Dear Liver, I'm sorry.

Here's a recrap of The Great Brewpub Tour vacation (13 brewpubs in four days). It's the story of going for the brew and finding out about the towns.

Friday

We hit the road for Michigan, which brings us just west of Chicago, into Indiana for a bit, and then finally SW Michigan. Frodis's directions only had us stuck for two hours in bumper-to-bumper traffic. Kidding! It was smooooth sailing-thanks Fro!

We stopped in Michigan City, Indiana for gas and lunch. Saw a sign for a brewpub...of course we had to stop!

Shoreline Brewery....very cool first stop. It's an old pink building with great beers and food. I had an AMAZING cajun shrimp wrap with wild rice and sauteed shrimp, onions and peppers in a creaole seasoning. It was served with fried veggie chips, which were divine.

Yes, I took a picture of the food.

Michigan city, on the shore of Lake Michigan, is home to a lot of power...coal and nuclear. It's the kind of town where you understand why the waitress was "escaping" to Hawaii this fall.


Then it was onto Lawton, MI to visit Old Hat Brewpub. Lawton is home to a Welch's juice factory. We were surprised this little town had a brewpub. Beers were awful, but the building was nice, as was the bartender. Did not take any beer with us.

Next it was on to Marshall, MI, home of Dark Horse Brewing Co. What a cool find this was! It's kind of a shack, in this beautiful, small town. They had a cool outdoor bier garten, cool specially-handmade mugs (each made by a local potter), and great beer. We ended up sitting next to two guys that were on their way from Detroit to Indiana, as officially sanctioned beer judges for the Indiana brewing competition at the state fair. Great guys to chat with! We also snacked on a jalepeno cheese crust appetizer. Left with a growler (jug) of their Black beer.

Look at the cool mugs on the ceiling!

Finally, it was time to hit Battle Creek, MI and Arcadia Brewing Co. We were STUFFED by then, but this place did in-house BBQ. Sigh. We ordered too much food and could barely finish one beer each. We bought some 6-packs there since we couldn't try it all. We parked next to the Kellogg's building! Very cute area.




We then headed to Kalamazoo, MI for our hotel. 9 p.m. and we were dead. We had a super-nice hotel, thanks to my Marriott points. It was an all suite extended stay.

Saturday

We headed out late from our hotel, as our next stop didn't open til 11:00. We had a donut at Sweetwaters, a very popular donut shop local to Kalamazoo. I had a peanut butter cup donut. *burp*

Bell's Brewery was actually the impetus for this whole trip. The are a microbrewery that distributes to quite a wide national area. Super good beers. We dropped a lot of cash in the souvenier shop and headed to drink. It was fun to try all the beers that aren't distributed outside of the brewery. Took home a lot of varieties in bottles. Another place with an awesome bier garten.

Mmmmm....all those yummy beers on tap, AND more varieties in bottles. Mmmmm.

Our last stop in Kalamazoo was Old Penninsula. It was more focused on food than brew, IMHO. Beers were pretty good, but only had a few on tap. We took home a growler of IPA.

Know what Kalamazoo is known for? Home of Gibson guitars. Well, and pharmaceutical supplies.

Next we hit a surprise that wasn't on our list...Walldorff Brewing in Walldorff, MI. Good, unique beers. Took home a growler of IPA. Had a hot dog from a street vendor. :-)


Next it was off to Grand Rapids where we first hit The Hideout. This was a funky place, hidden back on some back street. A sweet young bartender filled us with samples and we took a growler of Stout home. Another cool bier garten!


Then it was off to meet Breezy and BFBreezy at Grand Rapids Brewing Company. We picked a bad table so I could neither hug nor kick Breezy from my seat. What was I thinking? We spent about three hours chatting and having dinner. I wasn't the greatest company because I was full and tired. Next time, fewer drinks BEFORE I meet up with Breezy, more DURING. :-) We got to look at her Mighty Putty job and talk about some of you. We also talked about a strip joint a lot...

Our last stop of the night was a little brewery called Schmoz. They had GREAT beer, but zero atmosphere. But that's ok. A bar doesn't have to have great atmosphere. The brewer hated Belgian beers (we also hate Belgians), so we got along just fine with the ones he did brew.

Then it was off to our hotel to plunk our full bellies into bed.

Sunday

The next morning we had a destination for breakfast and plenty of time to kill. We went to Wolfgang's in Grand Rapids. What a GREAT breakfast place. They even have hazelnut coffee as an option with no upcharge. :-) I had spinach and tomato benedict. Yum! We then walked around some very cool aread of Grand Rapids. We were perplexed by all the beautiful, giant homes and had no idea what the town was known for. Thus, it was off to the Grand Rapids Public Museum. We spent hours there, learning that Grand Rapids is a huge furniture manufacturing town...the largest in America in the 1800 and early/mid 1900s. Who knew? It was a great museum and I'm glad we went. We then went to see the Frank Lloyd Wright designed Meyer May home. It was open, but we were strapped for time, so I just wandered around outside.

Let me tell you how uncomfortable those seats were...

Then it was off for more beer at Founder's Brewery. They had a cool building that looked to be a former railroad stop. It had giant garage doors that opened up the patio. We had yummy guacamole here with our beers. Took home a few six-packs.

Next comes the disappointing part of our trip. We drove to a brewpub in Spring Lake, MI only to be told, despite them being open, you can't get beer there on Sundays. The county has a law prohibiting beer and wine sales on Sundays. WTF? We then notice our next stop of Holland is also in that county. Grrrrr. There was about an hour of driving for NOTHING. We had a hotel in Holland, so knew we could hit that one on Monday. We found a brewery south of Holland by a few miles that was in the adjacent county. Yay! Sagatuck Brewing Co. was in a beautiful lakeside resort area of Douglas/Sagatuck. We enjoyed some beers there, chatted with others, and had dinner at a good place named Phil's. We enjoyed Sagatuck, although we probably made less money than anyone that was visiting that area. Lots of money strolling around there.

They had mini-kettles because they also offer a "brew your own" opportunity.

A park in Sagatuck had this pensive polar bear. Maybe he's wondering how he ended up in Michigan.

Monday

Monday morning we headed into downtown Holland for some shopping. There are some nice shops there. I found a huge kitchen and outdoor furnishing store that I could've spent hours in. We in fact did probably spend AN hour there. Chris bought me prezzies! I got two knives, a paring knife (previous one had disappeared) and a Santoku knife for my Wusthof collection. Additionally he also bought me four new Wusthof steak knives. The set we got for our wedding was in an older style and we had trouble with the handles cracking. This new set won't have that problem. Yay! *does Padima knife dance from Top Chef* <---Swami will like that

After shopping, we hit New Holland Brewing Company. Nice place, decent beers.

Just a beautiful day, looking back at New Holland Brewing Co.

Then it was off to Shoreline in Michigan City again to fill our growler on the way home. This time I had mini-quesedillas (pork & cheddar, goat cheese & pork, veggie and feta). *drool*The drive home was also good, thanks to a good Frodis route.

Missed you all!