Heading to Vancouver...

I'd say Alibi Room is the must visit place in Vancouver for beer.

If you're desperate for Cantillon (like many Americans coming up here seem to be), the BierCraft's almost always have some of the regular bottles for drink-in.

If you want to hit a brewery, Brassneck is pretty awesome and easy to get to from downtown.

 

I'd also recommend 33 Acres. Great beer and it's close to Brassneck Brewery so you can hit up both! Lots of great food around those two joints as well. Often, food trucks will park outside each of them and they're really top notch as well. Have a blast in Vancouver! Hopefully you catch some nice weather...It's quite a beautiful city!

 

Depending what week you're coming there is always various events, tap takeovers, dinners, etc happening. I'd say Alibi is a good default #1 pub, but on any given day there might be other places to go. A place in Langley (very far from DT Van - it's a few cities over) just did an Eclipse tasting for example, who woulda thought that?!

Quite a few restaurants are starting to do interesting things as well.

 

As stated before, The Alibi Room is great. If you go to one place this is it.

Brewery wise in Vancouver proper, you should check out Brassneck, and Strange Fellows. Both offer good to great beer and have solid tasting rooms. Also they are both easy to get to from Down Town.

If you can get out of the city, Four Winds Brewing in Delta (about a half hour out of the city) is one of the best breweries in BC and worth the trip.

Have fun.

 

As hornet2003 mentioned, Brassneck and 33 acres are good bets. Also in walking distance is R& B Brewing, Steel toad brew company, Main street brewing, and Craft beer market in Olympic village.

 

LOL ya go to Craft Beer Market, where a sleeve of Stone Go-To IPA is $9 hahaha. (noting OP location of California). Steel Toad has good guest taps I hear...

 

Could be worse! I'm sure you know about bellwoods already, but just in case you don't... it bears repeating. Bellwoods. Go there.

 

What are the local bottles worth picking up right now? Heading to the border next Saturday morning to get our Nexus passes, so we're making it into a day trip. Brunch at Alibi Room, shopping at Viti and a visit to Four Winds on the way back are the only definites so far.

 

Singularity from Driftwood (black wax and all black label this year) and Vexillum the new IIPA from Four Winds will definitely be worth the grab. There was a drop of Westy 12 last week so there could still be some floating around if you're into that. Mosaic One Trick Pony is on at Brassneck right now too, I've never had it but heard some really good things.

 

I'd recommend stops at Brewery Creek, Legacy, Kerrisdale West Coast Liquor Store, and a couple other before I'd recommend Viti. Nice little shop, but if you're coming from the border anyways all the other places I mentioned are on your way, have more selection, and will be cheaper.

 

Fully agree - Viti would be my last pick both in terms of selection and price

 

Don't forget service. Man what is that manager's problem...

 

Limited time in the city, unless something else is closer to Alibi Room than Viti. Doing brunch there, a little bit of bottle shopping then taking our daughter to Stanley Park to ride her bike and walk around before heading to Four Winds/Delta and then back home to Seattle. Driving around all over to multiple shops isn't in the cards.

 

Brewery Creek is about a 5 min drive directly down/south Main St from Alibi, which would be on your way into or out of the city pretty much (depending how familiar you are with the city, it's only a few minutes East of Oak, which turns into the 99 South/I5 eventually). Free parking there in the back alley as well right behind the store. Really not out of the way at all.

Actually, if you're doing Alibi > Stanley Park > Delta/Four Winds, you could easily stop at Kerrisdale on your way south to Delta. Google map it but it's also not out of the way at all. Well maybe 5 minutes tops.

 

That totally works. We normally just stay at Moda so going downstairs to Viti is easy, and I've never had a problem with the guy who runs the place. Thanks.

 

Instead of starting a new thread, I thought I would continue in this one. YOU'RE WELCOME CANADA.

I am going to be driving to Vancouver last weekend of March from Portland. I am staying downtown next to BC Place.

My trip is not exactly beer centric so I only have limited hours to this endeavor. After a preliminary search I have the following places on the agenda:

• Four Winds
• Brassneck
• Alibi Room.

My Questions:

• Is this a good agenda based on beer quality and overall vibe?
  
• What great local beers should I be looking out for at restaurants or bars?
• Where can I score some Cantillon?! Just kidding Just kidding. I don't care.

Thanks for the helpful responses!