I'm planning on making a pilgrimage to New England's finest targeting Hill Farmstead, Bars/pubs that serve/sell Lawson's, Alchemist, NEBCO, and then Treehouse. I plan to fly into VT from DC, rent a SUV and work my way down. On this particular trip, I am only focusing on VT, CT and MA with these breweries as my must-visit. I will only have 3 nights/4 days to spare working my way down to DC (~11 hour drive total). With that being said, are there any tips or recommendations before visiting these breweries, any cool lodging or restaurants I should be checking out around these places? I will be using the beeradvocate places page for ideas as well. Cheers!
Make sure you pay attention to HF and Tree House's fairly limited hours and plan to spend at least 2 hours at each place if you show up at certain times. Recommendations: - Stop at Lost Nation for a couple beers and food before or after Hill Farmstead. Their beer is pretty good but the food is unreal. SO good. Their Gose is very nice. - Get some Brisket at BT's smokehouse in Sturbridge before or after Tree House. Stop at Yankee Spirits in Sturbridge first and get a couple beers from their huge selection, BT's is BYOB. - If you find yourself in the Boston area, check out Trillium and Jack's Abby - If you're in CT on a Saturday, check out OEC for some really cool sour stuff if you like that. - Second on Beer'd. Their hoppy stuff is on par with most of the other great hoppy stuff coming from NE these days lastly, just making sure you realize that Alchemist doesn't have a retail space open currently!
I will 2nd BT's smokehouse and OEC Brewing. Julios is a great beer store in MA. In VT Prohibition Pig for a restaurant with good beer, close to ProPig is Craft Beer Cellar for a beer store. Also in VT is Hunger Mountain CoOp for another beer store.
I agree with the usual responses re: VT, but on the way home try to stop at the Pizza Boy outside of Harrisburg, PA.
If you make it to MA, you have to visit Trillium if they have any IPAs/Pale Ales at the moment. They will be on the same level as those in VT (go for growlers at Trillium, if possible).
