Rare pleasures in the lakes

I was up in the lake district for more excitement this weekend. Dusting off an old copy of  The Dentist's Guide to Hens Teeth, also known as Winter Climbs in the Lake District I managed to catch what looks like the end of the routes being in winter condition and heroically battle my way up a couple of grade I snow plods. Touching the Void it was not but you can't help but have fun when you get to swing your ice axes. 
I also managed to take in The Golden Rule in Ambleside, a pub that to my shame I'd never been in before despite the frequency with which I'm up that way. 



It's an great pub, that looks just like a pub should. On the downside the brewery is Robinsons, which is not one of my favourites. I will definitely be back but I don't think it will become a regular stop like the Watermill at Ings has. 

The beer highlight of the trip came thanks to Booths. I popped in hoping that their excellent beer selection would include some Worthington's White Shield as since reading Hops and Glory both myself and the lovely Lisa have had a thirst for it. Sadly it was not to be but I did manage to stock up on Coniston Old Man, York Guzzler, Daleside Morocco Ale and a favourite of mine I wasn't expecting Brooklyn Chocolate Stout.



As I take the current fashion for health scares about alcohol very seriously I shall have a sip only out of each of these bottles before disposing of the rest of the contents in a government approved waste dump. You can't be too careful you know. 

Rob's stag do (part one)

I've just beer to the beer oasis that is York for young Rob's stag do. I know Rob from when I was studying brewing at Heriot-Watt. He now works for Daleside brewery.

First stop was the Lowther pub:



It was only a brief stop though as the only cask beer they had on was John Smith's, so we made our excuses and left.

In York you're never far from the next pub so we called in at the King's Head.



The is a Sam Smith's pub and was a keg only establishment, as it didn't even have their piss poor Old Brewery Bitter on. More annoyingly it didn't have their wheat beer on either so I had a bottle of pale ale. It was OK but nothing special.

After this things improved as we got to the Ackhorne.



This had some decent beers on but I wasn't too taken with my first choice Saltaire Blackcurrant cascade. It had the citrussy smell of Cascade hops but I found the flavour too much in the way of blackcurrant. My next choice was more like it, Wylam Summer Magic. This was a pale beer with Amarillo hops that really hit the spot.

The it was on to the Maltings, an excellent beer pub I've been to before.



My first one here was Outlaw IPA. It seems Outlaw brewing is the name that Roosters brewery use for their experimental beers. Outlaw IPA was beyond being a pale hoppy beer and was in fact a full on American style IPA. I'm not convinced cask is the best way to serve this type of beer but it certainly worked in this case. If Roosters fancy doing any more experimenting I'm quite happy to be a guinea pig.



For my next beer I was looking for something darker. No matter how good golden coloured beers are I don't generally make a session of them as they don't seem to sit that well. So I went for Summer Wine brewery's Teleporter. This was at the other end of things from Outlaw IPA, being as black as your hat and made from ten types of malt. It was excellent and put me back in balance.

Then it was on to the Guy Fawkes, the pub I stayed in when I was last in York.



The sign's had a V for Vendetta makeover.

I went for a Timothy Taylor's Landlord here and it was as lovely as ever. There was a brief outbreak of arm wrestling at this point for reasons I can't quite remember. It was clearly time for some food now so some of us went off for a curry, whilst others moved on to the next pub. Still having my wits about me I opted for the curry, washed down with plenty of water.

We caught up with pub goers at the Old White Swan.



They were looking a bit worse for wear and had decided that maybe food wasn't such a bad idea after all.



I had a Yorkshire terrier, another pale hoppy beer, but a good example of the style.

It was getting late by now and some people there was talk of going on to a club. That's not really my thing so it was bed time for me, and as the talk the next day was of Chardonay I don't think I missed anything.

Farnham Beerex

Saturday night was Farnham Beer Exhibition. It's my favourite beer festival. It's held at the old maltings, a venue that actually has some atmosphere.



There was a slight hitch at the start as I'd forgotten the poxing tickets and had to run back home for them before we got the train. I certainly earned my first pint. 

Over 80 beers were on offer, and a selection of scrumpy ciders for those who really wanted to dissolve some brain cells. No foreign beer bar though, so some of my friends who normally seek solace there were stuck with cask beer. 

I started off on Dark Star's Chestnut Ale, which was sadly a bit disappointing. I'm a fan of this brewery but the beer was brown and sweet and that's about it. 

Twickenham Fine Ales didn't let me down though, and both their Naked Ladies and Pale Beauty (a wheat beer) went down a treat. Good, hoppy beers I'd happily drink anytime. 

I was pleased to find Abbey Ales Bell Ringer on offer I'd heard good things about the brewery. It's an amber coloured beer nicely balanced with citrusy hops.

Several more beers followed, the exact details of which are now a little vague. A few had the whiff of wet dog about them, even beers that we've previously found to be great, like York Guzzler and Dr Hexter's Healer. Not sure what causes this, but off putting though it is it doesn't affect the taste. 

Beer of the festival for me was Oakham's Bishop's Farewell. I drink their JHB whenever I can find it so I couldn't resist trying something stronger from them. It's a cracking pale beer with the unmistakable taste of cascade hops. The lovely Lisa spotted this in an instant, which lead to her being accused of being a beer geek. An unfair accusation I think, I mean it's not like she's got a beer blog or anything.

At Farnham beer has to be paid for in tokens. An irritating system that can lead to even more over consumption than normal as you run round pissed at the end of the festival trying to use up the last of your tokens before they turn into worthless pieces of paper at 11 o'clock. This time I'd judged it about right, getting through a tenners worth and only needing to scrounge a couple off a mate to pay for my last half. Until Jimmy came running up with a fat wad of tokens and saying there was an emergency at 20 to 11 that is. It seems he'd lost track of the time and just bought another tenners worth. As no one wanted to see them go to waste we all trooped down to the bar and got guzzling. I managed a couple of Naylor's porter before the surplus token crisis was resolved. Nice beer it was too, but I don't think the final guzzling did me any good for the next day.

So I decided to have a day off the beer on Sunday, even though I was staying up to watch the boxing. Well done to Carl Froch, though he did cut it a bit fine.