Berkeley to Healdsburg visit Oct. 9 - 10th

If you are going to be in Berkeley try hitting up Fieldworks. They are still fairly new and have some incredible beers. I highly recommend the coconut IPA, white mocha golden stout. Awesome. Have fun.

 

I'd say spend saturday night in arcata. Hit up Redwood Curtain Brewing and Mad River in Blue Lake, although not on par with RR and Bear Rep., but are great little breweries. Next day continue up the 101 and take the 199 back across to I-5. Much more enjoyable and scenic drive.

 

I did Russian River yesterday, got there at 11:10am and waited for 25 mins, not bad. Happy hour all day on Sunday! The only bummer is that my case of Pliny was brewed 3 weeks ago. I'm still going to drink the heck out of it though.

 

how's North Coast for a visit, guys? I'd like to stop one of these days.

just want to suggest that you're in Sonoma at this point and should throw in a couple winery visits if that's at all your bag. lovely stuff up there i can help with if needed. like i'm coming up to oregon soon and plan to make time for willamette for that very reason

 

Downtown Berkeley has a few decent spots. Beta Lounge has a small but pretty good tap list, and some good bottles as well. Perdition Smokehouse has an extensive taplist, though they close at midnight. There are also two brewpubs downtown, both owned by the same people as Drake's Brewing, one of which, Triple Rock, was one of the first brewpubs in CA after prohibition. The other downtown Berkeley brewpub is Jupiter. Neither have beers that will blow you away, but are generally solid.

 

Jupiter has quite a few guest taps, and usually has something decent to offer.

 

There's the Sierra Nevada Torpedo Taproom in Berkeley that's not too far from the Rare Barrel, the got some good stuff on tap. They even offer a six pack vertical of the Bigfoot barleywine to take home.

You should also try to make your way to Sliver and/or Cheese Board Collective as they both make great pizzas. Sliver was started by people who used to work for the collective so they both make pretty similar types of pizzas but they're still pretty damn good and the two places are worth a visit.

 

If you have time before hitting Bear Republic, BeerCraft in Rohnert Park is worth a visit.
They often have Cellarmaker and SARA on tap.
Cooperage Brewing in Santa Rosa has been open for a few months but is already putting out some great hoppy beers.

 

If you've never seen the northern part of the state, definitely do yourself a favor. Humboldt County is amazing. If you have the time, take a hike in Fern Canyon. If you don't have that much time, at least make a pit stop in Trinidad and hit up Luffenholtz Beach or College Cove.

Beer wise, there's also The Local Beer Bar in Eureka. Decent little beer bar.

 

Beer revolution in Berkeley and Cellarmaker in SF.

 

After hitting RRBC, maybe BeerCraft, and definitely Bear Republic, you may not want to drive almost 4 hours up to Eureka/Arcata from Healdsburg. You could split the difference and drive 2 hours to Boonville /Ukiah (Anderson Valley, Buckhorn, and Mendocino Brewing) or Fort Bragg (North Coast and Piaci Pub & Pizzeria) to have some nice brewery and pub options and a beautiful place to stay for Saturday night. On Sunday, you could hit the Eureka/Arcata spots along the way depending on how much time you can spend.

If you're going on I-5, why not detour a bit to Sierra Nevada? Great place to visit. Redding Alehouse Pub is supposed to be good if you end up there.

 

Beer Rev is in Oakland. Not super hard to get to from downtown Berkeley, though maybe more effort than OP is looking for.

 

On way down would suggest Fall River Tap room in Redding. If you cant stop at least get a couple bombers small brewery doing good beers. Would suggest the coast route back and hitting the breweries on the coast six rivers mad river eel river redwood curtain and enjoy the drive.

 

I haven't been to the Anderson Valley tap room in years do I can't help on daily offerings. I was just at Hop Grenade last week and their tap selection is definitely worth your time. Enjoy

 

I'm a little bit if a Belgie freak, so the Trappist in Oakland is the place. Bonus: they sell bottles to go.