Aberdeen may not seem the most obvious of holiday destinations, and it isn’t, but I went there anyway. Aberdeen is a mid-sized city in North Eastern Scotland, on the edge of the highlands. It has a nice enough city centre, filled with granite buildings that have stood for centuries, it has a beach (though not normally beach weather), the Gordon Highlanders museum and a hand full of other diversions that can keep you busy for a day or so but, to be honest, unless you are really into your beer, there isn’t an awful lot to do in Aberdeen. I went there again because, as you know, I really like my craft beer, so I put the city at the start of my holiday. I have a small shareholding in a local brewery, a company called BrewDog, so I wanted to see how my money was being put to use and pay the brewery a visit.
Also of influence on my decision was a new game that the good people at BrewDog HQ had recently come up with. Earlier in the year they had introduced The Intergalactic Beer Visa. When you registered for the Beer Visa, you were sent a small, sky blue, passport-like booklet. Inside the booklet, there is a space for every bar and every brewery that is part of the company. There are currently 58 bars world wide, and 3 breweries, in places as far flung as Tokyo and Sao Paolo, but most of them are still in Great Britain. Every time you visit a bar, you get a stamp in your beer visa, and when you complete certain combinations (all bars in Aberdeen, all bars in Scotland etc.) you receive free beer and a Brewdog merchandise pack. It’s a fun game and good for business.
I decided that I wanted to complete all the bars in Scotland, so that’s where I started. I would make my way to the brewery in Ellon, outside Aberdeen and then travel to Glasgow by way of Dundee and Stirling. From Glasgow I would fly to Berlin, the centre piece of my holiday, for a 5 day stay and dig into the history of the place. Then I would make my way down to Prague, a city I had been to many years earlier, to see how it had changed, and then push on for Wroclaw in Poland for the sole reason that I had not been to Poland before and I wanted to see it.
My initial plan for this trip had been to go back to New
York as it was 10 years ago since my first visit to New York and the USA, but I
decided to move that to next spring as I had some things I wanted to do in
Europe first.
And I really, really wanted to see Berlin.
Because of my New York plan, I had taken holidays from 5 September onwards. My idea was to get back to New York on 5 September, exactly 10 years to the day since my first visit.
Because of the Beer Visa game, I needed to visit both our breweries in Ellon, but the problem was that one of them, our new state of the art sour beer facility, is only open to the public on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. I decided to fly to Aberdeen on a Thursday instead of Wednesday because, honestly, I really wouldn’t know what to do with myself in Aberdeen for 3 whole days. This left me with an extra free day in Dublin, a rare luxury because I generally only take days off when I have to go somewhere. I spent the day having lunch at my local craft beer bar, made a short tour of all my other regular haunts and went to bed early.
I arrived in Aberdeen on a sunny Thursday afternoon and went about my Aberdeen routine (yes, I have an Aberdeen routine, and am probably one of the few people who don’t live there that do)
And I really, really wanted to see Berlin.
Because of my New York plan, I had taken holidays from 5 September onwards. My idea was to get back to New York on 5 September, exactly 10 years to the day since my first visit.
Because of the Beer Visa game, I needed to visit both our breweries in Ellon, but the problem was that one of them, our new state of the art sour beer facility, is only open to the public on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. I decided to fly to Aberdeen on a Thursday instead of Wednesday because, honestly, I really wouldn’t know what to do with myself in Aberdeen for 3 whole days. This left me with an extra free day in Dublin, a rare luxury because I generally only take days off when I have to go somewhere. I spent the day having lunch at my local craft beer bar, made a short tour of all my other regular haunts and went to bed early.
I arrived in Aberdeen on a sunny Thursday afternoon and went about my Aberdeen routine (yes, I have an Aberdeen routine, and am probably one of the few people who don’t live there that do)
I checked into the Sopranos hostel in the city centre, a
nice and relatively cheap place that offers dormbeds for about 12 Pounds per
night and went to the Brewdog bar on Castlegate. It’s a nice bar. It’s bigger
than the other bar, on Gallowgate, and has a more extensive food menu. I walked
in and the manager recognized me instantly. This surprised me, because the only
times I had been there before were during the annual shareholders meeting
weekend in April, which is by far their busiest weekend of the year. The
Brewdog shareholders meeting, you see, is not your average shareholders
meeting, where men in gray suits drone on over endless Powerpoint presentations
with stats and graphs and other boring stuff. No, the Brewdog shareholders
meeting takes place in the Aberdeen convention centre and has 150 beer taps,
food trucks, live rock bands and a number of other beer-related activities. It
is a great party and thousands of Brewdog shareholders from all over the world
descend on the city from Thursday night on and go on a drinking binge that
stretches into Monday. As the Castlegate bar opens at 11AM, that is where
everybody usually starts out, so when I got there at 10.55AM, back in April,
there were already about a dozen people at the door and it stayed busy all
weekend. The manager climbed on the bar just after opening to welcome everybody
to Aberdeen, but I must have stood out from the crowd, because he recognized me
anyway, and we had a short chat about beer choices, Brewdog and the craft beer
industry at large.
