Nottingham Beer Festival

From 13th - 15th October I worked at the Nottingham Robin Hood Beer Festival located in the grounds of Nottingham Castle. This was my first visit to this beer festival, the promise of over 900 different real ales helped me decide to give it a try. I was not dissappointed. An excellent location, friendly and helpful staff, and a great selection of ales including quite a lot from breweries I had not yet sampled.

I arrived at Nottingham station at about 2 o'clock on the 13th and decided to visit a couple of pubs I had been to on previous visits on my way to my hotel.

 The photo above is of the Canal House, complete with canal running through the middle of the pub. It is owned by Casle Rock brewery and I had a half of their Spyke Goldings Ale.

 The photo above is of the Salutation. A free house where I drunk a half of each of Clearwater - Proper Ansome, Abbeydale - Contraption and White Rose - Guaranteed Sunshine.

Then having booked in at my hotel, a 3 minute walk took me to the beer festival entrance and the sight below.

Pathway leading to marquee

 

First view of inside the massive main tent.

I signed in at the staffing desk, asked which bar I would be working at and was told I could work at whichever bar I liked. I made my way to Bar A & B where I worked from 1530 to 2300.
Friday and saturday I worked on the bars 11-11. Long days, but good fun, plenty of breaks to keep me going plus drinking thirds of lots of new beers. I also found time to take some more photos.

Main beer tent

Main beer tent

A view looking out

A view looking out

A view looking out

Belly dancers at a beer festival!!!

Night time

Night time

Over the3 days I had beers from some great new brewerys. It is definately one of the best CAMRA beer festivals. I can't decide on my favourite though cos they are all different. Nottingham this year had great weather, the layout is well thought out, spacious, yet still cosy. I particularly like the fact that the music tent is separate from the main tent. The bar by the bandstand was a beer festival in its own right.

When I get some more time I will list some of the breweys featured here and some comments on the beers themselves.

So, will I be back next year. Of course I will. It takes some great organising to make these festivals work this showed. I'm glad to have been a small part of this festival team.

Before going home on the sunday I went for a little walk along the canal, near the station.

Nottingham railway station