Purple Moose seen in the wild

I was delighted to see Purple Moose on the bar when I stopped off at the Ty Gwyn Inn on the way to Llanberis pass. Last time I called in they only had Doom Bar. I went straight for the Dark Side of the Moose (4.6% ABV) and it was a delicious dark delight. So after some rapid guzzling and an even more rapid swap of driving duties I went and got another one.

The pub also had real crisps, none of that fizzy keg crisp rubbish.

 The weekend had started well, and it stayed that way.

It was cold enough to get an easy Winter climb in on Parsley Fern Gully on the Friday, my enjoyment enhanced by my American born climbing partner's attempts at Welsh.

In mountains the Welsh word for valley "cwm" crops up quite a lot. The Welsh pronounce it something like "coom", but my friend pronounced it exactly like "quim". I didn't correct her of course, as it was far too entertaining.

On Saturday we trekked up Banana Gully, over Y Garn and dropped down on the other side to the Vaynol Arms.

I wasn't overly taken with where our journey was due to end. The Vaynol is a Robinson's pub and I'm not fond of their beers. I mentioned this to the barmaid as I peered along the five hand pumps and she replied "yes, a lot of people say that". The pump clips listed the hops used so I plumped for Dizzy Blond (3.8% ABV) as it was made with Amarillo, a great hop. And whilst I wouldn't go as far as saying the beer was great, it was certainly pleasant, which is a real step up for Robinsons as far as I'm concerned.

Having had pints of Purple Moose, and pleasant beer from Robinsons it seems things are looking up in Wales.

You can have any colour you like, so long as it's black

One Saturday we went to the old ale festival at the White Horse on Parsons Green. They didn't list what beers they had on the website but they did say what types of beer they would have:

• Winter Warmers
  
• Christmas ales
  
• Old ales
  
• Porters
  
• Stouts
  
• Milds

It was going to be a dark night. 

Disturbingly when we arrived there were morris men dancing inside the pub, and for some reason they'd painted their faces black. Now it's bad enough having morris men outside a pub, inside the pub is even worse and when they're done up like black and white minstrels there really ought to be a law against it. Fortunately they were just finishing so didn't disturb our drinking too much. 

Our first beer of the day was one of the lovely Lisa's favourites: Coniston Old Man. At 4.1% ABV it was a gentle introduction to the day's debauchery. Free programmes were available, which was handy, so we were able to get on with some serious plotting whilst sipping our first half. Purple Moose's Dark Side of the Moose, another favourite, was on in the side room or the Coach House bar as it was rather grandly styled. It took us two attempt to buy the beer as the first time we were driven out by someone dumping their guts. Bastard. Bring back smoking that's what I say, then you never noticed the flatulent bastards. The Purple Moose beer was worth it in the end, though perhaps a little astringent for my taste. 

Having read about the Sharp's Massive Ale with added wild yeast I had to give that a go next, but I wasn't overwhelmed. At an intimidating 10% ABV I was expecting something a bit, well, massive, but though it was a pleasant enough barley wine it didn't really taste massive. I thought Howard Town's Dark Peak, at a slightly more sensible 6.4%, had a lot more flavour, in fact in some ways it reminded me of something with rum or whisky added. 

Unusually for a beer festival the programme included a list of keg beers. I would normally dismiss such an anomaly out of hand, but as I have it on good authority that a craft keg revolution is sweeping the UK I thought it warranted further investigation. None of the keg beers were actually brewed in Britain though, which sadly made it look like another failed revolution. Still, I did get to try some craft keg during the day, as we managed to find seats upstairs where there was only a limited selection of beers on offer. My friend Dan (you didn't think I was going to buy it did you?) got a pint of Sierra Nevada Porter (5.8% ABV). Alas, this was not a whole new dimension of quality beer opening up to me, as it was too cold and almost devoid of flavour. And that's not just from me, that's what Dan thought and he was drinking a pint of lager when we arrived at the pub so I think it's fair to say is not much influenced by CAMRA. 

We did have some other beers, but funnily enough none stand out like the one we found on the way home. Waiting for a tube at Putney Bridge we saw what can only be the charitable work of CAMCL. On the bench opposite us was a unopened can of Carling. Being more than half cut I grabbed it immediately, I mean it may be shite but free beer is free beer. But then I thought of the poor thirsty tramps out there and I put it back. I would like to say this gave me a warm glow but it was so bloody freezing I didn't notice anything. I do hope whoever found the can enjoyed it though, as I'm sure it would have been wasted on me, and I was wasted enough already.   

 

Greenwich beer and jazz festival

Me and the lovely Lisa went to Greenwich beer and Jazz festival today. We got the boat from Waterloo as you get much better views than you do on the tube.



You realise that some of the buildings are designed to be seen from the river.



And you get to see sights you wouldn't normally.


If you look closely you'll see that this sail boat is in fact a fake - that's right there are no sails. In fact it was motoring along like everything else.

Surprisingly enough beer festivals are quite quiet on Thursday afternoons.



So we could get on with important beer research.



The beer range didn't seem as good as last year. There seemed to be fewer breweries on offer this time. Last year we went on Saturday, so many of the beers we'd hoped to try had sold out anyway (and the lovely Lisa missed out on Sarah Hughe's Dark Ruby mild yet again!), although we did discover the delights of the excellent West Berkshire brewery though and Twickenham Original and York Guzzler were also on top form.

This year only Wolf's Lavender Honey, a very nice pale hoppy and refreshing beer stood out. It didn't taste of either lavender or honey but that was in its favour. The Nelson Brewery and Meantime had their own bars but the beers didn't seem up to much. Commendations go to Purple Moose Dark Side of the Moose (smooth and drinkable with a taste of chocolate malt and plenty of hops) and Oak Leaf Nuptu' ale (floral hop taste) but otherwise the beers we tried were OK but nothing special.

The fact that this year there were no tasting notes in the programme may have hampered our efforts to find beers we liked, as could the fact we were there in the afternoon and we're heading off on holiday tomorrow so we were strictly limiting our intake less than our body weight.

On the plus side the Jazz wasn't offensive.



Some people even thought it was nice



Though something was making Captain Cook scowl.



It's a good festival in a great venue and even though we thought the beers were mostly pleasant, not outstanding I'm sure we'll be back next year.