I settled in at a table in front of the bar and thought about the trip ahead. It wouldn’t be a pure overland trip, as I normally would do it. I had thought about going down the length of Britain from Glasgow and maybe stop off in London for a day or two and then make my way to Berlin by train, but it took too much time. And anyway, I had found a flight from Glasgow to Berlin for 31 Euro so this was just easier.
I sipped my beer and looked up photos of Berlin on my phone. I was loaded with anticipation. The wall, the radio tower, and a hundred other places I wanted to see. Rarely had I been so excited about going to a city. I looked up Prague too. I had been to Prague with school, many years ago, and was excited about returning there. I’ll fill you in on that first trip to Prague on the bus from Berlin. There is a lot to tell about that trip. And then there was Wroclaw. I knew next to nothing about the city, but I would read up on it on my way there.
I drowned my pint, got up and walked to our other bar, some 5 minutes up the road. It is much the smaller of the two, but it is always referred to as Flagship, because it was the first bar the company ever opened, back in 2010. I ordered a beer and got talking to the girl behind the bar. We talked about Brewdog, the recently released beers and working for Brewdog. I ordered another beer and told her that the pizza that had been sitting on the bar since I came in was getting cold. She said it was a mis-order and if I wanted, I could eat it. I happily accepted her offer and dug in. It was still warm so I praised myself lucky with a free dinner. It was coming up to dinner time anyway. The pizza was delicious.
After a few more beers - it is always good etiquette to order some more drinks after you receive something for free- I went on my way. I had more things to do. Another local brewer, Fierce Beer, had recently opened their first pub too, so I had to check it out. It was a nice place, around the corner from the Castlegate Brewdog bar. It was light, bright and served some very tasty beers.
After I had a few, I made my way to a bar called Krakatoa.
According to the bar’s promotional material, it was named Krakatoa after the volcano in Indonesia. When it erupted in 1883, the entire mountain collapsed leaving at least 36.000 people dead. It spat out so much dust, rock and ash that it caused an effect similar to a nuclear winter, lowering temperatures worldwide for years afterwards. The final eruption was heard 3000 miles away and it is said that it is the loudest noise in the history of mankind.
I settled in at a table in front of the bar and thought about the trip ahead. It wouldn’t be a pure overland trip, as I normally would do it. I had thought about going down the length of Britain from Glasgow and maybe stop off in London for a day or two and then make my way to Berlin by train, but it took too much time. And anyway, I had found a flight from Glasgow to Berlin for 31 Euro so this was just easier.
I sipped my beer and looked up photos of Berlin on my phone. I was loaded with anticipation. The wall, the radio tower, and a hundred other places I wanted to see. Rarely had I been so excited about going to a city. I looked up Prague too. I had been to Prague with school, many years ago, and was excited about returning there. I’ll fill you in on that first trip to Prague on the bus from Berlin. There is a lot to tell about that trip. And then there was Wroclaw. I knew next to nothing about the city, but I would read up on it on my way there.
I drowned my pint, got up and walked to our other bar, some 5 minutes up the road. It is much the smaller of the two, but it is always referred to as Flagship, because it was the first bar the company ever opened, back in 2010. I ordered a beer and got talking to the girl behind the bar. We talked about Brewdog, the recently released beers and working for Brewdog. I ordered another beer and told her that the pizza that had been sitting on the bar since I came in was getting cold. She said it was a mis-order and if I wanted, I could eat it. I happily accepted her offer and dug in. It was still warm so I praised myself lucky with a free dinner. It was coming up to dinner time anyway. The pizza was delicious.
After a few more beers - it is always good etiquette to order some more drinks after you receive something for free- I went on my way. I had more things to do. Another local brewer, Fierce Beer, had recently opened their first pub too, so I had to check it out. It was a nice place, around the corner from the Castlegate Brewdog bar. It was light, bright and served some very tasty beers.
After I had a few, I made my way to a bar called Krakatoa.
According to the bar’s promotional material, it was named Krakatoa after the volcano in Indonesia. When it erupted in 1883, the entire mountain collapsed leaving at least 36.000 people dead. It spat out so much dust, rock and ash that it caused an effect similar to a nuclear winter, lowering temperatures worldwide for years afterwards. The final eruption was heard 3000 miles away and it is said that it is the loudest noise in the history of mankind.
This, according to the bar, was their ambition: to be the
loudest bar in Scotland.
This sounded like my kind of place so I made my way to the harbour, where the sun was just starting to set. And what a place it is.
