BrewDog in the Winerack at the Waterfront...

 ...would be a good name for pub or maybe a 70s prog rock cover band.

But this was the headline the local paper reported that everyones favourite punk Scottish craft brewers BrewDog had applied to the local council for a drinks licence to open a new bar down in one of the empty units on the Ipswich waterfront.

The waterfront was or is Ipswich's attempt at a docklands style regeneration of the old industrial dock area & buildings turning it into a new cultural centre for Ipswich,which resulted in two of the tallest buildings in Ipswich the Mill and Winerack, if not the whole of Suffolk, built for residential flats, a new hotel and a new University campus, the majority of which were constructed by 2010, in between existing buildings that housed restaurants and a pub/bar.

The Mill on the left, the Winerack on the right

 

Unfortunately most of the construction work took place just as the last recession hit in 2007, whilst the majority of the buildings that were built were finished, the developer went bankrupt and work was ceased leaving the second tower block building as a concrete skeleton, which was nicknamed the Winerack as it looked exactly like a giant winerack, which loomed on the Ipswich skyline for the best part of a decade, and left most of the Waterfront project uncompleted and without much direction.

Nearly facing demolition having been left for so long uncompleted it was eventually bought by a local property developer who has since finished the construction and fitting out,adopted the Winerack name and is now finally looking to lease units at the bottom of the tower blocks, which have largely been boarded up this whole time.

Enter the BrewDog, who if local beer crowd rumours were to be believed are on the 3rd or maybe even 4th attempt at finding a venue in Ipswich over the last 5 years, which seems somewhat remarkable given as far as Im aware nothing from BrewDog themselves has ever hinted that Ipswich was on their radar as their next bar venture. Ipswich doesnt exactly have the kind of local beer scene BrewDog bars pop up in. Whilst a tap take over was held at a bar in the town a couple of years back, lots of tap takeovers are held they dont necessarily result in new bars opening.

 

And whilst as far back as 2020 before the pandemic hit, BrewDog announced plans to launch 30 new bars in the UK and across the world, this had understandably been scaled back by the end of 2020, to a mere 20, there was no hint Ipswich was among those venues, and nearly a year later many of those bars they did announce in the UK are still yet to open, whilst their existing locations are probably only slowly recovering from lockdowns, both in customers and staff retention.

So it seems an unusual move, whilst the location may well fit into BrewDogs urban style, though there are issues still in that the Waterfront and the majority of the town centres night economy are detached from each other, whilst the Waterfront arguably does need more bars to make it more of a leisure destination, the big downside of having built so much residential space before commercial and the planning zoning that resulted, means a drinks licence is automatically denied unless the applicant can prove it is beneficial to the area, given previous attempts by various sole trader businesses at getting a drinks licence in that part of the waterfront have failed, with more than a few handfuls of resident objections, it will be interesting to see if the licencing committee who next meet at the end of September, approve it.

If they do so, maybe more official announcements and planning submissions will go in, if not maybe theres no actual negative outcome for BrewDog since theyve not even confirmed its something they are doing anyway, but maybe there is something to be gained by proving these particular units wont ever be able to be bars if even the lure of well known brand cant get approved.

Bath and Bristol bimble - part 2 the new Bath guide continued

Day 2 of the Bath odyssey, and it was tipping it down, which was going to make standing outside watching the Tour Series cycling event a bit wet, and travelling between pubs in between a bit soggy too.

The Ale House
First stop of the day, there are quite a few pubs in the area of the Roman Baths, which obviously appeal mostly to tourists, The Ale House sits somewhat unassumingly on the corner of York Street near the Parade gardens. As it happens its a Grade II listed building, easy sometimes to forget with millennia of history around you even Victorian buildings are several hundred years of history. I stopped for a quick sandwich lunch and probably the best pint of Bath Gem I had all trip.

The Bath Brew House
Opened the summer of 2013, so a year after my last trip to Bath, and one of the City Pub Company pubs who are slowly creating a new chain of pubs across mainly London & Cambridge and Bristol (more of that later). One of the bars Id tried, and failed miserably as it had been so busy, the night before to get served in, a bit quieter on a soggy Saturday afternoon, and as the name suggests its also a micro brewery, as well as the obligatory gastro craft style restaurant. If anything the food side was doing better business than the bar at this time as the must have been 20-30plus people in the eating area which was full, and people were being turned away, note this was post lunchtime mid afternoon.

So its the place to go for deep fried stuff and fries it seems, though notable from my seat across from the bar very little  of the ale was being sold on the back of it, wine yes, lager mainly to the rugby fans, cider, even coffee, but not the beer, which seemed disappointing since some of it was brewed on site, and had been one of the things Id briefly noticed the night before.

a half of the Brewhouses own Emperor, average, and half of Faultline by Kettlesmith Brewing Company, better than average. Again a place that looked interesting on the menu side but for whatever reason I never ended up eating there.

