Favorite Brewery Tour

[jsan]

+1 for Monteith's brewery in Greymouth NZ!
sampled all 8 tap beers and then the nice lady let us help our selves to the taps.

Did the Asahi brewery tour in Hokkaido and Matsuyama, Japan. Free, and both times only two of us on the tour.
At the end the hostess gave us "30 min to drink as much as you can". Thats a challenge i'm willing to accept!

 

[unterberg]

Weltenburger
Gutmann
Lammsbraeu
Winkler
Kneitinger
Glossner
Riedenburger
Schneider

all in good old Bavaria

 

[pmolou]

+1 for the cantillon brewery
and in cesky krumlov not sure what the name was maybe eggenberg one the best beers iv ever had and funny storys
apparently they used to have women swim through the fermentors to prove they loved there husbands at 0celcius and it made them beutiful hahaha

 

[drsmurto]

The old Coopers Brewery in Leabrook where you had to limbo under beams and climb ladders and then sit in the boardroom and share a few bottles of sparkling with Max and Glenn. Hard work that!

Guinness - very boring tour but sitting atop the brewery with a fresh pint in my hand made it all worth it.

 

[HoppingMad]

One hell of a plane trip but the Alaskan Brewery in Juneau Alaska.

You can do an organised mountain bike tour (called Bike 'n Brew) from the Juneau wharf or the chapel (strangely enough) outside town, that takes in great scenery and a whopping great glacier, ending at the brewery for a few ales (after the ride you'll want it!). Their Summer Ale is my fave. Yum! The guy there told me they entered the Australian Beer Awards a few years back (I think for their Porter or Stout - can't remember) and did quite well here. I had never heard of them so was quite surprised. Unfortunately they don't sell their beer here otherwise I'd be guzzling truckloads of it.

No affiliation, link:Alaskan Brewery

Hopper.

 

[cdbrown]

The wife and I did the Eggenberg tour in Cesky Krumlov, but we were the only english speakers on teh tour, the rest were locals, so unfortunately the guide walk talk to the group for about 10 minutes each time and then turn to us and say a couple of words. The beer was nice except for the yeasty unfiltered beer - although maybe should have tried that one first.

Heineken experience in amsterdam was good fun. Guinness factory in dublin was probably the most enjoyed brewery walk around.

Scotch whiskey experience in Edinbrough, Glengoyne distillery in Loch Lomond, Jameson distillery Dublin

Plus quite a few winerys and brewery visits in margaret river and the swan valley

 

[cubbie]

Guinness - Dublin
Cantillion - Brussels
Carlsberg - Copenhagen
Heineken - Amsterdam
Brasserie du Bocq - Purnode (near Dinant Belgium) - whilst I really liked the above, this one was my fav because I got to see a lot more of the actual process (ie got to stick my head against the viewing window of the fermenter)

I also think I did a tour of the Swan brewery with my Nana as a wee tacker and been to many Micro's here in WA and Chimay Belgium without touring the operations.

 

[Pumpy]

Hook Norton Brewery UK

8 pounds for the tour they had an original steam engine pumping the water to the top of the brewery

they made mainly cask beer .

In the bar you could try a pint of all thier range inclusive of the tour fee which was great value as in the Uk beer was about 2.50 per pint


Pumpy

 

[raven19]

* Guinness brewery in Dublin. Awesome big money experience.

Good views too, after all that time in a brewery (getting thirsty), it made the Guiness taste awesome IMO.

Heineken - Amsterdam

I like the samples halfway through the tour, midway pitstop was great. And as a bonus they were doing marketing on the new bottle shape = free T-Shirt (3 sizes too big) for me. More Bonus!


Also did the Coopers tour at Regency Park a few years back, was an 'engineering' site tour, and a great excuse to have a few with Dr Tim at the end. Discussion ended with us recommending Coopers should make thicker glass bottles for home-brewers. Then we started asking him for clean empties! Aah the good ol' days....

:icon_offtopic: (Also been to a few distilleries in England & Scotland).

Edit: Forgot the Beer Tour in Munich through the beer museum and finishing in a beer hall with 1L steins, not really a brewery as such, but some great history of beer!