It is, hang in there, a pirate themed, tiki cocktail karaoke dive bar and live music venue. I liked it instantly. The music was deafening, the drinkers all looked like characters, and the whole place was packed with neon signs. It was awesome. The only downside to the deafening volume of the jukebox was that it is difficult to strike up a conversation, especially when you travel alone, but I didn’t mind. I spent a happy couple of hours there before returning to the streets. I made a last stop at the Brewdog bar on Castlegate, where I stayed much longer than intended, and went to bed around midnight.
This sounded like my kind of place so I made my way to the harbour, where the sun was just starting to set. And what a place it is.
It is, hang in there, a pirate themed, tiki cocktail karaoke dive bar and live music venue. I liked it instantly. The music was deafening, the drinkers all looked like characters, and the whole place was packed with neon signs. It was awesome. The only downside to the deafening volume of the jukebox was that it is difficult to strike up a conversation, especially when you travel alone, but I didn’t mind. I spent a happy couple of hours there before returning to the streets. I made a last stop at the Brewdog bar on Castlegate, where I stayed much longer than intended, and went to bed around midnight.
I awoke the next morning, surprisingly chirpy when you
consider how much beer I had drank the previous night, but quite hungry. The
hostel didn’t have a free breakfast because of the way it was set up. Normally,
hostels offer you a simple breakfast in the morning, served in the common room
or kitchen, which is included in the rate. Sopranos is not a typical hostel. It
is also a hotel, a lunchroom and a bar. Because the hostel is just an add-on
to the hotel, it doesn’t have a common room or kitchen where they can serve a
breakfast. You can buy breakfast in the bar, but I decided to take up one of my
favorite breakfast options: Wetherspoons.
Wetherspoons is the UK’s biggest pub chain and gets a lot of crap from people, who say that it’s a faceless corporate chain with no atmosphere. Most of this is true. It has over 900 pubs across the UK, there is never any music and the sound on the TVs is always off. People rarely spend an entire evening with their friends at a Wetherspoons because there is little or no atmosphere. The only time I ever spend an entire evening in one of their pubs was in 2011, when we were having Christmas at my sister’s place in Edinburgh. We had a number of people coming over, all at different times and from different places, so we needed somewhere central that was easy to find for people so we decided on a big Wetherspoons in the centre of Edinburgh. As soon as everyone got there, we got up and left. So no, they are not places that you would spend much time in, but that is not what they are for. They have many pubs in strategic locations close to, or in, public transport hubs, so if you’re waiting for a train you just pop in, get a pint and then leave again. I always go to Wetherspoons for breakfast when I’m in Scotland. They have cheap meals and a great selection of cask beers. I like cask beers, but they’re not really a thing here in Ireland. I always order a big greasy breakfast and a pint of cask ale with a curious name like Big Humdinger or Marley’s Great Northern Railway Bitter or something like that and for less than 6 Pounds I’m set for the morning. I did this now and forty minutes later I walked out a happy man.
As it was still early, I decided to go on a tour of the city centre. I walked around a couple of sights, had a look at the harbour in daylight and took some photos of the Castlegate monument. I walked into a shopping mall in search for an ATM, succeeded and went back out into the street. I walked past a bar called The Snuggery which appeared to be open for business so I had a look. They were open, but the lady in charge was clearly still getting the place ready for the day. She had the look on her face of someone who has been dealing with Scottish drunks their entire life. She looked weary, tired and old beyond her age. A lone drinker was at the bar drinking cider. The choice of beers was meagre, so I had a pint of Guinness. The other drinker had clearly been looking for someone to talk to because the bar lady was busy ferrying boxes and crates around and he addressed me immediately. After talking to him for 5 minutes about the usual topics as the weather, local politics and sports, he asked me what I did for a living. I explained to him what I do (I work in digital marketing for a large tech company) and gave him a long and detailed explanation of how everything works in that field. He clearly did not understand a single thing I told him, and after that he kept to himself.
I was going to go to the brewery today, something I looked forward to, but it took some planning. The brewery, you see, is not in Aberdeen itself, but in the town of Ellon, some 15 miles to the North, and even then it is not in Ellon itself, but on an industrial estate outside of the town. Ellon itself has a population of about 9000 and mainly functions as on overflow town for the oil industry in Aberdeen. There are several bus lines that go to Ellon itself, and some of those go near the brewery, but none of them will drop you off right on the doorstep. I worked out all the options while sitting in the sunshine outside the bus station and decided to take bus 67 as that one seemed to be getting closest.
I whiled away a couple of hours by looking in shop windows, having a drink here and a snack there, and then went back to the bus station.
It took about 20 minutes to get to the Park&Ride area that was advised on the Brewdog website so I got off there. I had a look around. I could see the brewery. I could smell the malt that is always in the air around breweries. But I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how to get there. I had a look at Google maps, which showed a route, but there were no sidewalks and the road was a highway, so I spent 15 minutes traipsing through the grass on the side of the highway, but ultimately I got there. It really is quite a sizable brewery.