The Trinity Inn
An Abbey Ales pub, one of 4 in Bath though as I was to discover all 4 are very different propositions. But so Id expected to find at least one Abbey Ale on, but only St Austell Tribute was visible. The pub itself is basically just a dedicated sports bar, the locals were avidly watching any screen showing more rugby, but with both tvs in corners of the pubs rooms and high up and, its one of those bars you walk in and wonder why everyone is wordlessly staring at the ceiling. I drank my half reasonably quickly and left.

The Lamb & Lion
Much like the Trinity Inn another sports bar focused pub, albeit for a much younger group, football was the sport of choice this time, and whilst the pub was alot lighter and had more pub atmosphere, the beer selection wasnt much better, another swift half followed, this time of Butcombe Bitter.


At this point I headed off to watch some of the cycling up around the Pulteney bridge area of the city, which was great except the heavens opened and needing some respite from the rain I tried to find the nearest pub. Now I hadnt realised the GBG listed Pulteney Arms was very close to where I had been, on the list for next time, and instead I made my way to...

The Rising Sun.
which is actually an Inn, in the old sense, in that it provides beer, food and somewhere to stay overnight, albeit with only 7 rooms, but it looked a very nice traditional but modern updated place to stay at a price not that much more than Id paid for a Holiday Inn Express and Id have had a decent breakfast chucked in too. I think if I went to stay in Bath again Id certainly look this place up. And the beer served with great care by the on duty manager, was pretty good.


Coeur De Lion
A quick run back to my own hotel to dry out and change before setting off back round Bath for the evening. The Coeur de Lion, Id been here before on my previous Bath trip, so knew what to expect. Its Baths smallest pub, and another of Abbey Ales pubs, its most striking feature being the stained glass windows that still refer to the since lost Devenish Brewery who used to own the pub and tried to close it in the 90's. Fortunately the locals campaigned against the closure and its worth revisiting on any visit. Abbey Ales - Bath Best, and an exceptionally good Abbey Ales Crafty Friar, showed this is still a good pub to call at.


The Pig & Fiddle
only a short distance in the grand scheme of things away the next stop was here. An odd mix of old shop frontage and courtyard back, with the bar somewhere in the middle surrounded by a table football table, and collection of memorabilia, with what felt like a very student vibe to the place, certainly I wasnt the oldest patron in residence, but I bumped the average age up considerably. Owned by Butcome Brewery, so not as surprising to find a Liberation Smugglers Ale on as Id first thought, and reportedly closed recently for refurbishment, thereby proving the point about how quickly pub reviews can date.

The Star Inn
Now the reason Id been heading northwards out of the city, a pub Id tried to visit on my previous visit but had found it closed at the time as it still very much runs to traditional pub opening hours during the week. GBG listed and another Abbey Ales pub completely different in style to the other two Id visited so far. Abbey Ales on offer of course, as well as Bass, but the "Star" if you like, is the Abbey Bellringer served by gravity into a jug and poured into your glass, a practice very few pubs use anymore.The art as the barman was explaining to his protege apprenticing behind the bar is knowing how far to fill the jug so the minimum amount of beer is wasted, which he proceeded to demonstrate on all 3 occasions near perfectly every time I ordered a pint, and no the jug wasnt lined as far as I could tell, and certainly the best cask ale Id had in Bath.

Assembly Inn
Time to head back and made my way to the 4th and final Abbey Ales pub, though confusingly owned by Greene King. Again another completely different style of pub, a two room pub with one dedicated to being part sports bar with pool tables, the other being more a gastro eating craft bar style room with only the actual bar providing connection between these seemingly disparate setups. On the gastro side I tried a reasonably average Azacca Gold by Milestone Brewing Co, on the sports bar side it was Greene Kings House Lager named after the pub, I didnt like the lager much at all.

The King of Wessex (Wetherspoon)
If anything just to get the Cask Marque checkin, your average Wetherspoon built next to a gym and cinema, selling average beer for not alot.


The Cork
Included in the Bath list except it was actually only somewhere I visited after my day trip to Bristol following the end of Bath day 2, but it makes more sense to include here for the map and link to Bath..

Now when Id walked past it on the other two days Id discounted it as sounding like the atypical Irish themed pub, which on the whole I avoid on my travels, as cask ale is rarely on their agenda, and it didnt look a whole lot different to the array of sports pubs in this area. But for whatever reason, it was half nine on a Sunday night and seemed to be one of the few places left open I hadnt already tried, so I went in and found its not an Irish themed pub at all. Actually its another City Pub co (same as the St James Brewhouse), and had a good selection of cask ale, infact they had one of the St James Brewhouse beers on Gladiator, which was good, I also had a Seven by Bristol Beer Factory, also good, and then a couple of craft American beers, Lagunitas IPA and Brooklyn Lager, in bottles and cans so also good for what they were.

all in all very good pub I was glad I went in, and enjoyed the pub quiz. Just shows sometimes appearances can be deceptive sometimes.

