Upcoming Adventures in the Summer of Beer

The Summer of Beer in its true sense is reaching the final stretch. School starts back up on August 27th, and with that my 7th and final year of college classwork ever (8th year is just rotations). Summer of Beer however isn't just a 3 month journey... it is me, and I am it. So I have a few things marked on the schedule that I plan to squeeze into this final 30 days.

• August 4th-6th - Heading back up for a 2nd Pismo Beach trip this Summer with Pat and Milty. Pat's parents have a vacation house there which makes it convenient. Among the favorite things to do are to stop at the Firestone Taproom in Buelton. One of the best kept secrets is the mustard they put on tables for you to dip your complimentary pretzels in as you sip on some beers. Also enjoyable is The Frog & Peach Pub in San Luis Obispo. They have a very nice tap selection, about 14-16 total, and a bunch of bottles. Last time they had plenty Deschutes Black Butte Porter, New Belgium Skinny Dip, Alaskan Amber and more. The third and final main event is to stop at a great seafood restaurant called "The Seachest." This place is open from 5:30pm to about 9:30. People show up by 4pm just to wait in front of the door and tailgate with wine, beer, and picnic baskets of appetizers. It is fun to sit at the oyster bar where the cooks prepare the food right in front of you. They also have many microbrew and imported beers to pair with your dinner. I plan to have a couple this time since previously I was in no mood for beer once we got there.

• Aug 9th-13th - Milty and I head up to Santa Rosa to visit Russian River brewpub. We leave at 1:00am Thursday and are staying in Santa Rosa for half of Thursday, Friday, and then heading a bit more north for a rafting trip on Saturday and part of Sunday. We go back down to Santa Rosa for some more Russian River Sunday afternoon and leave back for So. Cal on Monday. A couple other spots we plan to hit while in Santa Rosa are Third Street Aleworks and The Flavor Bistro, who apparently have a small but nice tap lineup that includes Moonlight beers (which I have not tried but will make a point to find when I'm up there). The main focus of this trip though is Russian River, which has in the last 3 months become one of my favorite breweries.
  

• Aug 18th-26 - Lucky Baldwin's Belgian Beer Fest II. Plan to stop in somewhere during this fest and have some Belgian beers, though with what I've noticed over the last couple years, if you don't get there the first couple days all the better Belgian beers will be gone.

On top of all that I have a beer inventory that seems to grow exponentially here at home, so I need to try and knock down as many of those as I can. This weekend looks like a good one for Summer Yulesmith and New Glarus Wisconsin Belgian Red.