Brewdog has grown explosively over the past decade, from their start up days in a garage box in Fraserburgh to this big brewery in Ellon. Moreover, just a few months earlier, a new brewery was opened across the street which will specialise in sour beers and beers with spontaneous fermentation. Sour beer may not sound appealing to a lot of people, but they really are tasty once you get over the fact that they are not bitter, as beer is supposed to be, and there’s a wild variety in substyles within this section of the beer spectrum. As a shareholder, I am entitled to 2-for-1 tours around the brewery, but as I was on my own on this trip, I had decided not to do the tour and wait until the next time when I could put my perks to use.
With no tour on the agenda, all I had to do was check out the 2 bars. I walked past the famous wooden statue depicting the Brewdog logo and went inside. It really is quite a sizeable bar. Ofcourse, this being HQ, you would expect that. Booths are spread around the place, like in most Brewdog bars and there is a bar with 12 taps. This may not seem like a lot, but the stance is that HQ only serves Brewdog, and no guest beers, so that only our core range beers and whatever has come out of the brewery most recently is served on tap. The cool thing about the bar is that you can peek into the brewery to see how your beer is made. The beer is so fresh, it is unreal. After a few drinks, I walked across the street to the new sour beer brewery, called Overworks, which was now also open. I had a few more drinks there and then realised that I was pretty much done there. I had seen HQ, gotten my stamps, thereby completing the first assignment of the game, and I wasn’t hungry yet, so having dinner there was not necessary. I said goodbye to everyone there and made my way back to the bus stop. The rest of the evening in Aberdeen was largely uneventful, so I went home at a responsible time so that I could get up in the morning. My trip was off to a good start. Now it was time to do some light traveling.
This thing normally stands at HQ.
My next destination was Glasgow, but I would go there by way of Dundee and Stirling, so that I could get my stamps and finish my second assignment in the game. I looked at traintickets to Dundee, but thought they were insanely expensive, so I booked a Flixbus for half the price. With time to kill I had breakfast at Wetherspoons again and, before heading to the bus station, remembered that there was one more place I wanted to visit. 6 Degrees North, is another craft beer bar in Aberdeen city centre. I had been there in April, but that was late at night. The good thing about Scotland is that they have pretty cool licensing laws, especially when it comes to early openings. 6 Degrees North opened at 11AM so that gave me just enough time to have a beer or two before setting off South. When I approached the bar just after 11 and walked through the door, a large white dog started growling and walking towards me. I’m not a fan of dogs at the best of times, but I’m especially not fond of big dogs that growl at me at 11 in the morning. I stopped in my tracks but, fortunately, the girl who worked there emerged a second later and commanded the dog to go out the back which he did. What is it with dogs? Do they sense that you don’t like them and does that offend them? Are they just not nice, the first time they see you? I’ll never be a dog person.
Wetherspoons is the UK’s biggest pub chain and gets a lot of crap from people, who say that it’s a faceless corporate chain with no atmosphere. Most of this is true. It has over 900 pubs across the UK, there is never any music and the sound on the TVs is always off. People rarely spend an entire evening with their friends at a Wetherspoons because there is little or no atmosphere. The only time I ever spend an entire evening in one of their pubs was in 2011, when we were having Christmas at my sister’s place in Edinburgh. We had a number of people coming over, all at different times and from different places, so we needed somewhere central that was easy to find for people so we decided on a big Wetherspoons in the centre of Edinburgh. As soon as everyone got there, we got up and left. So no, they are not places that you would spend much time in, but that is not what they are for. They have many pubs in strategic locations close to, or in, public transport hubs, so if you’re waiting for a train you just pop in, get a pint and then leave again. I always go to Wetherspoons for breakfast when I’m in Scotland. They have cheap meals and a great selection of cask beers. I like cask beers, but they’re not really a thing here in Ireland. I always order a big greasy breakfast and a pint of cask ale with a curious name like Big Humdinger or Marley’s Great Northern Railway Bitter or something like that and for less than 6 Pounds I’m set for the morning. I did this now and forty minutes later I walked out a happy man.
As it was still early, I decided to go on a tour of the city centre. I walked around a couple of sights, had a look at the harbour in daylight and took some photos of the Castlegate monument. I walked into a shopping mall in search for an ATM, succeeded and went back out into the street. I walked past a bar called The Snuggery which appeared to be open for business so I had a look. They were open, but the lady in charge was clearly still getting the place ready for the day. She had the look on her face of someone who has been dealing with Scottish drunks their entire life. She looked weary, tired and old beyond her age. A lone drinker was at the bar drinking cider. The choice of beers was meagre, so I had a pint of Guinness. The other drinker had clearly been looking for someone to talk to because the bar lady was busy ferrying boxes and crates around and he addressed me immediately. After talking to him for 5 minutes about the usual topics as the weather, local politics and sports, he asked me what I did for a living. I explained to him what I do (I work in digital marketing for a large tech company) and gave him a long and detailed explanation of how everything works in that field. He clearly did not understand a single thing I told him, and after that he kept to himself.
