Swindon Beer Festival

 

What a great event Swindon Beer Festival was in 2013. Set in the fabulous Steam Railway Centre, which is the most splendid venue for such an event. The main room where the festival is held can hold over 700 people comfortably in the one session, creating a superb friendly atmosphere.

The big regional beer festivals such as Swindon do a tremendous job in promoting cask ales and their importance should not be under estimated. They offer consumers huge choice and spark real interest and debate, all of which is very healthy, plus of course they are great fun events and there is never any semblance of trouble. In a way they make real ale down to earth and accessible, helping to take away some of the fear of trying new beers. It is a chance to experiment with different tastes and styles and no one minds if you don't like a certain beer.

Swindon CAMRA had done a great job in selecting a fine beer list with beers from all over the UK, including CAMRA GBBF winner Elland 1872 Porter. Three South West brewers had separate bars. St Austell Brewery, as I was there with my day job show casing our beers. I'm really very lucky to get to do that as there is no better selection of ales to represent. The other two brewers were Ramsbury and I've written previously about what great beers they brew and Box Steam, the Wiltshire brewer who also have a fine selection.

Both of the aforementioned brewers have won Champion Beer at Swindon before. Ramsbury with their excellent Silver Pigs Stout and Box Steam with Derail Ale. The latter is a big tasty IPA, full of hops and plenty of citrus, its a very popular style at the moment and Derail is one of the best examples you can get.

However, back to the festival. for me one slight disappointment was not to see local Swindon Regional Brewer Arkells with a brewers bar. They have a new young brewer now in Alex Arkell who I believe is brewing some interesting and different beers and it would have been great to try some of these. Hopefully next year they will attend again. I've known Arkell's beers for many years having grown up around the Swindon area. They would not be favourite beers but I do have a certain fondness for them so hope to enjoy them next year.

Finally, congratulations to Swindon CAMRA for organising another excellent beer festival and also to the venue for hosting such an event.

Weymouth Octoberfest



CAMRA organisers Dave, Russell & Rich.

A recent visit to Weymouth Pavilions for the CAMRA organised Beer Festival (or Octoberfest as its called) turned out to be a excellent couple of days. The pavilion is no longer council run and was due to be demolished, but a community group has now taken over the venue and although the building is run down, its good to see this great facility looks likely to be saved.

The Beer Festival on the other hand has gone from strength to strength. A very well run event by West Dorset CAMRA, it attracts people who are both local and those from further afield. This year the beer list focused on brews from the South West and what a great selection of beers it was too.  Across the UK many smaller craft brewers are brewing some good and interesting beers and its great to see the South West has a fine selection.

However, it was not just great beer that made the festival. Friday evening featured a quiet session, but it was actually a really sociable night with lots of people wanting to talk about the beer selection available. This is the opportunity for people who are genuinely interested in beer to meet and discuss all things beer. I was doing my day job show-casing St Austell ales and there is no better selection of beers to represent and be proud of. Needless to say the St Austell beers were very popular, so much so that Big Job was runner up in the champion beer competition.

Festival goers enjoy the music

The Saturday evening featured two great bands, selected by a local licensee who new their music and they turned out to be great choices. Beer and music go together so well. This year the bands played at the right volume so chatting was still possible. I was able to enjoy the music as the St Austell bar had been drunk dry by 9pm on the Saturday leaving time to sample some delicious beers from competitors!

All told this was a great event and over 4750 pints were consumed. I'd certainly recommend a weekend in Weymouth in early October if you want to enjoy some great beers at a well run festival in a town that's really very welcoming. Congratulations to West Dorset CAMRA and we look forward to 2014.