What Is The Great American Beer Festival ?

Summer is meant to be beer festival season, but actually, some of the best events occur in the fall when the leaves have fallen off the trees. The Great American Beer Festival (GABF) is held in Denver in September, and tickets for this year's event are on sale next week for the general public.

Denver is home to one of America's first brewers, Coors, and their baseball field is named after the brewery. Other far more impressive brewers that make up the Denver beer landscape make this festival pretty special. Craft breweries have taken over the landscape of the city and embrace this festival like all visitors are part of the family. Breweries like Great Divide Brewing, Avery Brewing , Oskar Blues, and New Belgium are among others that are only a short drive from the city.

This festival is for any aspiring beer geek to hang out with other beer geeks from across the country. Having attended the last two festivals, it is far and away my favorite beer event of the year. The very mention of tickets going on sale this week has gotten me excited enough to write a post for those beer lovers who haven't yet made the trek. It's hard to explain the enormity to people well enough, but it is big. Not that big is always better, but if you go with no expectations you will be impressed.

You must buy tickets in advance, through the Brewers Association website. General Public tickets are on sale starting June 28, 2010. You can buy each session individually, or you can buy the weekend pass. There is a Thursday evening 5:30-10 session, Friday 5:30-10 session, Saturday 12:30-4:30 members session, and Saturday 5:30-10 session.

In my experience the Thursday and Friday evening sessions were the best times in which to go. Thursday is the least crowded of the public sessions. There is a members only session Saturday afternoon that is the least crowded of any session and is primarily where brewers pick up their awards for the show.

Article Author: bierfesten

Bierfesten is a Vancouver based Beer Writer that has drunk beer in the strangest, hippest, trendiest and dive-iest bars in the world. The extremes one will go to for tasting beer is limitless, but that is the fun of it.

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