I was going to go to the brewery today, something I looked forward to, but it took some planning. The brewery, you see, is not in Aberdeen itself, but in the town of Ellon, some 15 miles to the North, and even then it is not in Ellon itself, but on an industrial estate outside of the town. Ellon itself has a population of about 9000 and mainly functions as on overflow town for the oil industry in Aberdeen. There are several bus lines that go to Ellon itself, and some of those go near the brewery, but none of them will drop you off right on the doorstep. I worked out all the options while sitting in the sunshine outside the bus station and decided to take bus 67 as that one seemed to be getting closest.
I whiled away a couple of hours by looking in shop windows, having a drink here and a snack there, and then went back to the bus station.
It took about 20 minutes to get to the Park&Ride area that was advised on the Brewdog website so I got off there. I had a look around. I could see the brewery. I could smell the malt that is always in the air around breweries. But I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how to get there. I had a look at Google maps, which showed a route, but there were no sidewalks and the road was a highway, so I spent 15 minutes traipsing through the grass on the side of the highway, but ultimately I got there. It really is quite a sizable brewery.
Brewdog has grown explosively over the past decade, from their start up days in a garage box in Fraserburgh to this big brewery in Ellon. Moreover, just a few months earlier, a new brewery was opened across the street which will specialise in sour beers and beers with spontaneous fermentation. Sour beer may not sound appealing to a lot of people, but they really are tasty once you get over the fact that they are not bitter, as beer is supposed to be, and there’s a wild variety in substyles within this section of the beer spectrum. As a shareholder, I am entitled to 2-for-1 tours around the brewery, but as I was on my own on this trip, I had decided not to do the tour and wait until the next time when I could put my perks to use.
With no tour on the agenda, all I had to do was check out the 2 bars. I walked past the famous wooden statue depicting the Brewdog logo and went inside. It really is quite a sizeable bar. Ofcourse, this being HQ, you would expect that. Booths are spread around the place, like in most Brewdog bars and there is a bar with 12 taps. This may not seem like a lot, but the stance is that HQ only serves Brewdog, and no guest beers, so that only our core range beers and whatever has come out of the brewery most recently is served on tap. The cool thing about the bar is that you can peek into the brewery to see how your beer is made. The beer is so fresh, it is unreal. After a few drinks, I walked across the street to the new sour beer brewery, called Overworks, which was now also open. I had a few more drinks there and then realised that I was pretty much done there. I had seen HQ, gotten my stamps, thereby completing the first assignment of the game, and I wasn’t hungry yet, so having dinner there was not necessary. I said goodbye to everyone there and made my way back to the bus stop. The rest of the evening in Aberdeen was largely uneventful, so I went home at a responsible time so that I could get up in the morning. My trip was off to a good start. Now it was time to do some light traveling.
This thing normally stands at HQ.
My next destination was Glasgow, but I would go there by way of Dundee and Stirling, so that I could get my stamps and finish my second assignment in the game. I looked at traintickets to Dundee, but thought they were insanely expensive, so I booked a Flixbus for half the price. With time to kill I had breakfast at Wetherspoons again and, before heading to the bus station, remembered that there was one more place I wanted to visit. 6 Degrees North, is another craft beer bar in Aberdeen city centre. I had been there in April, but that was late at night. The good thing about Scotland is that they have pretty cool licensing laws, especially when it comes to early openings. 6 Degrees North opened at 11AM so that gave me just enough time to have a beer or two before setting off South. When I approached the bar just after 11 and walked through the door, a large white dog started growling and walking towards me. I’m not a fan of dogs at the best of times, but I’m especially not fond of big dogs that growl at me at 11 in the morning. I stopped in my tracks but, fortunately, the girl who worked there emerged a second later and commanded the dog to go out the back which he did. What is it with dogs? Do they sense that you don’t like them and does that offend them? Are they just not nice, the first time they see you? I’ll never be a dog person.
The girl behind the bar was a lot friendlier than the dog
and while we talked about her bar, the beer scene in Aberdeen and brewing in
general, she let me taste a bunch of beers. I would have liked to have stayed
beyond my 2 beers and chat, because she was friendly and liked talking about
beer, but I had a bus to catch, she had a bar to run and, frankly, 2 days in
Aberdeen is enough, really.
In Dundee, my only choir was visiting the Brewdog bar, which I did. The bar had just had a refurbishment at the start of the week and had only reopened the day before. It looked the part, but as I had never been there before the refurb, I had no idea how much of an improvement it was. After that, I took a train to Stirling and the ticket cost as much as the bus ticket from Aberdeen, which is a trip twice as long.
