{"id":18840,"date":"2017-02-25T12:05:49","date_gmt":"2017-02-24T23:05:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/?p=18840"},"modified":"2017-02-24T02:27:53","modified_gmt":"2017-02-23T13:27:53","slug":"brewday-2017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2017\/02\/25\/brewday-2017\/","title":{"rendered":"Trains, Rains, and Brewday ’17"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Garage<\/a>
A half pint in a shallow puddle\u00a0\u2014 and yes, I do get Looks when I take these photos<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This time last year, I was recounting three years’ of Brewday experiences over the hill in Martinborough, as I missed out on the festival’s fourth incarnation<\/a>. This time last week<\/em>,<\/span>1<\/sup><\/a><\/span> I was on a train to Upper Hutt \u2014 the event’s original organisers had sold it, and it’d been relocated there for this year (and, all going well, onwards). The move brought some skepticism, including from myself, but I went exploring<\/span>2<\/sup><\/a><\/span> and am happy to report\u00a0that the transplant seems a success and the prognosis looks\u00a0good.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Garage<\/a>
Relatively high-class pre-loading discovered at the train station<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There’s only 35 kilometres of raw distance between the old venue and the new; it’s under an hour by car, even with the winding road over the hill. But \u2014 as I said last time<\/a> \u2014 psychogeography is weird. A lot of Wellingtonians tend to treat Martinborough as “weekend away” territory: it\u00a0has a reliably warmer microclimate, wineries, and open fields into which to plonk a beer festival. Upper Hutt is working class: there’s large tracts of semi-abandoned industrial buildings (though a good number, not coincidentally, are being converted into breweries), and a kind of charmingly dilapidated racecourse as the best bet for a venue. So it’s\u00a0different<\/em>, and obviously so, but it still works. The more-suburban location means regular trains, there’s a station literally across the road, and there’s discounted return tickets to designated events such as this. That gives you a massive catchment of easily-transportable potential patrons,<\/span>3<\/sup><\/a><\/span> more than\u00a0capable of making up for a smattering of folks \u2014 like a lot of my own friends, admittedly \u2014 who might pass if it’s now “just” an afternoon beer festival.<\/p>\n

On top of skepticism of the new location and the new operators, the forecast was for buckets<\/em> of rain, which would’ve likely \u2014 haha<\/em> \u2014 dampened turnout somewhat. Patches of blue opened up in the early afternoon and plenty of smug comments were made in the sunshine before everyone was reminded that meteorology is an actual goddamn science and a proper deluge arrived almost as on-schedule\u00a0as the trains. But there was plenty of shelter to be had and people seemed mostly unfazed\u00a0\u2014 as Dad always said, humans are basically waterproof; so long as your nostrils point down, you’ll be fine.\u00a0I was slightly more careful than usual with my notebook and my camera, but undeterred. Others just covered their tasting glasses as they walked.<\/p>\n

\"Garage<\/a>
Patchy blue\u00a0skies and Garage Project’s ‘Petite Mort’<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The festival’s focus is on local producers, not on particularly obscure or unusual beer, but I (nerd that I am: notebook and all) was still easily able to find enough to try to fill my time. I stuck mostly to sour and funky things, as I seem to do at these things lately.<\/span>4<\/sup><\/a><\/span> Food options looked good, though as a Brewday veteran I didn’t stray far from\u00a0the crew who’ve been showing up for years and expertly slapping together preposterously messy and massive venison burgers. And the music was, well, predictably terrible \u2014 the usual crappy covers band nonsense that does nothing for me but which I can easily-enough tune out; there’s always a small crowd dancing along by the end of the afternoon. Go nuts, y’all.<\/p>\n

I got the sense that attendance might’ve been similar to the\u00a0original Brewday, back in 2013. Given everything \u2014 the relocation, the weather, and the overall sense of a\u00a0reboot<\/em> \u2014 I take that to be a good sign. Apparently it’s the Upper Hutt City Council\u00a0itself that has bought the thing, and the more I think about it the more I like the idea of a local government owning an event like this: a Council can have a different perspective and sense of the “value” in these things. A festival could scrape by and break even, or even run a small\u00a0loss, and still be worthwhile for the wider community. Upper Hutt is\u00a0obviously positioning itself\u00a0as a hub for small-to-medium-sized breweries,<\/span>5<\/sup><\/a><\/span> and this’ll complement that nicely. There’s a good chunk of population living within this thing’s reach and they’ll be well served by a festival as diverse, relaxed and welcoming as this. That seems like\u00a0exactly<\/em> the sort of thing I’d want my Council supporting. I suspect I’ll be back, with or without my umbrella.<\/p>\n

\"North<\/a>
North End’s ‘Oude Draak’ and a tumbledown shed near-overdosing on the Quaint<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Abandoned<\/a>
Beer festivals bring people together; closer, if there’s heavy rain<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Panhead<\/a>
My solitary hoppy\u00a0beer of the show: Supercharger, resting on the Panhead delivery van<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This time last year, I was recounting three years’ of Brewday experiences over the hill in Martinborough, as I missed out on the festival’s fourth incarnation. This time last week, I was on a train to Upper Hutt \u2014 the event’s original organisers had sold it, and it’d been relocated there for this year (and, … Continue reading Trains, Rains, and Brewday ’17<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18840","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-locations"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":17909,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2016\/02\/27\/brewdays-gone-by\/","url_meta":{"origin":18840,"position":0},"title":"Brewdays Gone By","author":"Phil","date":"February 27, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"It's a lovely day for a beer festival. Admittedly, I say this without bothering to look at the forecast or indeed out the window. Today is the fourth running of Brewday, a festival of wider Wellington's beer and beer-adjacent communities, held over the hill in Martinborough \u2014 a place long\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Wild & Woolly's 'Basilisk' Berliner Weisse from Brewday 2015","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/BrewDay-2015-Wild-Woolly-Basilisk.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/BrewDay-2015-Wild-Woolly-Basilisk.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/BrewDay-2015-Wild-Woolly-Basilisk.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/BrewDay-2015-Wild-Woolly-Basilisk.jpg?resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":7318,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2014\/08\/12\/beer-baroness-unite-pale-ale\/","url_meta":{"origin":18840,"position":1},"title":"Beer Baroness ‘Unite’ Pale Ale \u2014 at a Moa Tap Takeover","author":"Phil","date":"August 12, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Feminism, as they say, is1 the radical idea that women are people too. By very simple extension, women can be beer enthusiasts, bar owners, beer writers, and brewers. There's a lot more to say on the subject, obviously, but it's not really my gig to hold forth given my obvious\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Beer Baronness & Pink Boots 'Unite' Pale Ale (LBQ, 17 July 2014)","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Beer-Baronness-Unite-300x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5438,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2013\/04\/03\/beer-diary-podcast-s03e01\/","url_meta":{"origin":18840,"position":2},"title":"Beer Diary Podcast s03e01: A Very Good Friday","author":"Phil","date":"April 3, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Back with unusual promptness \u2014 which is hopefully a good omen \u2014 George and I sat down on Friday for a few beers and a somewhat-supersized season opener for another round of the podcast. 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