The festive season is something that doesn't really fill me with excitement, I'm a run away and hide kinda gal and S kindly indulges me in this.
So this year our running stopped at Weymouth.
It's an interesting place with historical bits, and watery bits, and wildlifey bits and beachy bits. Unfortunately its beery bits were a bit less...ummm...interesting than I would have liked.
We went to lots of different pubs in the town, and none of them were bad. A couple of them were interesting and one I really liked. The beer, though...well-kept, for sure; well brewed, definitely...just not enough distinctiveness for my taste.
We drank a reasonable range of DBS, Ringwood and other brown beers - mostly from big to medium-sized breweries - with a good balance of malt and hops. 20 years ago I would have been in veritable beer heaven...but not now. It was nice, but lacked a wow factor.
Then, on our last day we decided to take a walk to a local nature reserve, and whilst walking we released we were within striking distance of a brew-pub just outside of the main town. We took the opportunity to walk to the Royal Standard in Upwey (via a muddy fall and a sprained wrist, for me). Only one interesting beer on (and not one of their own) but what a beer - from the Sixpenny Brewery.
This was definitely the high beer point of our holiday (even taking into account the wrecked wrist).
After Weymouth, we traveled home via our place in Bristol. I know I keep harking on about how good the beer is there...but it really, really is. And it's not just the beer per se - it's the wide variety of lovely places of different character where you can enjoy it that continues to thrill.
We explored the neighbourhood around our flat only to find that a couple of pubs we tend to get to by train are easily walkable...and then we tried a new pub - the Plough which is a pretty basic place where OSB is the decor of choice with stacks of old speakers making partitions in the space. Nice place and I suspect we'll go back.
Then on Sunday we took ourselves to Bristol's first micro-pub: The Drapers' Arms. It's an old drapery shop taken over and turned into a small, but beautifully formed pub by Bristol and District CAMRA stalwart and founder of the Ashley Down Brewery and a mate. Now I'm going to come clean and say that Vince's beer isn't to my taste - but one of the things I like about beer is that there are many styles and you don't have to enjoy all of them to appreciate something that's well-made.
What we did love was a comfy seat a couple of nice pints and the chance to have a good old natter with Vince about all matters beer.
Yeah - Bristol's beer scene isn't all about hipster bars and 1/3 measures...whatever it is that you like in beer, you'll probably find it and that's pretty amazing.