The British railway system is a bizarre and convoluted network, run by 20 different companies who all have their own rules, timetables and conditions. The ticketing system is so byzantine that even after long hours of research I have no idea how it works. Your ticket price is based on so many different factors that it is impossible to predict. Depending on the time of day, the operator, the stations the train stops, how many train changes you make and the number of operators involved, whether you want to get off between your starting point and final destination and a dozen other factors all chip in to your final ticket price. It is no wonder that everybody these days flies from Edinburgh or Newcastle when they have to go to London or Birmingham. I boarded the train to Stirling, performed my routine of going to the Brewdog bar, having a few beers and getting out of there, and boarded the train to Glasgow without buying a ticket because I was sick of this ticketing bullshit.
In Dundee, my only choir was visiting the Brewdog bar, which I did. The bar had just had a refurbishment at the start of the week and had only reopened the day before. It looked the part, but as I had never been there before the refurb, I had no idea how much of an improvement it was. After that, I took a train to Stirling and the ticket cost as much as the bus ticket from Aberdeen, which is a trip twice as long.
The British railway system is a bizarre and convoluted network, run by 20 different companies who all have their own rules, timetables and conditions. The ticketing system is so byzantine that even after long hours of research I have no idea how it works. Your ticket price is based on so many different factors that it is impossible to predict. Depending on the time of day, the operator, the stations the train stops, how many train changes you make and the number of operators involved, whether you want to get off between your starting point and final destination and a dozen other factors all chip in to your final ticket price. It is no wonder that everybody these days flies from Edinburgh or Newcastle when they have to go to London or Birmingham. I boarded the train to Stirling, performed my routine of going to the Brewdog bar, having a few beers and getting out of there, and boarded the train to Glasgow without buying a ticket because I was sick of this ticketing bullshit.
Glasgow is an interesting city. Despite all the bad press it
gets, it’s actually quite a nice place. Yes, it’s a bit rough around the edges,
but it’s a port city and they are always like that. The buildings in the city
centre have a nice old feel to them and one of the main selling points, for me
at least, is that the streets in the city centre are laid out on a grid system,
which makes it much easier to get around. You typically see this in American
cities like New York and Philadelphia, and not so much in Europe, but in
Glasgow they had the foresight to organize the city centre like this. I like
that. You always know where you are. Maybe the city planners were aware that
their population is fond of a drink and wanted to make it easier for them to
get home.
Well, fond of a drink is a bit of an understatement. There are few places I have been where people throw themselves at intoxication with such vigour. People in Glasgow really love getting wasted. This doesn’t always end well (just Google Glasgow and Buckfast and you’ll get an idea) but I like the city.
I checked into my hostel, which was large and had a noisy bar on the ground floor, and went into the city. It was Saturday night so it was busy everywhere. I first went to the Brewdog bar in Merchant City, a large bar with an extensive food menu. Again, somebody there recognised me, which was odd as this was the first time I was there but, apparently, I had spent some 10 minutes talking to him at the Brewdog shareholders meeting in Aberdeen earlier in the year. I had wanted to go bar hopping in Glasgow that night but, as I got talking to the staff and other beer enthousiasts present, I spent most of the night there. In the end, when I eventually walked out, it was past midnight and I decided to go to bed. In the morning I had something to do: I was going to visit another brewery.
In the morning, I had a hot shower and walked into the Sunday morning streets. Apart from a few early birds and a handfull of people swaying across the sidewalks, clearly still going from the night before, the streets were quite peaceful. One thing I noticed is that E-cigarettes are one of Glasgow’s leading industries these days. I walked 3 blocks and counted a dozen shops that sold nothing but e-liquids, vape pens and other assorted e-smoking parafernalia. I located my favorite breakfast pub, had breakfast and set out for the Drygate Brewery.
Well, fond of a drink is a bit of an understatement. There are few places I have been where people throw themselves at intoxication with such vigour. People in Glasgow really love getting wasted. This doesn’t always end well (just Google Glasgow and Buckfast and you’ll get an idea) but I like the city.
I checked into my hostel, which was large and had a noisy bar on the ground floor, and went into the city. It was Saturday night so it was busy everywhere. I first went to the Brewdog bar in Merchant City, a large bar with an extensive food menu. Again, somebody there recognised me, which was odd as this was the first time I was there but, apparently, I had spent some 10 minutes talking to him at the Brewdog shareholders meeting in Aberdeen earlier in the year. I had wanted to go bar hopping in Glasgow that night but, as I got talking to the staff and other beer enthousiasts present, I spent most of the night there. In the end, when I eventually walked out, it was past midnight and I decided to go to bed. In the morning I had something to do: I was going to visit another brewery.
In the morning, I had a hot shower and walked into the Sunday morning streets. Apart from a few early birds and a handfull of people swaying across the sidewalks, clearly still going from the night before, the streets were quite peaceful. One thing I noticed is that E-cigarettes are one of Glasgow’s leading industries these days. I walked 3 blocks and counted a dozen shops that sold nothing but e-liquids, vape pens and other assorted e-smoking parafernalia. I located my favorite breakfast pub, had breakfast and set out for the Drygate Brewery.
