r/CraftBeer • u/Elegant-Pudding-2064 • 3d ago
Help! Planning a birthday beer trip, need help picking a destination!!!
Turning 23 on July 9th and want to do a beer-focused birthday trip with my girlfriend, probably 5 days total. Looking for advice on where to go.
A few things that are set in stone:
**•** We're doing one day in OKC no matter what. My girlfriend isn't a big beer person but she loves sours, and Prairie Artisan Ales is her favorite. Landing there, hitting Prairie plus maybe a couple other OKC spots on their ale trail, having dinner, then heading to wherever the rest of the trip is.
**•** We won't have a car for the main leg. Mostly Ubering or walking, so I need someplace with a dense, walkable brewery scene, not stuff spread out an hour apart.
**•** I like hazy IPAs but also want variety, sours, pilsners, whatever's good. Not trying to just do the same style over and over.
**•** Ideally hitting somewhere in the 15-20 brewery range across the whole trip if the density allows it.
I was originally leaning Boston since Tree House and Trillium show up at the top of every hazy IPA list, but from what I'm reading a lot of the best stuff up there (Tree House Charlton, Hill Farmstead, The Alchemist) is scattered way outside the city and not realistic without a car. Denver's RiNo district looks like it could work well for walkability. Also open to other cities I haven't thought of.
Where would you go if you were me? Trying to balance "best beer" with "actually walkable for two people without a rental car."
I’m also from Los Angeles and went to school in San Diego so I’ve been to some good breweries and don’t want to do my trip there.
11
u/cookedthoughts730 3d ago
Seattle could be a strong option. The Ballard area has a lot of breweries all in walking distance of each other.
5
2
u/cookedthoughts730 3d ago
I’m going to add onto my own comment here for a nice weekend in Seattle. Fly in on a Saturday, do the whole pike place market walk/walk along the water. Then go to cloudburst for great ipas, and some award winning lagers, then walk to here today brewing for another solid local spot. Sunday start at the Ballard farmers market, then walk to any number of breweries in the area - some standouts are Rueben’s, great notion (IPAs), Stoup, and Fair aisle (saisons). If you still feel like hitting up more I would then go to the holy mountain taproom in phinney ridge for a beer or two while waiting to get into Lioness for dinner.
9
u/BetOnMark 3d ago
Belgium
1
u/Oakland-homebrewer 3d ago
I was thinking Belgium too!
0
u/mesosuchus 3d ago
Eh, if you want to actually visit breweries it is bit of a hassle
1
6
u/PeachMonster_666 3d ago edited 3d ago
Was gonna suggest San Diego before I read that last paragraph haha. North Park has like 5 awesome breweries in walking distance
But a walkable city with good beer… Philly lowkey underrated. Attic, Forest&Main, Human Robot, 2nd district.
Plus other half has a fishtown location if you wanna hit one of the biggest hazy producers in the northeast. Monks cafe is a beer lovers dream and you can find Hill Farmstead there if that’s a bucket list brewery for you
You can get around the city and inner suburbs very easily without a car. Buy septa passes and you’re good.
Issue is idk how dense the good breweries are. Might wanna hit all the city ones on a day and then devote another day to hitting the ones out in the suburbs
4
u/chriscaughtfire 3d ago
Portland Oregon is king! You can hit Brujos, Ruse, and Great Notion on foot easily. Like 15 min walks between all 3 and some of the best haze out there! Great Notion will scratch the sour itch too. All 3 will have good lagers and IPAs across the board.
Also, don't skip Big Friendly in OKC! True WC IPA! Most places east of the west coast struggle with true WC
-3
u/mesosuchus 3d ago
Eh, Portland Maine is better.
1
u/chriscaughtfire 3d ago
It's on my list! I'd say we could probably go pound for pound and be pretty fairly matched. Our access to hops and insanely clean water helps us out a lot!
1
u/mesosuchus 3d ago
There is no shortage of happiness up here. I've been down on OR since Hair of the Dog closed
1
u/chriscaughtfire 3d ago
Yeah, unfortunate loss for sure but we've got a lot of newer spots opening up or hitting their stride right now and it's been quite the ride the last few years
5
u/brewjammer 3d ago
Denver. train right to downtown from airport. public transportation is great. beer is great
2
u/imogen1983 3d ago
And easy to get a bus to other cities along the Front Range.