Bath and Bristol bimble - part 1 the new Bath guide

I dont often write pub reviews as on the whole I dont think "man walks in pub, has drink, kind of liked it" is a particularly interesting narrative style of writing, though thats generally the standard fare of review you get. They can also date pretty quickly given the pace of change in the beer/pub world can mean a pub that was outstanding on one visit is rapidly left behind even if it manages to maintains its standards, whilst others might change hands or close down become part of ever bigger pub groups.

But as Id last visited Bath & Bristol 5 years ago which had just been on the cusp of a wave of new breweries,pubs and bars opening, in some cases literally the week after Id left, I figured it would be interesting to see how things had changed, had the places Id been recommending to my friends as the best places to go since, still as good or had the new places supplanted them.

'the new Bath guide'

looking back to my last visit, which I remember most from being terribly excited to see the BBC filming some of Doctor Who, I got to see Richard E Grant stand on a street corner and that was about it, I was surprised how few pubs Id visited, admittedly visiting the Roman Baths had taken up most of the day (top tip leave plenty of time to do it and avoid weekends), but Id only managed to visit 4 pubs in total. The Salamander, one of Bath Ales pubs, the Raven an atypical CAMRA GBG stalwart, Coeur De Lion one of Abbey Ales pubs and the Old Green Tree, well it was in the GBG and is 300 years old. I do remember the Star Inn,which Id wanted to visit, had been closed as it was still operating very traditional opening times and I think at that point having walked around Bath alot that day Id had enough and got the train back to Bristol, thinking there were probably better food/drink options to be had there instead.

So would the old and the new match up.

Graze 

First up of the new bars was Graze which opened just under 5 years ago and is Bath ales biggest outlet, twice the size of any of its other pubs/bars, with its own microbrewery on site. Its a 1st floor bar/restaurant which actually puts it on the same level as the platforms on the train station, but the entrance is on ground level, and as the ground level which is part of Baths "food quarter" a number of other shiny restaurants/bar vie for the attention, certainly had I not known Graze was supposed to be there I could easily have missed it or walked in any of the other venues instead, obvious it isnt.

Once inside and up the flight of stairs,though there is a lift for accessibility, its clear the place with its central lozenge shaped bar area and the rest of the space set out for dining the focus is on food, though the balcony with views over the bus station,not the greatest of views, Id have preferred to watch the trains instead, does allow you to sup your beer feeling you arent intruding on people eating.

I went for the house special Platform 3 (the train station has only 2 platforms you see) though there was a good range of Bath Ales available, was slightly taken back by the price which was close to £5 for a pint, and went and sat on the balcony, which was pleasant enough given the hot sunny weather.

I had thought at the time I might pop back in over the weekend,either to try more of the beers or even the food, and I dont think necessarily a reflection on the place, but ultimately didnt find the time to.

The Royal Oak

After decamping to my hotel, I then headed to the GBG listed Royal Oak, local branch Bath and Borders City pub of the year 2017. A quick half of Butts brewery Barbus Barbus (its a fish),which was pleasant enough, the pub had a decent selection of micro brewery beers, though it was fairly quiet, I could have stayed longer, but needed to move on to find some food.

The Hop Pole

Another one of Bath Ales pubs in Bath, though Bath Ales were bought out by St Austell just under a year ago and Id have said their influence is already being felt, both Bath and St Austell beers were available on the bar, along with a "house ale" Hop Pole named after the pub, less gastro pub than Graze, but still gastro and very clearly tenanted. Annoyingly my beer ticking instincts overrode my beer common sense and I went for the house ale. This was a mistake because like Greene King "house ales", they are generally fairly nondescript beers to begin with, but suffer through poor turnover as none of the locals ever drink it, preferring the standard ranges instead and most visitors to gastro style pubs, plump for lager or wine, and notably despite spending just under an hour there, mine was the only pint of house ale they sold. Unsurprisingly it was a little lacking in life and was vaguely heading towards an accompanying condiment to my chips, served in the obligatory gastro pub bucket, and burger, which werent much to write home about either. As I say the influence of a much larger pub group in evidence.

Electric Bear Brewery Tap

the story, which maybe apocryphal, of how Bath Ales came to be based originally on a Bristol industrial estate tells how it was down to the fact the local Bath council wouldnt give them the permit to brew beer in Bath. Clearly such problems have been ironed out as the Electric Bear Brewery are based on a Bath industrial estate, as is their brewery tap.

