2015 BEER DISCOVERY TOUR: Surly Brewing Company, Minneapolis, MN (July 7th, Brewery Stop #32)

2015 BEER DISCOVERY TOUR: Surly Brewing Company, Minneapolis, MN (July 7th, Brewery Stop #32) (recovered post) The 32nd brewery visited during our cross-country beer discovery tour (click to read about the whole trip) and second in Minneapolis was the Surly Brewing. After spending an hour or so at Fulton Brewing in downtown, we decided on driving out to Surly next. We had only heard of Surly through reputation, be it that they do distrubute around the mid-west and east coast and have a pretty large production as compared to smaller ‘micro’ breweries. They are located out in an industrial park, sort of off the beaten path. You need to use navigation or have a good map to find them. When we pulled up, we found that they have ample parking and lots of warehouses and a humongous production facility. We figured they would be busy, but we had to park almost a full block away they were so busy. The parking lot(s) are really big. After walking up, we realized they were a bit more ‘corporate’ than we anticipated, in that it looks super slick, overproduced, and expensive when you go inside. They have lots of artwork up along the …

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2015 BEER DISCOVERY TOUR, Portland OR to Portland ME and back… 24 June-9 July, 2015

2015 BEER DISCOVERY TOUR, Portland OR to Portland ME and back…7800 miles later… From late June to early July 2015 I was lucky enough to go on a cross country road trip with Gary and our nephew Devin. We drove my car from Portland Oregon to Portland Maine in just about three weeks. We took a ‘central US’ path East and came back taking a more northern passage. Regarding where we went each day, we made it to about 40 breweries and a handful of tap-houses, bars, and brewpubs to find local beers and food along the way. While the long distance driving was challenging some days (10+ hrs at a time), we really enjoyed the trip with it’s the ever-changing scenery and wonderful cities, towns, and people we met. Before leaving on the trip, we gathered and then took a couple of cases of local specialty beers for our friend Rusty in Pittsburgh. The sucky part was that while we wanted the beers to not get ruined by the heat, we ended up unloading and reloading it a LOT as we stopped each night. This is a valuable learning experience, to stick to mailing stuff like beer and wine, …

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