Previously: 40 Years in Beer (Book II), Part 69: Spring Break in 1997 with the classic Central European brewers.
Apparently 1997 was a stable year at Rich O’s Public House and Sportstime Pizza, for had there not been sufficient cash flow and staffing, my travel schedule would have been considerably less expansive.
As it stood, after five years I finally was able to settle into a getaway routine.
March: Czech Republic and Bavaria for “spring break” (link)
August: Austria, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania
October: Denver, Colorado for the 1997 Great American Beer Festival (G.A.B.F.)
Whenever humanly possible: Louisville, by car, to patronize Bluegrass Brewing Company (B.B.C.)
I refer somewhat hazily to 1997, 1998 and 2000 as the “G.A.B.F. Years,” providing an opportunity to emerge from the Southern Indiana backwoods, jet off to Denver, and become acquainted with a wider world of better American beer in a city where the downtown breweries alone outnumbered the entire “Kentuckiana” region.
These brief but frenetic stays in downtown Denver also were less complicated to arrange than my typically labyrinthine itineraries in Europe, just Louisville to Denver with a change in Dallas; book a hotel room; and acquire G.A.B.F. tic ......
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