Yes thats right, as one of the people who had arrived by car asked "is this really a real thing ?" among the car accident repair, builders merchants, plastics manufacturers is the Electric Bear Brewing Co, in a fairly big industrial unit warehouse, big enough for their brewery kit, some benches for sitting inside and a counter from which their beer is served. Outside in the "car park" more benches provide seating which on a balmy sunny evening was a perfectly pleasant way to try 4 of their beers, NZ Pale,
Mochachocolata Ya Ya!, Drop and Werrrd! though check their website for opening times as they arent conventional.

As the industrial estate is right next to the Bristol and Bath Railway path its accessible from Bristol and a group of cyclists had ridden up from Bristol area to try it, and its a very pleasant walk back into Bath alongside the river, though Id probably not recommend walking alone along their at night, but there are buses that run out that way.

The Raven

it was turning into a busy Friday night in Bath by the time Id walked back from the Electric Bear, and several of the bars Id wanted to try were packed. The Raven, still standing room only though, was the first I could get remotely near the bar to get served. It was also the first pub Id revisited from my trip of 5 years previous and first impressions it was still a CAMRA GBG stalwart, both beers I had, Raven, the house ale but one worth trying by Blindmans Brewery Ltd, and Foresters Black by Dawkins Ales which had almost whiskey smoked barrel overtones were great beers, in fact one of the regulars at the bar Im sure I recognised from last time. Always worth remembering, though Id forgotten again, there is a bar upstairs which serves the same beers but maybe quieter.

The Salamander

another revisit pub, again nominally a Bath Ales pub, usual Bath range plus a St Austell beer and the house beer which I avoided this time opting for a Bath Ales Gem, which was fairly average disappointingly. A shame as previously Id rated the place, and the food too, which didnt look much different to the Hop Pole, whereas I remembered it used to be more uniquely home made food. Awkward setup as well for a night time, people eating meals, but not many places for people to stand/sit just for drinking.

The West Gate

A Greene King pub, atypical of the style really, but Cask Marque'd so worth visiting to get the check in if nothing else, only beer among the usual suspects that caught my eye was the Amarillo Single Hop Session IPA, which actually wasnt that bad so not a complete waste.


The Map

A year of 2016 beer...

So the last one of these I did, year in beer from Untappd not blogposts :) was 4 years ago covering 2012, and it makes an interesting comparison to see how much beers and brewing have changed since then, if at all.
Before we get to that just a reminder of the ground rules on how Ive been using the application

• a third is the minimum amount required for a valid check-in,and extends through 330ml bottles or cans), halves and pints, only free tasters are still excluded
• check-ins arent retrospective, bar the occasional one lost to various phone issues, lack of signal, battery or in case the phone broke, but none of this I drank this beer 4 years ago stuff, which some people still do.

Unique types of beer checked-in per brewery

The first chart is basically a chart that shows the number of different beers, as opposed to total beers thats the second dataset, per brewery, which tries to highlight how varied the range of beer some breweries are now producing,though it can be skewed by local availability obviously.

Back in 2012, Adnams topped the charts with 21 different types of beer, 2016 they topped it again with 26, alot of these are the collaboration beers they now produce for Wetherspoons, but it shows they are consistently producing alot of different beers over the year above their core range.

Moving into surprising second place was Thornbridge, as its mainly just been bottles. A Waitrose opened up in Ipswich since 2012 and has carried a fair sized range of beer since, what will be interesting to see is if Thornbridge's switch to 330ml bottles will change that as Im not a fan of 330ml bottles.

And 3rd, quite literally coming from nowhere since 2012, as they didnt even exist back then, is Briarbank, who started brewing in Ipswich in 2013.

The rest in the list are mainly local East Anglian breweries, but notable highlighting of Grain (they now have a very good pub in Ipswich so tend to see their whole range on offer), Fourpure and Tiny Rebel both the results of tap takeovers at another excellent pub to have opened in Ipswich since 2012, and Muirhouse.

Marks & Spencers are a data anomoly I think with the way the beers have been created on Untappd as they just use normal brewers to produce similar versions of existing beers, most of the ones I get tend to be just Adnams or Meantime, which wouldnt have changed Adnams rank, but might have pushed Meantime into the list.

Those notably missing since 2012, Darkstar whose beers no longer seem as easily available locally in Suffolk which is a shame and Thwaites who were producing lots of fairly decent one off beers for Wetherspoons in 2012 but have since been taken over by Marstons...who basically dont.

Total Beer check-ins

The next chart shows the total number of check-ins per beer over the year, no suprises Brewers Gold still at number 1, and drunk more than twice as often as any other beer on the list, I really do like me Brewers Gold.