Drygate is a small brewery that stands in the shadow of the
huge Wellpark brewery where Tennent’s, Scotlands best selling beer, is made. I
checked my map and found that it was about a 20 minute walk, that I still had
an hour before my tour started, and that the Brewdog bar I had spent most of the
previous night in was on the way, so I decided to check in for a beer. As I had
completed my first assignment on Friday, I was now also eligible to claim a
free pint at any Brewdog bar of my choice so I decided this one was as good as
any. I decided to try a new beer first, and while I was drinking this, a guy in
surfing shorts and dreadlocks walked in. He looked vaguely familiar but I
couldn’t tell why. He was in discussion with the bar man about some free beer
he was supposed to pick up there. The bar man couldn’t find it, and the guy
with the dreadlocks then said that it might be in his stagename. When he said
what that was, I knew it instantly- he was one of the people I know from the
Brewdog message board. We had a chat and a beer, I proudly collected my free
pint and after that, he had somewhere to be, and I had a brewery tour to do.
I walked in to the Drygate brewery at 5 minutes to 1, asked about the tour in the shop and was told to go to the bar where we would be picked up for the tour. As I was planning to go to the bar anyway, this was a happy coincidence so I ordered a beer, read the menu and waited for the tour. As it is a small brewery, the tour didn’t involve much walking, there were only 2 or 3 rooms to get through, but it was entertaining nonetheless. The thing is, I have done dozens of brewery tours all over the world, so I know how a brewery works. They always ask more or less the same questions during the tour, and I always know all the answers so I usually let the rest of the group answer and only if no one else knows the answer, I’ll step in. The tour lasted about half an hour, and was quite entertaining, given the small size of the place. Well done. After the tour came, ofcourse, the most interesting part- tasting. We were all given a wooden board with 4 taster glasses of Drygate beer on it- a lager, an IPA, a Mango Pale Ale and a stout. They were all very nice, but I decided that the Mango Pale Ale, a beer called Disco Forklift Truck, was the winner. While the rest of my tour group, a couple of Spanish people, some Germans and a sole American, all dispersed, I stayed a bit longer to try some more beer. I liked this place. The staff were friendly, the beer was nice, the place looked cool. Yeah, this was definitely a place to remember for future visits to Glasgow. Glasgow is just across the sea from Dublin, so flights aren’t expensive and it’s a fun city to go to.
After a while, I decided that it was time to go, because there was one more thing I had to do in Scotland. There was one final Brewdog bar that I had to tick off to complete my second assignment in the game and I went there now. It was quite a hike, close to 3 miles, but I like walking and the weather was nice so I set off. When I was about halfway there, the weather changed like it only can in Scotland. In the space of 3 minutes, the sky changed from bright, sunny and late-summery to dark, menacing and full of black clouds. And then, ofcourse, it started raining. Thick, heavy rain, that soaks you to your skin within minutes. I tried walking close to the buildings, but as the rain came at an angle, they offered little protection. When I finally got there, I felt like a towel that had been thrown in the pool by an angry hotel guest. After 5 minutes under the hand dryer in the toilet, I felt somewhat dried up and presented myself at the bar. I received my beer and presented my stamp book. Proud, I told the barman that I was now a Flying Scotsman, having visited all the bars in Scotland. He high fived me and said that if I wanted my free pint, I should let him know. I would. It was quite busy, and I sat down at a table in the middle of the bar. I looked out the window and noticed that the rain had stopped and the sun came out from behind the clouds again, dropping that beautiful after-rain sunshine on the lawn and buildings in front of me. Only then did I realise what a beautiful view we had from this bar. Right across the street was the Kelvingrove Museum, a large, beautiful red sandstone building. I hadn’t noticed it when I came in because of the foul weather but now, with the sun shining out on the wet grass before it, it looked magnificent. What must it be to work here and have that view all day long? I had dinner there, and a few more beers, including my free pint for completing the second challenge and then decided to start the long trek back. I picked up a beer in a convenience store for the way back, because you haven’t really been to Glasgow unless you’ve been drinking in the street, stopped off for one more drink (okay..) at the Brewdog bar near my hostel and then went to bed with a light head, but full of anticipation. I would see Berlin tomorrow.
