Truly Astounding Beer Tales...

My niece's wedding, held at the long deceased Bandersnatch, Tempe, AZ. My introduction to craft beer in general and Milk Stout in particular. Mercy!

 

"Astounding" these are not. However, they are my only beer tales...

Spent a week in Vermont. Left without any purchase of Alchemist, Tree House, or Hill Farmstead beers...

Spent a week in Massachusetts. Paid $24 to park in a Boston lot for about 20 minutes just to purchase a case of Trillium beers. Why? Because last time I was in Vermont, I left without any of their signature beers...

Also, once waited in line for about an hour for a Sand City release. Had to pee really bad the whole time.

That's all I got, BA...

 

OK since I'm an old timer I have a few.
A bunch of drinking buddies and a taproom manager, Chuck Higle, in 1982 (?) (memory a little hazy, I'll check the old photo albums later) at a place called Spike's in San Luis Obispo, Ca. decided to hold a beer festival in the parking lot, proceeds to be donated to the local Hospice. It was called the "International Festival of Beers" We had German, French, Belgium, Mexico, Japan, and a few others which we built booths for, beer was provided by the local distributor at no cost We had one booth for American micro brews with just three breweries. Anchor Steam, Hopland ( later to be called Mendocino) and Sierra Nevada. A guy called Ken showed up with a 5 gal carboy of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale from Chico, nearly an 7 hour drive away. Yep that guy.
Within three years there were no more foreign booths, the festival grew to huge proportions and is now called the California Festival of Beers.

 

Here is another, I was a musician for a proffesional English Country Dance group that toured the Renaissance Festivals in California. The Actors and support people camped just off site for the duration of the festival and every night had huge parties going on. One day we sent a new member to go get the beer with the tips we got during the day explaining that we only wanted "good beer" Well, he did Ok, bringing back Guiness, Sierra Nevada . some Dos Equis and one case of Keystone Light which nearly got him drummed out. During the night we left the case in the middle of the campground with a "free beer" sign. No takers. and I'm talking about a campground with hundreds of poor actors. That case became a white elephant that the members of the dance group would "gift" or hide in each other's homes. I ofttimes wonder if it's still out there as the group is still in business. But I live too far away from them now.

 

About a year ago I started a post something like 'What makes Pliny so good?'..Being in SC we don't get it..One of the coolest guys in the world messaged me with the offer to send me one-wanted nothing in return-just wanted me to try it..too cool Still thanking @warrendietrich2001 !!

 

That is certainly an epic tale!

 

I don't trade, but I watch the bad trader threads. The guys on this site who trade are some of the most generous people I have ever seen. If someone gets jacked over in a trade, they are jumping all over each other trying to make him right with no expectation of returns. They could fill up many pages in this thread with things they have done for each other.

 

Used to trade a bit, but not any more. Most people are solid, with some being outstanding and throwing in extra beers and swag. There are always gonna be a few bad apples that short trades, take a really long time returning boxes, or just plain steal beer. While that certainly sucks, it's good to have feedback on that type of thing because when I used to do it you didn't have any and it was just purely trusting a complete stranger.

 

I wouldn't say its an astounding tale by any stretch, but in June 2003 I went on a school exchange to Germany. I was 15 at the time, and still pretty wet behind the ears, and although I had some beer experience, it wasn't an awful lot.

Fortunately for me, my host (who had stayed with me in Shetland the year before) had just finished school, but had requested that I stay with him anyway because we got on so well, and the teachers agreed this was a good thing. Even better, I only had to go to school for 1 day of the 2 weeks we were there.

The rest of the time was spent exploring, getting trains into the city, going fishing, etc and all of it involved drinking Warsteiner pilsner. It very quickly became my first favourite beer, it was far better than anything I'd been able to get up until that point. I have finally been able to get it locally in this past year, and every time I have it I'm reminded of an amazing holiday spent with fantastic people, with whom I still keep in touch too.

 

I'd have to agree that it wasn't an astounding story, but it was a pretty damn good one.

 

Cheers dude, I appreciate that!

 

Next time spend 10 miuntes looking for a parking meter, $1-2.00

 

lol - totally did - we were driving around in circles for more than 15 minutes for sure - my wife was getting fussy and I was getting irritated - I was even looking for somewhere illegal to park, but there was not a spot to be found...

 

Once had a work event involving an intimate tasting in Brussels with 3F, Boon, Malheur, Van Steenberge and another 10 or so... I only wish I could remember all who were there. But the best thing was that it was an awkward Monday or Tuesday night in an odd location, poorly advertised, so there were no more than a couple dozen people passing through all night. I basically had the run of the place for the whole night, had as much as I wanted from them all, talked uninterrupted to all the brewers. (Well, Guido was standing in for his brother for 3F, so brewers plus one restaurateur.) Aaaaand, it was free.

 

Ok, Boston local here, got some good spots to park. Have her wait in the car while you go inside?

 

Modern Times: Black House Black Friday Festival 2015

I dont recall how much it cost, I want to say $30 per person. At any rate, it gets you TEN 4oz pours of a stout of your choice and you have about 20 to choose from, most of which are barrel-aged and all of which are rare and over 10%.

Anyway, me and the GF (at the time, fiancé now) get about 8 pours deep and are definitely feeling it. This random couple walks up to us and say that something came up and they cant stay, so they give us their tickets. 8 more tickets for each of us. 72 ounces of barrel-aged stout later, I was super glad we took a Lyft because I dont think I would've even remembered what a car was let alone where I parked.

 

Drinking Live Oak Hefe inside of Live Oak Brewing in Austin.

 

Here's one from last weekend:

Went to a liquor store in the town next to mine, a saw a Cantillon box on their shelf, shook it a bit, and it was empty, and thought "awww, just missed it.". Then I went into their walk in cooler, and what do I see on their shelf? A 2013 750ml bottle of Rose de Gambrinus. No price label, no UPC.

I bring it up front, the guy at the counter goes: "Oh, that's weird, no price. Let me look it up in our distributor book."
He looks.
"Hmm, nothing in there."
He pokes around the shelves a bit, looking for a tag, no luck. He comes back up to the counter.
"It's a lambic? Most of our lambics are $10 - $15, so how about $12.99?"

That's how I got a bottle of Cantillon that I'm holding for my next bottle share.

 

Thanks Debbie Downer. JK. All pretty funny because its not me. (But we all have similar stories).