Next is Oakham Citra, which didnt even feature in 2012, and another Crouch Vale favourite Yakima Gold. I guess its no surprise they are all fairly closely similar in taste.

Whilst 2012 was quite abit about seasonal beers, 2016 was very much core range beers, Wherry, Landlord, JHB, with only 3 recognisably seasonal only beers. Sadly since 2012 Fat Cat beers seemed to have stopped heading south from Norwich,whether thats to do with the fact they now run 3 very popular pubs in Norwich and dont have capacity, or they simply dont send the stuff this way anymore Im not sure.

Total Brewery check-ins

Finally the number of total check-ins expressed in brewery terms, so kind of an almagamation of the previous two sets of data. And Adnams as was the case in 2012 leading the table again 150 check-ins, no surprises really given the bulk of their checkins from the other data, Crouch Vale again still in second, but only just, which isnt all that apparent from the other data, though Brewers Gold does still make up over half the total.

And a return to 3rd spot from Woodfordes, though I suspect heavily slanted by a weeks holiday last year on the Norfolk broads, where it was literally the only brewers beer available. Top tip if you do go on holiday in Norfolk, dont buy a Woodfordes Wherry polypin as your cottage/boat back up beer supply, theres plenty of it available everywhere!!! Outside of Norfolk Id say its harder to get than even I thought it was in 2012, which probably explains how Oakham are pushing hard on their heels in 4th place.

What might 2017 hold...

Probably more of the same, interestingly for 2013 I predicted Adnams would hopefully bring back a few old favourites, mark the date in your diaries Regatta last seen in 2011 is back for 2017.

Who let the dogs out ?

 "Cry 'Havoc!', and let slip the dogs of war" #Shakespeare400

Brewdog have been busily expanding into bars recently and Norwich is their latest location. It just so happened I had a day free and could pop on the train up to Norwich and visit on opening day.

I was surprised initially when I worked out where the location of the new Brewdog venue is, its slap bang in the middle of what Id call "party night out Norwich", anyone who was walked back to the train station along Prince of Wales drive knows its full of nightclubs and lager drinkers, and Brewdog are kind of at the top end of that area opposite a Revolution cocktail/vodka/rum bar, this is not the real "City of Ale[1]" territory part of the city for sure.

And yet actually it kind of works where they are, just round the corner as Ill come on to later is the Norwich Tap House craft bar,and it feels right where Brewdog are as the punk child pushing in.

Norwich once its said had a church for every week, and a pub for every day of the year, and very much in that vein  Brewdog in Norwich are offering a unique, so they say, daily-changing tap selection,which will  amount to a 365 beers offering.

It was raining somewhat outside and the guy in the Brewdog caravan looked somewhat underused.

I got there after theyd been open for an hour, but the place was still buzzing and full with people, some on their lunch hour from nearby offices just popping in, others like me Im sure just making the effort to turn up.

Based on the 1st beer of the day recommendation, I went for the Jet Black Heart stout, albeit the bar staffs best attempts to get me to sample a few beers first and then just wandered round the bar which extends quite a way back from the main bar area into a seating/dining area as the bar also serves food (mostly grilled/deep fried), and also includes a Brewdog shop which includes merchandise, books and a selection of not just Brewdog bottled ales to take away.

 The daily draft promises 25 beers, albeit the menu only showed 24 :) but I was impressed by the Jet Black Heart stout, even though generally not a fan of keg beer infused with too much CO2 served at ice cold temperatures, this was actually really nice as a beer on its own merits, if all craft beer was as good as this I think CAMRA would have a much easier time accepting it.

Swiftly dispatching the stout I moved onto the Hop Fiction,the Jet Black Heart Stout as first daily recommended beer had already run out after less than a few hours which shows how popular it was.Though I first had to "fact check" a rumour some people had been putting around that Brewdog would be serving cask ale, they werent & wont be, but then again the rumour might have been started as an April Fool, so fool me but it was worth making sure.

But on both occasions at the bar, the staff were exemplary, prompt, friendly, and wanting to serve you, and it wasnt just me I noted multiple times the staff were chatting and helping customers with anything and everything, it actually felt like we were being spoiled.

Id only been to another Brewdog before in Leeds where the service was pretty average, as was the beer, this was much more like the Brewdog bars Id heard and read about and Id certainly recommend any visit to Norwich, even during City of Ale, its worth paying a visit.

So I reluctantly moved on to the next pub as Norwich has a selection of pubs and it was about investingating the whole rather than just the singular. But the next bar less than a few hundred metres walk away was the Norwich Tap House, which till now would probably have claimed to be one of Norwich's premier craft bar venue, at least on price matching London if nothing else.

It was empty...