The Kelvingrove museum
I walked in to the Drygate brewery at 5 minutes to 1, asked about the tour in the shop and was told to go to the bar where we would be picked up for the tour. As I was planning to go to the bar anyway, this was a happy coincidence so I ordered a beer, read the menu and waited for the tour. As it is a small brewery, the tour didn’t involve much walking, there were only 2 or 3 rooms to get through, but it was entertaining nonetheless. The thing is, I have done dozens of brewery tours all over the world, so I know how a brewery works. They always ask more or less the same questions during the tour, and I always know all the answers so I usually let the rest of the group answer and only if no one else knows the answer, I’ll step in. The tour lasted about half an hour, and was quite entertaining, given the small size of the place. Well done. After the tour came, ofcourse, the most interesting part- tasting. We were all given a wooden board with 4 taster glasses of Drygate beer on it- a lager, an IPA, a Mango Pale Ale and a stout. They were all very nice, but I decided that the Mango Pale Ale, a beer called Disco Forklift Truck, was the winner. While the rest of my tour group, a couple of Spanish people, some Germans and a sole American, all dispersed, I stayed a bit longer to try some more beer. I liked this place. The staff were friendly, the beer was nice, the place looked cool. Yeah, this was definitely a place to remember for future visits to Glasgow. Glasgow is just across the sea from Dublin, so flights aren’t expensive and it’s a fun city to go to.
After a while, I decided that it was time to go, because there was one more thing I had to do in Scotland. There was one final Brewdog bar that I had to tick off to complete my second assignment in the game and I went there now. It was quite a hike, close to 3 miles, but I like walking and the weather was nice so I set off. When I was about halfway there, the weather changed like it only can in Scotland. In the space of 3 minutes, the sky changed from bright, sunny and late-summery to dark, menacing and full of black clouds. And then, ofcourse, it started raining. Thick, heavy rain, that soaks you to your skin within minutes. I tried walking close to the buildings, but as the rain came at an angle, they offered little protection. When I finally got there, I felt like a towel that had been thrown in the pool by an angry hotel guest. After 5 minutes under the hand dryer in the toilet, I felt somewhat dried up and presented myself at the bar. I received my beer and presented my stamp book. Proud, I told the barman that I was now a Flying Scotsman, having visited all the bars in Scotland. He high fived me and said that if I wanted my free pint, I should let him know. I would. It was quite busy, and I sat down at a table in the middle of the bar. I looked out the window and noticed that the rain had stopped and the sun came out from behind the clouds again, dropping that beautiful after-rain sunshine on the lawn and buildings in front of me. Only then did I realise what a beautiful view we had from this bar. Right across the street was the Kelvingrove Museum, a large, beautiful red sandstone building. I hadn’t noticed it when I came in because of the foul weather but now, with the sun shining out on the wet grass before it, it looked magnificent. What must it be to work here and have that view all day long? I had dinner there, and a few more beers, including my free pint for completing the second challenge and then decided to start the long trek back. I picked up a beer in a convenience store for the way back, because you haven’t really been to Glasgow unless you’ve been drinking in the street, stopped off for one more drink (okay..) at the Brewdog bar near my hostel and then went to bed with a light head, but full of anticipation. I would see Berlin tomorrow.
The Kelvingrove museum
Monday morning is a part of my week that I normally prefer
to forget about. It’s a miserable place to be, normally. This Monday, however,
I was up early, showered quickly, packed up my stuff and checked out. I still
had 4 hours to go until my flight, but I just couldn’t sleep anymore. I walked
around Glasgow for a long while, went for a final drink at the Brewdog bar in
Merchant city, and had some macaroni and cheese by way of brunch and then
headed to the airport.
Now before we go to Berlin, let me say that this, so far, was not the most exciting part of the story. I know it was mainly just Lennard going into a bar, and then another, and then a brewery, and then another bar. I am fully aware of that. I had a hard time writing something that was interesting to read and I even considered not publishing this at all, but I decided it was part of the trip so it should be part of the story.
To be honest, without the stamp game in place, I probably would not have gone to Scotland at all on this trip. Don’t get me wrong- I love Scotland, I love the people and their accents, I love Scottish beer and Scottish whisky, and I love the scenery. The only problem is, I have been to Scotland so often, that it doesn’t feel like being on holiday anymore. When I walk down the streets of Edinburgh, I might as well be in Dublin or Rotterdam. It just looks so familiar, I know where everything is, and I can understand everything everybody says.
So once again, my apologies if this wasn’t the most interesting thing I ever wrote, but hang in there, things are about to get much, much more exciting.
I was going to Berlin.
Now before we go to Berlin, let me say that this, so far, was not the most exciting part of the story. I know it was mainly just Lennard going into a bar, and then another, and then a brewery, and then another bar. I am fully aware of that. I had a hard time writing something that was interesting to read and I even considered not publishing this at all, but I decided it was part of the trip so it should be part of the story.
To be honest, without the stamp game in place, I probably would not have gone to Scotland at all on this trip. Don’t get me wrong- I love Scotland, I love the people and their accents, I love Scottish beer and Scottish whisky, and I love the scenery. The only problem is, I have been to Scotland so often, that it doesn’t feel like being on holiday anymore. When I walk down the streets of Edinburgh, I might as well be in Dublin or Rotterdam. It just looks so familiar, I know where everything is, and I can understand everything everybody says.
So once again, my apologies if this wasn’t the most interesting thing I ever wrote, but hang in there, things are about to get much, much more exciting.
I was going to Berlin.