 

[np1962]

Guinness in Dublin with the view is awesome.
St Patricks weekend 2001, snow on the mountains and two non drinkers with me.. Mmmm.

 

[Philthy79]

Apart from the Guinness and Heineken tours, my favourites have been the Black Sheep and Theakstons Breweries in Masham, Yorkshire. Spent the afternoon chatting away to the brewer's in Theakstons when they knocked off for the day - brilliant.

I also went on a tour of the old Bullant Brewery when it was around in Guildford WA...what ever happened to them??

 

[reg]

Went about 10 years ago to meet the missus family in Holland.
3 weeks of not understanding a word, drinking coffee and eating cream cakes.

My birthday fell when I was over their so me and the missus organised a trip to Amsterdam for the day.

Trek through town only to find the brewery closed for the day...... :angry:

I have a lovely picture of me with a beer outside the heineken brewery......

Not happy Jan........

 

[brenjak]

Heineken in Amsterdam was fantastic, great fun too. Went with five or six others, including wife, who did not want to drink. More tokens for me. Eggenberg in Cesky Krumlov...yes...very little English spoken. The best of all was Pilsner Urquell in Plzen. Great tour and fantastic meal later. Love those pork knuckles!

 

[cdbrown]

I also went on a tour of the old Bullant Brewery when it was around in Guildford WA...what ever happened to them??

Rose and Crown is still there but there's no microbrewery to be seen. Can't find much info on them since 2000. Might have to go to the Rose for a few pints and some lunch on Saturday I reckon.

 

[brenjak]

Thought i would a picture of me with a roadie befire i left Heineken.

 

[Trent]

Hmmmm, interesting that not too many people have done any seppo brewery tours, but I am jealous as hell of all the lucky sods who have toured cantillon.
I dont really go on brewery tours too much anymore, cause they usually talk about how beer is made (I have read a bit about that, so know it reasonably well), and it is kinda the same everywhere you go. I have been lucky enough to go to some great small breweries and get to go and chat with the brewer or assistants in the brewhouse, and even luckier, fairly often been given samples of seasonals out of the tanks. Yay! But not everywhere, of course.

Potters, Murrays, Little Brewing Co and Squire's Melbourne brewhouse in Oz.
I think that Stone was the only one I hit up in the states. Oh, and the guy I was hanging with worked for stone, and was mates with Tomme Arthur, but by the time we got to Lost Abbey to go and have a look at his barrel room, Tomme had just walked outside on his way home after a double brewday And Pizza Port. Sure there are other, I cannot remember.
In Canada I have been to a fair few on the west coast, like Nelson brewing co, Tree, Victoria, Granville Island, Spinnakers, Canoe Club, Hugo's and Phillips.
Only did one in Europe - Alpirsbacher Klosterbrau, but I have no idea what town it was in!
Doc is the man for seppo breweries, he was trying stuff out of the barrel with Vinnie!
T.

 

[Millet Man]

I also went on a tour of the old Bullant Brewery when it was around in Guildford WA...what ever happened to them??

I remember seeing business and equipment for sale a few years ago (edit: or was it Inch Ant ??? can't remember)- It was small batch extract based with lots and lots of plastic fermenters as I recall, labour costs would've killed them.

Cheers, Andrew.

 

[quantocks]

+1 for another Heine experience in Centraal Amsterdam. It was closed for a fair while, just re-opened I hear.

 

[Fatgodzilla]

Real men don't talk of their experiences, they re-live them in their minds and watch the memories grow exponentially .


:beerbang:


Actually, just thought I'd put in a vote for all us poor bastards who have never visited a brewery.


Even last year at the Lord Nelson in the Sydney pub crawl I skipped the brewery tour (in favour of three of the beers on tap). Well worth ignoring a boring experience like a brewery tour ...................

 

[brenjak]

Just a note on Eggenberg in Cesky Krumlov...
Walked into the little bar at the side and said to the bloke "What is your beer like?"
The reply was a shrug of the shoulders and a "its o.k i guess"
What a salesman! I still bought a couple of each and took them back to the hotel mini bar fridge. Not too bad either.