I mean properly empty,I was the only person in the whole bar, having just come from a bar where I was struggling to find places to sit and having to stand & with lots of bar staff,to venture into a bar where there was no one around bar the lone bar staff & there seemed to have been no-one around nearly all lunchtime...suddenly the location of where Brewdog had placed themselves made sense. Basically anyone who previously had gone to the Norwich Tap House had found their new bar to go to at Brewdog.

Suddenly from seemingly being the bar who could charge £7.80 for a pint,and get away with it, now there was serious competion and they were losing.

I moved on from not bad but unmistakenly craft keg beers to the next pub in line, which just happened to be the St Andrews Brew house, for the first proper real ale cask beer of the day. Strangely I always used to remember this venue as the Irish Guinness bar that you ventured in only between sessions of the the Norwich CAMRA beer festival as it was nearest and you could watch the queue form. Now a micro brewery pub though it brews its own beer on site,but sadly neither of the beers I had were particularly in great condition.

So again on the move and hoped for better at the Norwich CAMRA branch pub of the year the Fat Cat Brewery Tap, which really is (if I ever get to publish my clowder of Fat Cats post) one of those pubs you have to make a special visit to in Norwich, its a good 20-25mins walk out of your way to get to, and it was raining.

Maybe thats why I arrived in a less than agreeable mood, having had 2 visits to bars where I wished Id just stayed at Brewdog, surely CAMRA branch pub of the year would sort me out. Scanning the beer list...the only beer that caught my eye Mocha Moggy by Fat Cat, one of my favourite alltime beers.

Whether I got served the wrong beer (as since suggested by the brewer) I dont know, but it wasnt Mocha Moggy as far as I know it to be, it was just a plain old boring stout, and again I was left wondering why Id bothered to leave Brewdog, so I left less then impressed.

Onwards again I picked a route back to the city centre via Grain Brewery's the Cottage, again another pub like the St Andrews brewery that opened in 2015 in its current form

They had a roaring fire which was keeping things nice, warm and drying off. I didnt realise they did food as well, beyond the famous Grain brewery sausage and onion pie, but apparently its a foody venue as much as pub which may explain that lack of patrons, to be fair it felt alot less "unbusy" than the Norwich tap house did. And the beer was great and I even got to try one of the Boudicca Brewery beers, which Id been trying to track down all day.

An interesting point to make at this stage as regular followers know I use an app called Untappd to tick beer I drink,and one of its features is you can ask it to show you beer ticks from other users of the same app within various nearby distances. Since arriving in Norwich on this particular day, Id struggled to see anything other than keg beer being ticked in via this, no Woodfordes, no sneaky Adnams, not even a Doom Bar, nothing really cask related or even standard lager/guinness/cider, which isnt something even in London Ive seen before.

But after a couple of pints I finally made my way to the final pub of the day, the Plasterers Arms, where they were promising a couple of special double IPAs in a clear "we also do Craft Beer,its not just Brewdog" promotion...unfortunately only from 6pm and I arrived at 5:45pm.

Why they chose 6pm I dont know,because there was no fanfare at 6pm that these beers suddenly came on, and no-one other than myself seemed particularly interested in them being on or was even waiting for them. So I filled the gap with a reasonable bitter, and come 6pm went on the barmans recommendation to pick the not Cloudwater DIPA v3 (and since discovering I had a backup solution for Cloudwate DIPA v3) I went with his choice, unfortunately Ive assumed I got whatever had been sitting in the pipes since the beer was pulled through and setup,  and so it was slightly less than proper temperature served if Im being generous.

So I drank it as quick as an 8% beer will let you and went for my backup solution for the Cloudwater DIPA v3, which was back at Brewdog.

Yep after at least 6hours of trawling round some of Norwich's "best" pubs I ended up back at the one bar Id started with, the one bar had anyone said to me before the day started Id be back there Id have laughed at, and yet the staff were still being excellent and friendly and even apologising when they didnt ask for the right amount of money for your beer and had to come back and ask for some more, and out of all the pubs/bars I visited that day it was by far the best overall experience for beer quality and customer experience, even if was near £5 a pint. I dont mind paying £5 a pint if the customer is being treated like they are awesome, I mind paying £4 a pint and being treated like Im basically nothing.

Which led me to this conclusion not necessarily just based on this visit, but on numerous visits Ive made over the years,there are alot of pubs in Norwich competing for the same customers,lots of them are offering the "craft beer" experience but have had till now relatively little serious competion but...

There are new guys in town.
Their name is Brewdog.

Up the game or lose out.

[1] a title Sheffield now clearly claim

CAMRA AGM & Member's Weekend part 1

Fraught - causing or affected by anxiety or stress.

That was how I felt best described the way we felt recovering over a quick couple of pints in between sessions after a breathless  start to the CAMRA AGM/Members' weekend in Liverpool held this past weekend.

