This turned out really well! The weather was just amazing!
Made it back home last night just short of midnight.
The VT Beer Fest was a great time! The weather couldn't not have been more perfect.
I schlepped about 100 kegs or so from the beer truck to the brewers stands, using 3 Bobcat/Kubota 4x4's (and with a team of 5 other guys). It was a rush at 11a to get all the kegs delivered to the brewers for a noon start but we pulled it off quite well.
The crowd on Friday night. This year they limited the number of tickets to 2,500, down from 3,000 last year (per session):
Sunset overlooking Lake Champlain:
Beer truck #1 (of 3).
#2:
The Canuck during his volunteer work shift:
Saturday afternoon crowd:
New (to me) brewery, the Trapp Family Brewery from Vermont. They had a "Rauch session". (I'm not making that up obviously):
Also had a chance to visit the Shed Brewery in Stowe, VT:
The biggest attractions at the Beer Fest were:
Lawson's Finest liquids. I didn't have the patience to wait in line for that one, it was always around a 30-minute wait. The other ones weren't though.
Most of the breweries from Quebec always get a lot of attention from Vermonters, mostly because their beers are not available/hard-ish to get in Vermont: Brouhaha, Dieu Du Ciel, Hopfenstark, Benelux. And a newcomer (to me anyways) from Vankleek Hill, Ontario, called "Beau's brewing".
Beau's had a delicious Kolsch (called "lugtread" - their kitsch is all farm/farm tractor related) that was amazing, but interestingly enough they had put in torrefied wheat instead of plain wheat (small percentage, but still, odd) in it. I could tell it was there - but just.
Link to breweries websites:
Lawon's Finest Liquids
Trapp Family Brewery
Brasserie Benelux
Brewpub Brouhaha
Dieu Du Ciel
Hopfenstark Brewery
Beau's Brewing
I noticed a moderately strong push on Belgian beers (to my dismay as y'all know me), and some double IPA's. All of the Quebec breweries were Belgian-centric.
M_C