week to bring you two boozers from the most Marmite place in Kent - Dungeness.

Love it or hate it, this most southerly tip of the county is besieged by visitors braving the howling wind to experience a unique landscape and boy do they deserve a drink.

Entering the Britannia Inn, which looks more gift shop/garden shed than pub, Kim behind the bar assures me they only get weather like this two days a year – yeah, yeah!

The welcome is warm, unlike the pub, but the staff are busying themselves trying to get the radiators up to speed. Apparently the fire can’t be lit because a new, powerful extractor fan has been fitted and it sucks belching clouds of smoke back into the boozer.

The interior has a bit of a beach hut look and is more than a bit tatty, but there’s a down-to-earth honesty about the place.

The decorations look as if they came out of my nan’s house and Mrs SD said the first thing she’d do is take down the dirty St George flags hanging over doorways and give them a darned good wash.

Selecting from the list of Shepherd Neame staples I chose a pint of 4.5% Whitstable Bay Blonde and Mrs SD went the usual Sauvignon Blanc. Both did the job and were well served.

The hallway to the toilets and the facilities look as if they might have been the last thing on the decorating list and I particularly appreciated the porthole-style window in the gents. I can report they were clean, fresh and sweet smelling.

Back in the bar I noted that there’s no jukebox, fruitie or darts, though one light arrangement did suggest there might once have been a pool table in situ.

What I did spot, was a yellow and black whirly wheel on the wall that must have come from a greyhound track or a bookies. The barmaid said she wasn’t sure where ‘he’ had got it from but the idea was to let visiting kids use it to win prizes.

Unfortunately, like a few things, it wasn’t quite functioning properly and always ends up landing on the same number. The result is kids make do and just spin it as fast as they can.

We decided not to spin the wheel and take our chances with the weather instead as the rain had relented a little and we had another stop to make.

This next stop was the second pub perched on ‘the UK’s only desert’ and it was immediately clear this place is used to being a good deal busier than our previous port of call.

This single storey building proudly proclaims it was created from the timbers of the 1633 Spanish vessel Alfresia, which was wrecked nearby, though this isn’t immediately apparent.

What is clear is The Pilot, and all its staff, are far more commercially aware than anything or anyone at our first stop.

It’s specially created logo can be seen everywhere – on T-shirts, the menus, mugs that cost £6, even the cutlery sleeves. And the waitresses and bar staff are all keen to sell the place but no-one is sure exactly where, if anywhere, the surviving timber from the Spanish wreck can be found?

The local Romney Marsh Brewery has joined forces in creating several beers for the place and I decided to try a B17 Sleepytime Girl. This 5% American pale ale isn’t a showstopper but it was a big step forward from my previous pint and left a decent slightly hoppy aftertaste.

The Sauvignon Blanc also received a strong thumbs up from ‘Er Indoors and with a combined cost of £11.40 the drinks didn’t quite break the bank.

For food we selected a broccoli and stilton soup each, which came with chunky bread and butter – this I must say was excellent, just creamy enough with a good strong taste of the blue cheese running through it.

I decided it would be rude not to sample the Baileys cheesecake so close to Christmas but by some strange quirk of fate this arrived with two spoons – and, one mouthful was gone even before I managed to get a picture to show you. I can report this one also achieved a top mark of approval.

The full menu has plenty of choice on it though unsurprisingly there is a leaning towards the pub’s speciality of fish and chips. A large portion, which did look massive, will set you back £15.95 but you can choose from plaice, cod, huss, haddock or skate.

The facilities were fine and had been maintained fairly recently but the futuristic hand drier, with its flashing blue lights, did give off an unfortunate aroma.

As you’d expect by now the place is festooned in Christmas decs, all of which look a good deal newer than at our previous venue, and whilst Yuletide tunes are perfectly reasonable in December I could have done without a double playing of Boney M’s Mary’s Boy Child.

The Pilot is much better organised and run than The Britannia and as a result must get many, many more feet crossing the threshold but I couldn’t help feeling there is an element of style over substance. This said, it was where we chose to eat at The Pilot so draw your own conclusions.

Read all Secret Drinker's Kent pub reviews

Want more Secret Drinker? Sign up for his monthly newsletter here

Follow Secret Drinker on Twitter here

The Britannia Inn, Dungeness Road, Dungeness, Romney Marsh TN29 9ND

Decor: In need of some freshening up, there is a limit to how far you can take shabby chic and the decoration is now looking very dated. *

Drink: The Whitstable Bay Blonde is as good here as it is anywhere else but it’s no show stopper. Mrs SD put her wine in exactly the same bracket and, unlike outside, it could have done with being a tad cooler. **

Food: I can’t score this one as we didn’t eat. Although the fellow on the table next to us reckoned his fish and chips were the best available locally.

Price: It was a straight fiver for the lager and £6 for a large glass of white wine – the former is a little overpriced, while the latter was probably fair. ***

Staff: Welcoming enough and chatty without being over-attentive – mainly because they were more interested in getting the radiators functioning. ***

The Pilot Inn, Battery Road, Lydd-on-Sea, Romney Marsh TN29 9NJ

Decor: Comfortably furnished all round with lots of wood and plenty of nautical paraphernalia. ****

Drink: Created specially for The Pilot by the Romney Marsh Brewery, the B17 Sleepytime Girl American pale ale, 5%, is a decent enough drop. ***

Food: The broccoli and stilton soup, served with chunky bread, hit the spot on a chilly day and the Baileys cheesecake was creamy and melt-in-the-mouth. ****

Price: The soup was £5.95 and the cheesecake £6.95. Obviously known for fish and chips, they cost £13.95 for a medium and £15.95 for a large (a ‘senior’ portion is £9.50). The pint and wine totalled £11.40. **

Staff: Efficient without being too effusive, they might not be able to locate an original timber but they know it’s commercially important to maintain the legend. ***