Others have described the mood in the conference room on Saturday as "divided", Tim Martin chairman of Wetherspoons described it jokingly as a "bear pit", and Im sure there were plenty more adjectives flying round social media that afternoon that may have given some flavour of what was happening.

This was the 4th conference Ive attended, though that still makes me a relative newcomer to these things, and I attend them on the basis its a weekend city break usually in a different beery part of the UK. Theres a members bar, there are organised trips (some good/some not so good) and a good list of local great real ale pubs to visit, plus you get to see a side of CAMRA that maybe doesnt always get covered in full in WhatsBrewing. This is where the heart and soul of CAMRA the volunteer organisation is on show, where the detail of the campaign is dissected and the passion of members for the campaign is demonstrably on show.

"Proposal to adjourn defeated. Special Resolution 1 now being discussed. #agm2016"

Anyone reading just that tweet from the official CAMRA AGM account might be forgiven for not appreciating the significance of what had just happened, or was happening, it looks a fairly procedural piece of AGM business at a glance, though admittedly it will take me far more than 140 characters to explain it properly (and I dont apologise for that, as the detail is important).

Even though its the first time Ive witnessed such a proposal being made, the sharp intakes of breath and reaction among members in the hall to it, suggests its not something thats occurred that often in the past either.

What in effect was happening was a proposal was being put, which required a near instant vote, to immediately adjourn the whole AGM & conference, including suspending all the voting for special resolutions, conference motions and elections for the national executive and conference policies committee.

Had the proposal succeeded, everyone would pretty much have then had a free weekend to explore Liverpool instead, Id describe its impact at least, as being akin to Her Majestys Opposition asking for a motion of no confidence in the government to be passed.

It was still fairly early in the morning and I hadnt had enough coffee to wake me up fully, so it wasnt initially clear to me why this proposal was being pursued as the fallout from it would be massive, "CAMRA members vote to stop own conference" seemed a remarkable thing to be even considering, what had caused this ?.

When Id read through the conference motions I hadnt seen anything Id felt would be controversial or likely to lead to extended debate,so it wasnt that, and it wasnt necessarily about the Revitalisation project  either (though there later appeared to be some fundamentel issues with this) as it wasnt a topic down to be debated. What I, and I suspect the 170,000+ other CAMRA members, had missed completely were the Special Resolutions.

Special Resolutions

"Any motion seeking to amend the Memorandum and Articles of Association is a Special Resolution.  A Special Resolution must give the precise wording of amendments, additions or deletions of or to specified Articles or Sections.  Once submitted, it will not be amended or corrected by Conference Procedures Committee for any reason".

Normally special resolutions are mainly house keeping in nature. Either corrections where mistakes have been spotted, updates to reflect the ever changing legal minefield organisations operate in, or changes to CAMRAs policies as the world changes over time.

Special resolutions generally refer to the specific articles, they arent as self explanatory as conference motions, so you not only have to go and try and read those specific documents to understand what the resolution refers to, but also what it changes, and the implication of those changes.

Additionally this year proxy voting online for special resolutions had been introduced, in an attempt to make CAMRA seem more upto date. Now proxy voting has always been allowed by post, though few have ever taken the option, and by allowing online voting this year, more than 5000 votes were cast, which seems on the face of it a good thing more votes, more members taking part.

However with only 1400 registered AGM/Members weekend attending, and certainly less than that in actual attendance, it was clear regardless of the way the votes in the hall went, the proxy votes would always outnumber those votes, so the resolutions were already fundamentally passed regardless. Although it also wasnt clearly understood whether members could be prevented from voting online and in the subsequent ballot at the AGM/Member's weekend, or that the online voting system was secure enough.

Special Resolution 3 (Revisions concerning additional methods of voting at Conference)

Article 43 - This change would pave the way for the potential use of voting methods at Conferences (as opposed to AGMs) that are additional to the traditional show of hands on motions. For example, subject to NE approval, “remote” online voting could be introduced for Conference motions.

Those issues aside the bigger problem though was the special resolutions had been poorly framed and worded and it was clear even the Chairman Colin Valentine wasnt aware how badly framed the resolutions had been made, it hadnt been intended to extend online voting for conference motions as was in Special Resolution 3 as these are the more open to debate motions, and the discussions and points made during the members weekend, do swing votes.

Conference motions (unlike special resolutions) can be and often are amended to clear up ambiguities or make better motions, motions can also be remitted where they are sent to the national executive for review. If online voting was extended to conference motions none of those options would really be open to use anymore, and in anycase the online votes would carry the result before the debate had even happened.