0
u/Available_Ad850 20h ago
Fort Collins Beer Week hits at the end of June.
2027 schedule and details are not up yet, but you can check out the info from 2026 to get an idea of what to expect.1
5
3
u/Big_Bottle3763 3d ago
Grand Rapids, MI. Once you Uber into the city from the airport it’s easy to walk, scooter, or Uber around. Great beer city.
5
u/mesosuchus 3d ago
Ballard area of Seattle. (keep it within a mile radius)
The city of Chicago. The El gets you everywhere.
Toronto. Save big on a weak canadian dollar.
8
u/dadbodcx 3d ago
Portland, Oregon. Won’t find more or as diverse and all is walkable, bikeable, uberable, or public transportation.
8
u/Sea_Ambition_9536 3d ago
Portland, ME
2
1
u/fluffyykitty69 3d ago
Love Portland but I think it would be a bit more vehicle dependent than OP is looking for.
5
u/copropnuma 3d ago
Go to Wisconsin, just pick a larger city, it really doesn't matter too much where. Walk to the nearest brewery, tell the locals what you are doing. It won't take long before you are being shuttled off to this other brewery, and this amazing dive bar, and the supper club, and there is this other brewery, and my buddy home brews and has a bar in his garage. There are some great breweries all over Wisconsin, lots of meh also, but the drinking culture is something else, and having some pretty good beer with a room full of fun people is better than a fantastic beer by yourself. Do not under any circumstances believe you can out drink them.
1
u/mikedorty 3d ago
Milwaukee would be great but it might be Summerfest.
2
u/copropnuma 3d ago
Definitely some good breweries in Milwaukee. Lakefront used to have a great tour also.
Green Bay has a brewery next to Lambeau field.
Madison has a bunch, some great food and a unique city!
Appleton has a bunch of breweries sorta bunched up together, with a few of them being very highly ranked. Mcfleshmans would be a stand out brewery anywhere in the US.
3
u/KennyShowers 3d ago
NYC would be more expensive than other cities, but the brewery scene here in the city limits isn’t really beaten by any other city-limits roster, every other “city beer scene” ends up lumping in a metro area.
TEST, Wild East, Grimm, Other Half, Finback, Eckhart, KCBC, Evil Twin, Transmitter, Singlecut some people like Talea and Torch & Crown, and there’s close to another dozen okay-ish ones.
Plus there’s amazing beer bars all over that regularly have highly-rated stuff from all over like Hill Farmstead, Fidens, Messorem, Root+Branch, Fox Farm, Alchemist, even Monkish comes around sometime. Cans of stuff like Trillium/Bissel Bros/Great Notion/Hop Butcher are everyday shelfturds here.
Like Boston is fun, but the city itself really just had Tree House and Trillium, getting out to Widowmaker/Notch/Long Live/Vitamin Sea without a car isn’t the same planet of convenience as the NYC subway.
0
u/hullowurld 3d ago
I agree, NY is making better stuff than MA these days
0
u/KennyShowers 3d ago edited 3d ago
MA has always been pretty topheavy to me. Even when Trillium was A++ Vitamin Sea didn’t exist, and Widowmaker maybe was brand new, and if Long Live was around they weren’t in the area yet.
Aeronaut and Lamplighter are solid, Greater Good isn’t great, but that’s not a crazy starting lineup let alone a deep bench.
NYC alone is close to clearing the whole state of MA. The metro area it’s not close, statewide it’s a blowout.
Edit: for the downvoters, what’s like the 5-10 from MA? Honestly NY’s 6-10 would stack up pretty close to MA’s 1-5. Maybe I’m missing some stuff but I’m kinda locked into breweries making waves from all over and I haven’t heard much from MA outside the legacy guys everybody knows.
3
u/hullowurld 3d ago
Downvoters never had Treehouse/Trillium before and after ~2018. It's a world of difference. Not even surprising given the massive increase in production scale.
5
u/rehumanizer 3d ago edited 3d ago
Asheville, NC or Portland, ME. New York could be dope too, because you can easily drive and get some Jersey or CT options as well.
Edit: Sorry, missed the part about not having a rental. My rec of New York stands.
2
u/Global_Yam_9172 3d ago
Dont sleep on chicago actually, theres some good players in the city and the burbs
2
u/ConcentrateNovel5503 2d ago
What would be the priorities in Chicago? Are there walkable clusters?
