Rocky Mountain High

This past weekend Leah, Johnny and myself attended the Great American Beer Festival in Denver. Over the next couple of weeks we will all give you our views on the event. Since I used to live in Denver I have attended the fest many times. Over the years it has really grown. This year there was 377 breweries at the fest and 1672 beers to sample. Now, even for me that is a lot of beer. The fest had a record 29,500 people attend this year so it is safe to say that beer hasn't lost it's popularity. With that many people attending it is amazing at how many people I ran into from other places that I have met before. For instance, I ran into one guy from Canada who was on the train with us last year in Belgium and this time I ran into him on one of the shuttle buses. Too weird. The fest not only showcases some great craft breweries but also some of the large macro breweries, and yes, unbelievably, people even stand in line to sample some of their beers (although some of the people in line for Coors/Bud Light may have been there just because of the Coors/Bud Light Girls and giveaways that the big breweries hand out). Miller lite had a Golden Tee Challenge that I took part in. Not winning was fine with me because the prize of free Miller Lite for a year would have been wasted if I had won.
For me, the fun part about the fest is not so much the beers at the fest but the chance to interact and get to know others in the industry. There are a number of events and get together's outside the fest (that usually involve beer drinking) where we all get to hang out and get to know each other, some of it is organized and some is not. As an example a number of people like us cruised up to Boulder to visit Redstone Meadery and Avery Brewing. Adam Avery met us with his standard line of "go in the other room and you'll know what to do". Of course the other room is full of beer taps and other people visiting like Vinnie from Russian River. These side trips were pretty good in that we were able to try some new beers/meads that we can't get here that were very good. Avery, which is known for making very big high alcohol beers actually had a 4.7% beer called Piglet (half of Hog Heaven) that I thought was excellent and quite different from his other beers.
During the day, before the fest starts and almost every night after the fest many people head to Denver's version of Papago called the Falling Rock Tap House. This year I'll have to give Falling Rock a grade of B though instead of the normal A+. While they had some great beers and events there, trying to get a beer often turned into quite a challenge as they were not properly staffed. One day at lunchtime (when it wasn't that busy) we were only able to get one beer in an hour and a half, luckily it was a good one, a fresh hopped version of Sierra Nevada Harvest. That evening they were having a event called 'Me so hoppy' and had eight great hoppy beers that were being served out of jockey boxes out on the patio by some of the brewers like Adam Avery, Tomme Arthur of Pizza Port and Brian Dunn of Great Divide. I was only oh so hoppy myself to go back and help them pour beers as it guaranteed that I would get to drink them and I got to man the jockey box that had Alpine Brewing's 'Pure Hoppiness' and Russian Rivers 'Pliney the Elder' (Which won a gold medal in the Double IPA category).
The fest itself has so many beers to choose from that it is tough to decide what to drink. I usually opt for beers from breweries that we can't get here like New Glarus, Elysian, Pizza Port and Russian River as examples although I was spotted at Dogfish Heads table more than a few times also. The people attending the fest can be divided up into two groups, those that are looking for good beers and those that are just looking at getting drunk. This was especially true on Saturday. Saturday night is generally referred to as amateur hour as it is filled with younger kids just looking to get drunk. A couple of kids as an example parked themselves at the Papago booth and were pounding glass after glass of wheatwine. This is a big contrast to those that attend the Saturday afternoon session who have to pay more to get in and those that go on Thursday night that can be considered beer connoisseurs.
O. K. I'll guess I'll talk a little about the competition now. This year there were 2335 beers entered in the competition in 69 categories. Arizona did pretty good this year winning 5 medals. Last year Arizona just won 2 medals. Arizona had two repeat winners. BJ's repeated with a Bronze medal with their Belgian Wit and Prescott Brewing repeated with a bronze medal for their Pilsner. Barley Brothers in Lake Havasu won a silver medal for a coffee stout. Oak Creek won a silver medal for their American Pale Ale and some place called Papago won a bronze medal with El Robusto Porter in the Other Strong Ale or Lager category. Winning a medal is nice but I know that it is a lot of luck involved because there are many good beers that didn't win medals that could easily have. I actually get more satisfaction out of reading good reviews on our beers on sites like ratebeer.com or beeradvocate.com than in winning a medal there but still, it was a nice feeling standing on the stage getting a medal.
Now, it is time for a liver break.
Prost, Ron