Networking and CPD in Edinburgh

Last weekend I was back in Edinburgh for some Continuing Professional Development and networking. I went via the Lake District so I could get in some snow, having felt left out in Surrey.

This is not Edinburgh

If I'd known Snowmageddon was coming I might not have bothered, but nevermind I'm sure it was character building. Particularly the bit when I found the limitations of Grivel spiders whilst high on a steep slope of hard snow.

Events in Edinburgh started with a a pub crawl on the Friday. I skipped the first stop, The Hanging Bat and went straight to The Blue Blazer. It was packed when I got there but some experienced loitering soon saw me shifting to a vacated table where I could await my fellow crawlers in comfort.

The Blue Blazer

We ended up having two pints in here as people gathered, but made up for it by missing the next pub on the list and going straight to the Bow Bar. My dad used to drink there when he was a student at the Royal Dick.

The Bow Bar

Again we had two pints here. Rather reckless behaviour on a pub crawl if you ask me, but at times like this you just have to go with the flow. We skipped a pub again which made up for it a bit and went straight to The Malt Shovel.

Here there was a delicious range of beers from Greene King. The Scrum Down was surprisingly bananery. The Greene King esters I was informed.

Things were definitely getting messy by this point as we then had an unscheduled stop at The Halfway House, where I had another rugby beer that was considerably worse than Greene King's offering. Horribly astringent.

The Halfway House

Never mind we were into the home straight. At The Guildford Arms they had Jarl on so I went for that and at the last stop, The Cafe Royal, I had nothing as I was keen to be able to find my way back to the hotel.

The Guildford Arms

Networking and CPD resumed on Saturday lunch time at Andrew Ushers.

Andrew Ushers

The free beers were both pale and hoppy and served from the evil keg. I have to say I did find them too cold and fizzy. Perhaps hoppy beers aren't suited to keg dispense?

The main event was the evening dinner with beer supplied by Timothy Taylor's.

More giant beer mats?

The main speech from Peter Ells, their recently retired Head Brewer, was a cracker. I was slightly disturbed by some comments after it from the chairman though. He said the students present had an excellent opportunity to network and speak to potential employers. Does this mean I've been doing it wrong? I thought "networking" was just a synonym for "getting pissed".