A recap of Strange Brewfest 2011

Naturally it’s in the media pass securing, hotel room reserving & the getting excited that I start to think about my Strange Brewfest blog from last year. In the ‘thinking’ process I slowly turned to look at MGD and asked “Uh, did I ever write that Strange Brew blog or just post pics on Facebook?” It has to be said that I am a very lucky lady to have a guy in my life that is so sure of my abilities and timeliness and word slinging that he replies with “Of course you wrote it babe, that was forever ago! There’s no way on Earth you wouldn’t have accomplished such a feat by now.” 

The 2012 Strange Brewfest is throwing down a Funk-A-Delic 60’s theme for their 8^th go around. With that being said, I find myself now sitting down to tell you all about the 2011 Strange Brewfest which I in fact never did write about. Yay for great note taking and photos!!!

(and, ermmm, thanks for waiting)

Sooooo… (puts hands in pockets while looking around aimlessly and whistling) about those notes. I just scoured my house (& collective beer journals) and there are none. Meh, I’ve worked with less. Enjoy the photos and subtle intellectual & not so subtle self-deprecating humor!!!!

Saturday

You know it's going to be a good festival when the first thing you see is that Big Al Brewing brought a camper & a pop up tent and parked it across the street so they wouldn't have a hard time finding their way home!

This picture comes next because I like to pre-emptively warn you that the fest was packed on Friday night. The first thing I did when we arrived was turn right back around and head to the truck to ditch the tank top I was wearing under my sheer sweater. So sorry for my sweaty grossness and not so sorry for any bra shots due to the flash.

Flyers served up a Breakfast Stout and their Red Pepper Porter was very sporty!

Naked City looks on stoically as the Hot Tamale beer flies from the tap but the star of the NC show was the Citra Ass Down Sour Patch IPA, which brought back childhood memories

 

If you look at all 4 of the Elk Head pictures fast enough, it could almost be like a flip action book. Love the hairdos guys! Their Peachrind, Moka and one or two others saw them taking first place in 2011

Micah Sims of Big Al Brewing (& his bff BJ)  brought their Nut Warmer (a blend of the Winter Warmer and Peanut Butter Stout). I let the Nut Warmer do it's job on my mouth many times over during the night. It was just that delicious. I also think there was a point in the evening when I tried to take Micah & BJ into the Brewer's Lounge I was certain that existed (because I'm totally a brewer and would know these things...). Let's just say that I'm glad there are people in the universe that are entertained by my ridiculous antics & love me even when I have no idea what I'm doing or talking about.

Lotsa action at that Naked City booth. Total props on the inventive tap handle covers.

Janelle Pritchard (formerly of Trade Route Brewing) (oh, and that's totally not my hand in the picture) serves up some Ginger Pale Ale

The ever festive and entertaining group from 7 Seas

Mike Runion serving up what I'm sure is some blue ballz to some dude. He's so pretty, how could he not?! (the blue ballz was heavenly as well, which only adds to the problem)

The 7 Bloody Seas (a Bloody Mary beer) was RIDICULOUS too, I couldn't get enough of it all night and I don't even like Bloody Mary's!

I didn't let Queen Shannon in this picture. Ya know, didn't want to show her up and all with my non-dressing up when I swore up and down I was gonna show up in full masquerade costume.

This is where we kissed and made up under the mediation of Travis Guterson. Everything turned out okay in the end. As they should when beer is involved.

And this is when it ceased to work out any longer. I have a long standing phobia of things in full costumes & most circus related things. MGD said he wouldn't take me to where food is until I took a picture with this guy. As you can tell, food won. Barely. I'm so speedy that you couldn't tell in the picture but I'm already in mid-run in the opposite direction of this guy.

Being a vegetarian is a high-maintenance pain in the ass sometimes. [Read: Mostly a pain in the ass for MGD because if there isn't food I can eat then I'm drinking the whole fest with nothing in my stomach and then I'm HIS problem. I also have blood sugar issues so when I say 'problem' it's no joke. I cried in a bar once when they forgot to put my quesadilla order in.] And definitely at events where food options are limited. So we took a break and walked down the road for some Mexican nomz. Which was delicious and we got to drink cheap Mexican beer as a palate cleanser. Muy bueno! Ole!

Then back to Strange for some belly dancing by this loverly lady. And more beer. Pretty sure there was a rocking band too, but things got fuzzy later on. Suffice to say that Strange Brewfest make sure the entertainment at least equals the beer!

I reserve this space to highlight why you need to BOOK YOUR HOTEL EARLY for Strange Brewfest. Port Townsend is a small place people, and a 3 Day Weekend of beer festivalness tends to book solid the approx. 4 hotels in the area. Last year we waited until a week before the event to look into it and ended up having to stay in Sequim.

Sequim.