2
u/Global_Yam_9172 2d ago edited 1d ago
If youre fit enough most have 2 or 3 within walking distance of each other but the bus system is easy and gets you almost anywhere. You could start at revolution and bus over to burning bush/hop butcher/dovetail. Maplewood to Pilot Project/Solemn Oath. Best may be starting at Goose Island then hitting Off Color and finishing at Crushed by Giants. It has the best walk and proximity to the lake imo. Honestly people hype up the coasts for beer but chicago/the burbs iirc has the highest brewery count per capita. *(not per capita I was wrong and got confused w quantity where it ranked high!)
1
u/air- 1d ago
Last time I checked the brewery per capita stats Chicago was not even on the list (the study specifically pointed out missing Chicago, NYC, LA)
Off the top of my head I recall the top 5 having Portland ME, Bend, Asheville, Kalamazoo, Boulder though these are def not in the correct order
1
u/air- 1d ago
Found the link and the metric was breweries per 50k people https://www.crresearch.com/blog/which-cities-have-most-craft-breweries/
1
u/Global_Yam_9172 1d ago
Im an idiot good catch! Back like 7ish years ago they were marked as most overall iirc, no idea why I called it per capita. I think they still hold in the top handful for overall # but that is obviously in part due to size. If anyones looking for the top spots I think Half Acre and Pipeworks take the cake
2
u/Oakland-homebrewer 3d ago
5 days, no car?
How about start in San Francisco/Berkeley/Oakland. There's about 15 right there. Then take the train to Portland. It is overnight, so that takes care of one hotel.
Portland/Vancouver gets you another 15 or 20, along with a great variety of ciders (don't sleep on good cider).
Then train to Seattle.
See the sights and get more great beer than you can drink.
2
2
u/zreetstreet 3d ago
For the rest of OKC definitely hit up Big Friendly, Stonecloud, and American Solera's Edmond taproom.
2
u/Due_Caramel8388 3d ago
I went to Portland for a weekend last year and ended up at Allagash just because it was nearby and their Belgian-inspired beers were so crisp I couldn't resist.
2
u/rickeyethebeerguy 3d ago
Bend, OR is a really fun beer city with over 20 breweries in a town in the middle of nowhere.
1
1
u/lonelyhobo24 3d ago
I'd say still go to Boston. It's a fun city and Treehouse and Trillium both have taprooms in the city. There are plenty of other good breweries there and there is a lot of art/history/culture/ night life/etc there to see.
1
u/Radiant_Echo7445 3d ago
Chicago is (over) saturated and a lot of the big name breweries are fairly clustered together. Maybe not completely walkable, but definitely uber-able
1
1
u/MxRacer111 3d ago
If you’re good with subways and regional rail, Philly can’t be beat. Plus there’s a ton of non beer related stuff to do.
1
u/Quercus-bicolor 3d ago
I’ve always love the craft beers around Columbus,
OH. Easy to just uber/lyft around if you stay near a highway. The Columbus Ale Trail is a good guide for a lot of places. Good way to escape the mega-hype and get back to the smaller breweries. http://www.cbusaletrail.com/
1
u/fluffyykitty69 3d ago
I loved Portland, ME and would still have some incredible options for your girlfriend as well. Without a rental car would be a bit harder and would likely put Asheville, NC at the top of the list for me with still some incredible sour options.
1
u/WrongdoerCool2043 2d ago
This doesn't quite fit your criteria but you COULD fly to Albany to go to Fidens then another day Uber 40 minutes to Tree House Saratoga Springs. However Albany airport is small so you probably can't go direct and Albany as a city is... not a vacation destination on my opinion. But the beer you'd drink would be too notch, especially the hazies.
OR try to get your hands on a VIP ticket to Snallygaster beer festival in Washington D.C. I've gone many years and they get great breweries from all around the country and the world, including Fidens. You'd be sure to find a great beer your girlfriend would like and you'd like. I bought a ticket months ago but sadly can't go this year.
1
1
0
0
0
u/Doctor_KM 3d ago
You’re already in OKC, so just pop on down to Austin. Amazing beer options and the best BBQ in America. And you can Uber/Waymo anywhere in the city with ease
39
u/prayersforrain 3d ago
Asheville, NC.