July 24th, 2009 Joe Sixpack
This week’s column offers four ideas for summer beer destinations. I asked two other beer travelers for suggestions - here’s the second dispatch.
Chris Nelson and his wife, Merideth, offer “the ramblings of beer travelers” at their web site, The Beer Geek, where they proclaim they’re “seeing the world one pint at a time.” Merideth is working on the book about the their travels, tentatively titled Teachings from the Tap; Life Lessons from our Year in Beer.
I think one thing that we have found interesting about beer travel is going off the beaten path. You learn the darnedest things and have some once in a lifetime experiences going out of the way of the usual travel.
In Inyokern, California, for example, on the way to Vegas we went out of our way to visit Indian Wells Brewing. Out in the desert in the middle of nowhere is this brewery that opens at 7am! And believe it or not, they have fishermen that wait outside for it to open in the morning to buy their beer to take on their fishing trips.
Another place we found was Fredericksburg Brewing in Fredericksburg, Texas. This historic town with a tradition of German immigrants settling there certainly has been influenced by German culture. So in a small town north of San Antonio and west of Austin, we found this great beer. Who knew? Plus, in Fredericksburg, alcohol consumption on the sidewalk is allowed, so you can take your beer and stroll the shopping district. We watched a guy order a beer to go. It was put in a cup just like a soda would be, complete with lid and straw. And away he went out the door. Being from California, that was a weird thing for us to see. It blew us away! That, and the drive-through liquor stores…
I think the last example of this would be last year when we went to Colorado for GABF. Prior to going to Denver for the main event, we traveled out to Dillon and Pug Ryan’s. We didn’t think twice about walking from our hotel around the reservoir to Pug’s. It was a long walk, but we needed the exercise and planned to take a cab back after our night of imbibing. Well, they have no cab service in Dillon! The closest cab would need to come from Breckenridge, which of course would have been ridiculously expensive. In a nice gesture of small-town spirit, the owner offered up his bartender, who drove us the 10 minutes back to our hotel.
On the recommendation of some German friends, we visited the small town of Schlanders (Silandro in Italian) in the Italian Alps in June 2007. Near Bolzano, the people speak German in the region. In our three days there, we never uttered a word of Italian which is good because we don’t know any. We thought that people would speak Italian first then German as a second language, but teenagers in the cafes spoke German to each other. The area is beautiful, snow covered alpine peaks and orchard filled valleys. The hiking was pretty amazing rivaling anything we have done in Switzerland, Germany or Austria. Twenty minutes from Schlanders in Merano is Brauerei Forst, a German- style brewery complete with a massive biergarten. The level of German-ness was a pleasant surprise for us since Germany is one of our favorite places.
It’s surprises like that that make beer travel so fun for us. On our site, we try to encourage and inspire others to find their own beer adventures. Later this year, we should each reach our 500th brewery, probably in Portland, ME.
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July 24th, 2009 Joe Sixpack
I asked two beer travelers for advice on destinations this summer. Here’s the first dispatch.
Stan Hieronymus, author of many books including “The Beer Lover’s Guide to the USA.” Stan, his wife, Daria Labinsky, and daughter, Sierra, have spent the last year on a family road trip, writing and taking pictures for their web site - The Slow Travelers - along the way.
1. There can’t be a better setting for a brewery anywhere than Pelican Pub & Brewery in Pacific City, Oregon. Right on the beach, incredible views. And this is a brewery that’s won a ton of awards. Daria and Sierra really liked their meals. I didn’t eat - was in the brewery, collecting notes for “Brewing With Wheat.” (A Pacific City bonus: about a mile from Pelican, the Twist Wine Company has Pliney the Elder on tap. The winery is owned by [Russian River’s] Vinnie Cilurzo’s sister and her husband.)
It could fit into a bigger trip in two ways. Either if you were going to Portland (a little late to talk about OBF, I’m afraid). Or if you were going to drive from San Diego up to Pacific City hugging the coast. Multiple excellent stops, including North Coast Brewing in Fort Bragg. There’s an RV park across the road from Pelican, btw, and an RV park basically next to Rogue in Newport.
2. The Great Taste of the Midwest in Madison, Wis., next month. Problem would be that it is sold out. Side trip: New Glarus. You might have heard there is a brewery there and the region is thick with small-batch cheese producers. A short drive to Potosi and the National Brewery Museum.
But maybe you mean something different-er. And these days seeing basically local (it can be a long ways between towns here in the upper plains) hardly seems different, but it is my preoccupation. We’ve been in a boatload of national park lodges May and it seems they all have several taps with craft beer, usually brewed nearby. So you could make a trip out of helping your child earn junior ranger badges (Sierra has completed more than 30 programs since we started this trip 14 months ago) while you drink regional beer.
Probably not what you were thinking of, so I’ll try a couple more.
3. Catch up with New Belgium’s Tour de Fat. When you live in the Mountain Time Zone you tend to take this tour for granted, but people sure get excited. Most of the 2009 tour is left, although generally west of Fort Collins. Got to think it won’t be too many years until it joins New Belgium beer east of the Mississippi.
4. The $250 beer dinner at Ebenezer’s (Lowell, Maine). Quite honestly, the price seems silly to me, even for the beers I’ve heard will be there. The value comes from the fact that Sean Paxton will way over-deliver on the food, although it would really help if you had as many stomachs as a cow.
(You’ll notice that none of these suggestions is a place where you can order a ridiculous number of the best beers in the world.)
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November 9th, 2007 Joe Sixpack
I finally found an internet connection over here in Bavaria. This will be short because of the freaking German kezboard. A partial rundown of the beer intake so far - Faust, Konig Ludwig, Hacker Pschorr, HB, fresh Schlenkerla rauchbier, Carl Furst. All lagers, mainly pils and many, many bocks.
I´m a pro, so I can handle the beer. It´s the freaking food that´s killing me. Non-stop pork knuckles, wurst, sauerbraten and dumplings the size of breast implants. I swear I went three days before I saw a veggie. I asked for a salad at one place, and they gave me shredded lunchmeat. I also had lunch with an actual princess who posed with a glass of her brewery´s fest brew for my upcoming book on Christmas beer.
Meanwhile the gang at the back of the bus is consuming vast quantities of schnapps and playing a Bavarian card game called Sheephead.
More details when I return.
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October 24th, 2007 Joe Sixpack
I was up in New York yesterday with the Greater Phila. Tourism & Marketing Corp., promoting Philly Beer Week to several 7th Ave. magazines. They seemed extremely interested in our local beer culture; here’s hoping we get a little ink.
Coincidentally, we ran into the editor responsible for that Travel & Leisure mag story that rated Philly the ugliest city in America. She was extremely apologetic and said something like, “What we really meant is that you’re the 25th most attractive.” Whatever. I advised the GPTMC it should launch a new tourism campaign: “Visit Philly - You Never Looked Better.”
Also stopped in at the relatively new Blind Tiger in Greenwich Village and had a glass of Defiant Farmhouse. I also enjoyed a pint of pale ale from a freshly tapped firkin that the spacey barmaid claimed was from Chelsea Brewing. But she didn’t seem to know much more than that. FYI: Blind Tiger is across the street from Murray’s Cheese, the DiBruno’s of NY.
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