I do slightly recall a quick stop on the way back to our hotel at a grocery store. I don't know what I thought I needed so badly but somewhere in the back of my mind I thought staying at a Best Western in Sequim meant there would be a lack of body poofs, honey crisp apples (x4) and more beer (an Alaskan Raspberry Wheat). So that's exactly what I got. After wandering around the store for the better part of an hour while MGD sat idling outside. If you want a sneak peek into what happens behind the closed doors of our lives after dark, just close your eyes and imagine the following: Me laying stomach down facing the end of the bed while wearing striped knee-high socks, elbow length cable knit gloves & a hooded sweatshirt. Watching 'Pretty Woman' (watching ='s quoting the movie line for line during it's entirety) while eating an apple out of one hand and drinking my bomber of Raspberry Wheat out of a paper bag. I know what you're thinking... 

CLASSY.

Waking up hungover in Sequim is no picnic my friends. So I bring you the newly discovered best 'Hair of the Dog' remedies known to liBEERian kind: Giant Sugar Free RedBull & Port Townsend in the a.m. Please see exhibits below... 

(two of my all time favorite pics taken by MGD)

Sunday

I feel this picture is an accurate depiction of our day. We actually started at Pt. Townsend Brewery then hoofed it to the Fest. Which was a short 1.3 miles (I looked it up recently when researching hotels) but felt like FOREVER. However we did spend the entire walk laughing our asses off at nothing and primed for action by the time we go to the other end of town.

Another effing classic shot by MGD. Hello Port Townsend beers and hello Kenny T. Beerman, one of the most jovial people I know.

See how vastly improved this picture is when Kenny's happy face was in it? Told ya...

I do believe I spend my morning time at Pt. Townsend drinking, eating peanuts, reading comics & something to do with my beer journal. Which I can see in the picture so it was obviously present for the weekend but it's sitting next to me now and all I have written is the word 'strange' on a random page. Go me. The Glass Kisser Imperial IPA was a welcome wake up.

Award acceptance time!

Check out the big winners medals on Elk Head & 7 Seas!

Because I started my morning out right with Pt. Townsend, it didn't take long to get into full liBEERian mode. For those of you who don't know, this usually equals doing whatever sounds good/fun/mischievous. Including (and not limited to) hopping behind a table and grabbing myself a pour. I did leave a token. I'm not dishonest but I am impatient.

I was all up on the Flyer's business on Sunday. Two fisting even.

This is me helping. Helping what, I don't know. I do see that I have 2 gloves hanging out of my pocket at this time, whereas when I got home later... I had 1. I'm still sad about that. Maybe I'll find the lost glove in a couple weeks when we're back in the area. Scavenger hunt!

Inevitably there will be a point that comes where I'll start bugging MGD with something to the tune of "Come onnnnnn, we're not doing anything right nowwwwwww. Take pretty pictures of meeeeeee!" Here is the result. I look like Rudolph & have crazy colored alien eyes. Pretty sweet pic tho. 

This pic is definitely rad. I love the Christmas light effect. MGD recently told me this is probably his all time favorite picture of me. My asshole response was something like "Are you serious? You can't even see my face. Is that WHY it's your favorite, 'cause you hate my face? You don't even know what you're talking about." Where his normal person response is something like "Okay crazy, I just love the pic. Try and calm yourself for a hot minute."

Closing time. One last call for alcohol and Kenny T. Beerman hugs!

I love the closing up shop pics. I also love when we realized that we walked here and now have to find our way back to our car.

Which I was so distraught about that I sought comfort from the closest person available. Who was tall and had a trenchcoat and reminded me of the scary masked costumed stilt guy from before which caused me to become more distraught.

Luckily we hitched a ride from Kenny T. Beerman. Me riding shotgun & MGD in back with the meat smoker. Best part ever: I didn't even remember this part of the night until MGD showed me this picture a few days later. Hahahahaha.

Some other crazy beers that were featured were Redhook's Ham on Rye beer, Anacortes' Salami Sandwich (MGD said it actually tasted like salami, for reals), Georgetown Habanero Ale, Big Time's Curryous George, Laht Neppur's Strawberry Cream (yummy!) and Booted in the Rear & the Chocolate Orange Degenerator from Port Townsend. There were so very many more and this year I will be writing down everything (in a place I can find in January 2013 when I do the next Strange Brew write-up) for future reference.

Sorry for the slight lack of beer info this round but hopefully you can see from the pics that it was a blast and a half. Definitely one of my favorite festivals. So much that we already have a hotel room booked (a month early and within walking distance) and are planning on attending all three days. I'll bring my own body poof and stock up on some honeycrisps beforehand.

Buy tickets soon and book a hotel early. Find more info on the upcoming Strange Brewfest 2012 here, I hope to see ya there!

If you had a picture of yourself

drinking out of a Red Bull can

the size of a large tree trunk,

you'd post it again too for good measure!

the pissed liBEERian

Absolutely amazing photos (& I suppose editing too) by MGD