But as a special resolution once submitted, can not be amended, so we were stuck with the words and all that it entailed, and it appeared stuck with the results before anyone had even spoken for or against them, which is what had led to the adjournment proposal as the only way for the special resolutions to be sent back and given a proper review to fix them

Of course none of this discussion, and alot of it was very passionately,strongly & even angrily delivered, it was certainly a chastening experience for the Chairman and national executive as they largely had to sit there and take it, would have been heard by any of the members who had already voted online,they might even not be aware these issues existed, they might not care, nobody knows.

Unfortunately I think the ensuing mess of Special Resolutions only became apparent as each one was debated in turn and increasingly the numbers voting against each special resolution increased, but by which time the adjournment proposal had already been defeated, albeit by no more than a 100-120ish votes and was the only motion in the entire weekend which required tellers to count votes, which shows it was alot closer than it was merely defeated.

One might have thought that was enough drama for the whole conference, but there was more to come which Ill cover in seperate post.

The 32nd Ipswich Beer Festival

After taking a sabbatical last year (the history of which I might write a longer more detailed post on at some point) the Ipswich Beer Festival organised by the local CAMRA branch returned this year with a brand new location at Ipswich Town Football Club's stadium and a brand new date in June.

Add caption

Held on the practice pitch, which is essentially just a large expanse of astro turf. The festival had all the advantages of an outdoor beer festival, with the benefits of all the plumbing, electricity,lighting and security provided by an indoor venue, that should have made the logistic headache of organising a bit easier.

The beer list was an impressive 180+ beers for essentially a two and a half day festival with also a cider bar, Podges Belgian bar (familiar to many local East Anglian CAMRA beer festivals) and the welcome addition of a number of local brewery bars including Calvors, Nethergate and Earl Soham/Cliff Quay.

Musical entertainment was provided Friday and Saturday nights courtesy of the Grapevine live stage promoting local bands and singers, and BBC Suffolks Stephen "Foz" Foster hosted a music quiz on the Saturday afternoon.

The beer festivals charity this time was Krissy & Friends who were able to provide a family fun area for children, which seemed to cover face painting and five-a-side football mostly. And there were a decent selection of food options from pizza,bratwurst,steak sandwiches,thai,sausage rolls/pork pies and even the football clubs famous catering, though I forgot to check if the Portman Pie was available.

The sun did shine for a bit

The football club have been keen to hold an off season beer festival for a while but essentially needed a partner organisation willing to help run and manage it for them, and with the local CAMRA branch looking for a new beer festival location it was the perfect setup, the ground is a well known prominent local location has good bus links and is only a short walk from the train station.

Essentially though this years festival was designed to be,despite the amount of beer ordered, a lower key  affair to prove the event was feasible and manageable at the location, with the hope then a longer term arrangement could be made and give the beer festival some stability for future planning, something which has been lacking for a number of years.

For the record I volunteered at the beer festival and did two shifts of bar work serving, but also spent much of the rest of the time the festival was open as a consumer so pretty much saw both sides of things.

Sadly the weather wasnt in our favour, even when the sun was shining it was remarkably still chilly for the middle of June, and it rained heavily on Friday night (including a thunderstorm) and drizzled much of Saturday, which no doubt affected turnout. Though gauging the number of visitors was difficult by sight as the size of the venue, which comfortably accomodates at least 7,000-8,000 football fans on matchday meant  several thousand could have been in attendance but spread out across  the whole area, whilst for instance on Friday night they were still queueing to get in.

Overall the beer was reasonably priced in 1/3rds, 1/2s and pints, though a SNAFU on the pint glass printing had omitted the 1/3rd measure line, meant 1/3rds in the pint glass had to be measured in a different glass and then poured into the customers glass, fortunately the half pint glass did have the correct marks.

A view on Thursday that wasnt that different even by  Saturday night.

A further confusion arose in that only the CAMRA volunteer run bars, the brewery bars & Podges belgian bar provided their own staff, marked beer token cards. The other bars either took cash (but often forgot to state that upfront) or cut beer tokens out of the card for redemption from CAMRA later. Though this is a format familiar to most beer festival veterans, it surprised enough people for it to become a major topic of conversation and complaints at the bar. It probably wasnt helped by the fact it wasnt that obvious where the bars were demarcated or that not everyone was a CAMRA volunteer. I was even asked at one stage if I was working for the brewery which Id simply happened to be standing in front of a beer rack with their brewery advert on.

These minor quibbles aside the festival appeared to run smoothly enough across the 3 days, although it was notable that considerable amount of the beer was still left by the Saturday night and was becoming a source of frustation as though again beer festival veterans may be familiar with the concept that the beer list is merely a guide not a guarantee, the amount of beer that "wasnt on" or didnt even "come on" the whole time is certainly something I think needs to be looked at in the future. Hopefully of course the club invite CAMRA back next year and the festival becomes another permanent fixture for the future.