Some pubs you visit for a pint. Others you visit for the history. And then there are places like The Eagle in Cambridge, where you arrive for a Guinness and suddenly find yourself quite happy to write off the rest of the afternoon.

This pub was chosen by my father-in-law, who certainly knows his way around a boozer, and it was right up my street.

History? Tick. Busy? Tick. Tradition? Tick. Decent Guinness? Very much tick.

But sitting there supping on my stout, I found myself wondering which of these things I liked the most. Was it the centuries of history soaked into the walls? The satisfying hum of a pub full of people? The sense that, despite everything the modern world has done to pubs, this one has managed to hold on to something rather important?

Then I realised it wasn’t any one of those things. It was the combination.

The Eagle has that rare quality of making you want to stay. Not because there’s anything particularly elaborate going on, or because someone has spent a fortune trying to manufacture an atmosphere, but because everything just seems to work. It’s a proper pub, full of proper character, and the sort of place where an afternoon can very easily disappear without you noticing.

There’s a wonderful mix of people, too. Tourists taking in the history, students talking nonsense, locals who presumably know exactly where they want to sit, and people like me, content to occupy a corner with a pint and watch the world go by. Nobody needs to be doing anything particularly interesting. The pleasure is in watching all these different lives briefly overlap in the same room.

And then there’s the history. Not the sort that’s been carefully sanitised and presented behind glass, with a little plaque telling you what you’re supposed to think about it. Here, it’s right there on the walls.

The Eagle is famous for its RAF Bar, where airmen during the Second World War left their signatures, squadron markings and messages on the ceiling and walls. These aren’t just decorative curiosities. They’re little traces of people who passed through here during an extraordinary period in history. Young men, presumably coming in for a drink, a bit of company and perhaps a brief escape from whatever awaited them outside.

Their names and markings remain, decades later, while the people sitting beneath them get on with the ordinary business of having a pint.

There’s something rather moving about that. You can look up from your glass and find yourself contemplating the fact that this building has been quietly collecting human stories for generations. People have celebrated here, argued here, fallen in love here, worried about the future here and, no doubt, drunk considerably more than they intended.

And now we’re doing exactly the same things.

The Eagle also has its place in the story of Cambridge’s scientific past. It was here in 1953 that Francis Crick and James Watson announced their discovery of the structure of DNA to the pub’s lunchtime crowd. Imagine being in the pub that day, perhaps worrying about your lunch or your next pint, completely unaware that one of the most significant scientific discoveries of the century was being discussed around you.

Although, if we’re honest, most of us would probably have been more interested in whether the Guinness was settling properly.

That’s the beauty of a place like this. History doesn’t feel like something that happened somewhere else, to people who were somehow more important than us. It feels as though it happened in the middle of ordinary life, which, of course, it did.

And that’s why I could happily sit here all afternoon. I’d be drinking in the atmosphere, watching the characters come and go, looking at the walls and imagining the stories behind the names, occasionally taking another sip of stout and reminding myself that there’s absolutely no need to rush anywhere.

Drinking it all in.

Literally.

The Eagle isn’t just a pub with a good backstory. It’s a pub where the backstory, the people, the beer and the atmosphere all combine to make the experience feel wonderfully complete. You don’t need a tasting menu, a cocktail list as long as your arm or a bartender explaining the provenance of the ice. Give me a decent pint, a room with a bit of soul and enough going on to keep my mind wandering, and I’m perfectly happy.

In a world increasingly obsessed with making everything newer, shinier and more Instagrammable, there’s something reassuring about a pub that understands the value of simply being itself.

The verdict: History, character, atmosphere and a decent Guinness. The Eagle has the lot. And if you’ve got an afternoon to spare in Cambridge, I’d strongly recommend finding yourself a seat, ordering a pint and resisting the temptation to look at your watch.

Some places make you want to see more. This one makes you want to stay longer.

Good choice Stuart.