Birthday Beers

 So it was a nearly a random day of the year that happened to coincide with the diamond anniversary of my birth.

I mused on the fact that I've been a beer drinker for approximately 37 of those years and I can confidently say that good beer is so easy to find, that it's not so much a special occasion or treat like it once was - at least not in most places I go.

Even Eastbourne which was once a "you can have anything you like as long as it's Harveys" kinda town has its bright spots of interest.  The Crown which once had regular beers of Harveys (obvs), 6X, Spitfire and Youngs Special with just a nod to modern beer styles with Dark Star Hophead now usually has Harveys (well, yes), Timmy Taylor Landlord and two other local brews (quite often Gun or Kent, but frequently other breweries) and when we first starting going there, the Hophead was lovely but there was no element of surprise.

Most of the other pubs are so-so in their beer availability (mostly representative of no real freehouses in the town) but there are a couple of tap/bottle rooms which are keg and can kinda places (and really nice with it).  But I still think Eastbourne is dragging behind other local towns, sadly.

Anyway...back to the just before my birthday thing...I've always associated Harvey's Star of Eastbourne with my birthday since we once went to the Victoria after work on my birthday and there it was - it was love at first slurp. So this year, on Wednesday (T-1) I was working and suggested I met the BBB at the Hurst in the hope that it would be on there (definitely the most consistent Harveys pub in town).  Not only did they have that, but also Prince of Denmark (7.5% dark and chewy).  Let's just say I was a little squiffy by the time we left. 

On Friday most people might have expected me to go to the Eastbourne CAMRA beer festival but, these days, it's really not my thing at all.  Big room, lots of noise, loads of people and includes either lunchtime or late evening drinking - neither of which are our preferred way of things.  When I was younger and beer was much harder to come by - good beer even more so - a beer festival was a real treat:  a chance to try beers from all around the country and learn of new breweries.  Now they just don't feel like the thing I really want to do.

Instead, we defected to St Leonards/Hastings where there was a tap-takeover event taking place in a load of local pubs.  There were 6 in St Leonards alone but we wanted to concentrate on the 4 closest to the station.  Heist we already know well, the others - not such much.

Collective Fictions which is a bottle shop/tap room is tiny and hosting Polly's.  We started there.  Quirky and you have to be prepared to share tables (there are 3 inside, 2 outside and bar seating) but really enjoyable.  We moved onto The St Leonard pub just up the road.  They were offering Iron Pier and mainly on cask.  It's a proper pub and if their usual beer offering similar at other times, I could definitely be tempted to go back.  We were then joined by colleague/pal and she suggested that eating would be a good idea so she took us to a Sri Lankan place on the seafront which was magnificent and served portions that didn't knock us out.  We toyed with going off to the Piper but got waylaid by Heist who were serving "Simple Things" beer (never heard of them, very nice).  We started fairly weak but our last beers were 6.8% and 7% - the friend who says she likes beer but gets drunk very easily declared the 7% DDH the best.  Oh dear.

So we only managed 3 places but it's really nice to know that we are aware of a couple more places in that area so next time we're working over there...we could try somewhere other than Heist.

OK, so it's still a beer festival but it feels much more like going to the pub and that's all to the good.  If only we could find places in town that might be willing to organise something like this in Eastbourne... (no, I'm too busy...!)