As a follow up to Erik’s last post, I thought I’d chip in with my impressions and some pictures of the Washington Cask Beer Festival.  It was definitely a very good time and a very impressive festival.  Vancouver has nothing to rival this event, which hosted almost forty craft brewers and sixty cask conditioned beers.  I was surprised at how crowded it was; even knowing that this was the second of two sessions to sell out.

As for the beer itself, it was good.  I can’t say much more than that, mostly because I don’t remember.  I recall liking some more than others and, like Erik, I recall a particular fondness for Port Townsend and their Hop Diggidy IPA.  We did manage to soldier through and taste each of the sixty beers on offer, although we were sharing tastes by the end.  Those who opted out of the sharing duly suffered, up was chucked….

We definitely drank too much.  Next time (oh yes, we’ll be back), we won’t hit up a German restaurant with a solid beer selection beforehand.  It definitely didn’t help that the majority of the beer was 50% to 100% stronger than normal.  Highlights of the evening include my wife stealing a wet floor sign, silly walking across the festival floor, and talking to Chris Martin of Coldplay (not even a good facsimile).  It was also cool to see pregnant Darci having a great time taking down our tasting notes.  She proved that you can have fun without drinking, which scientists had previously thought impossible.  It was also really fun to read the tasting notes the next day, one from Peter read “tastes like dry erase marker, but I like it.”

As for the pictures, you can clearly see how our night progressed:

We begin, a nice normal picture

An hour later, not quite as subdued

Only a corner of the festival floor, it was big and well attended

And the fun begins

Cool tasting glasses. Erik and I smashed ours for not being made of glass. How dare they?

Erik's face, why not?

The wives, not as happy the next morning, still married to us.

After a while, nobody wanted to share with me anymore.

Still going strong...

Wooooooooooo!

Action sip.

Why not a group hug?

Hands in...

From there we went and took ridiculous pictures with the Space Needle, which I will spare you from viewing.  Then the night sort of feel apart, but we ended up having a good time the next day.  More to follow.

Cheers,

Chris