Breweries in Almaty

Equipped with a list of addresses compiled from google, I set to the streets of Almaty today to explore and find any local beer I could get my hands on. The walk was long and strenuous; the first couple addresses turned out to be out of date, one replaced with a sex shop, another boarded up and under construction. On the south side of town I managed to find one place called John's, unfortunately after a test glass I decided that it was undrinkable.

Random street on my walk

Humdinger Brew Pub & Uncle Johns The Brew Pub @ Kunming

After I sat down at Humdinger and browsed through the ipad menu, I quickly locked onto the sampler and ordered. Little did I know the sampler here is more like ordering a full glass of every beer. They all had a hefty hoppy taste kind of reminiscent of US craft beer, at least what it taste like 4 years ago when I was drinking it regularly; the Irish Stout was my favorite of the bunch. I had a chicken sandwich here which was pretty well prepared, fried and smothered with some spicy chipotle sauce, nothing mind blowing, but it was a welcome change after 4 days of Tibetan food and a cramped plane ride.

I have no complaints about this place, however the feeling here was much more the style of a large cooperate US brewery in every way, the HDTVs on  every wall, the brewing tanks behind glass, the incredibly large western food selection, the soft pop music selection, the overdone interior decorating and the carefully crafted lighting. After becoming familiar with some more rugged breweries in Beijing, this place kind of reminds me of what might happen if Disney created a brewery.

Cell phone for size reference

MB Beer Plus @ Ulaanbaatar

MB Beer Plus is a cozy little brewery and restaurant located close to central Ulaanbaatar. They serve 4 beers here(Wiezen, Amber, Lager and Black Consul) and a mix of international and local food. When I dropped in I had beef dumpling soup and a couple of beers to start my day; the Dark Consul had a dry effervescent taste to it and the warm soup was a great to compliment to the -20 C temperature outside. Each of the breweries I visited in UB was oriented toward a German style experience, however I felt like MB Beer plus had the most original tasting beer and overall atmosphere compared to the others. The rest of the town must agree, because when I dropped in at night the place was buzzing with energy.

Dark Consul and Amber

Outside

Grandma Liu @ Lijiang Baisha Village

Lijiang's Baisha Village is an old Naxi settlement, located north of old town near the foot of Jade Dragon Snow Mountain. When I read about the village there was a comment on the post explaining that if you are approached by an old lady who invites you into her house to share some tea, that its totally normal. So when I was walking through the village 3 hours later and this happened to me, I thought I would give it a shot.

She took me into her recently remodeled house and sat me down at an old wooden table with a pile of guest books on it. If there is such thing as a Naxi accent, I'm pretty sure this lady has it, I was unable to understand almost anything she said. Luckily she understood me when I asked if she had any beer(Ni You Pijou Ma?), she went into her kitchen, dug through some dirty boxes for a minute and then a large bottle of local Baijiu was dropped in my lap.

Grandma Liu

Ale House @ Sofia

In order to help my sleep cycle reach the desired point, I went out for some beer last night with my local guide. We ended up at an underground bar called Ale House for a while while he explained to me the dark underbelly of living in a former communist state, which includes everything from corrupt police to gypsy's stealing your electricity. Each table in the bar had a metered tap, allowing us to sit down and poor delicious weisse beer right out of the wall. The only danger with this is that a foreigner like me might not have enough beer tap skills to poor a perfect glass each time, I ended up with a couple glasses full of foam.

Main drinking hall

Our tap

Yantai Trip

My one day trip to Yantai was as spontaneous as some of my other trips, the location decided about 3 hours before the flight would be leaving Beijing. My decision was based on what I could find on the coast, that still had tickets available before 2pm.

As my plane descended over the new landscape of Shandong, I found myself reminded of the terrain of central California, the rocky formation specifically rung similar those around San Luis Obispo. The whole ride into town from the airport, the song Ventura Highway stuck in my head as we passed imagery reminiscent of one of my many rides up the coast.

After I got to town and walked around the beach front area in the center of town, I checked into my hotel and did some googling. What I learned made it all click into place, the area surrounding Yantai is considered the 7th best wine making climate in the world.

Rocky hill tops caught my eye

Windmills

Nanchang Fandian - Jiangxi Provincial Hotel

Another day off, another provincial hotel. This time I decided to try out Nanchang Fandian, the ride there in rain ended at what looked like something between a run down apartment building and a military compound. After I checked the address from the photo I'd taken off my computer screen earlier, I was able to verify that the Chinese characters on the compound matched the ones on the address, I was there.

Inside the compound I discovered a small room with 6 tables, which could probably double as a holding tank for offenders against the communist party. I got myself the local Jianxi Beer, some sort of hot plate of eel, and a pile of pork and veggies. I found the crunchy texture of the eel quite nice, however from what I was eating I couldn't have recognized that this was pieces of eel, for all I know this might have been a mistaken translation in the menu. The sauce at the bottom of the bowl reminded me of squid ink except with a spicy edge, I enjoyed this enough I drank several spoon fulls straight. The pork and veggie dish had quite a lot of meat however was a bit bland, to help spice it up a bit I employed yet more of my favorite eel liquid. Unfornuatly by the time I finished the eel liquid had caught up with me and I ended up leaving a pile of snot filled clean-ex on the table.

Eel

Dandong North Korean Restaurants

I was a bit behind schedule as I woke up on Saturday morning, to make up for my sleepiness I set a limit of 1 hour before I would have to have my bags packed and my tickets + hotel room purchased. After some hemming and hawing over a map of China I zeroed in on a city called Dandong, about 900km northeast of Beijing. I met my goal and 4 hours later I was in the air.

The main drag on the Yalu river is a tourist haven, dotted with hotels and North Korean restaurants. I dropped into many of the restaurants to get a feeling for what they had to offer, most had walls of aquariums from where you could select which fish to eat. I chose to focus in on the more land-based restaurants. 

Bombed Iron Bridge to North Korea

North Korean water park?

Wanto Burger @ Kobe

My second day at Kobe I decided to track down a Kobe burger for breakfast, after a bit of googling I was drawn toward Wanto Burger, located close enough to Sannomiya station to justify a walk from my hotel. Inside the place was laid out like a cramped 70s diner, complete with rotating bar stools and an open view of the burger stove. For 2,700 yn (23 usd) I was able to get a Kobe burger loaded up with egg and extra pieces of steak to top it off, for an extra 10,000 yn they will use Kobe beef for the steak slices also. The texture of Kobe meat felt very at home when greased up, inside of a sandwich, and followed by a swig of cheap beer. Out of the three chances I had to eat Kobe Beef while I was in Kobe, this was by far the most successful meal.

Outside Wanto Burger

Shin-Kobe Ropeway

Shortly after my arrival in Kobe I decided to get to business with some sight seeing. The biggest one to get crossed off of the list was the Shin-Kobe ropeway, a gondola which takes you up the Rokko mountains to the Nunobiki Herb Garden. The base of the ropeway is right outside of the Shin-Kobe subway stop, after exiting just head south and you'll eventually find a misplaced stairway built into the side of a shopping center which leads up to it. At the top you can find a draft beer, I found it difficult to enjoy the garden part, but soaking in the surroundings while enjoying a fresh beer was great.

Looking up the mountain from the gondola

Kyoto to Kobe

This morning before I caught the train from Kyoto to Kobe, I dropped by the Kyoto Tower to get a final view of Kyoto fro above. It was nothing too special, however it's always healthy to get a good view of your surroundings.

Kyoto Tower

View in a direction, not sure which one

Bungalow @ Kyoto

After recovering from walking up to the temple earlier in the day I finally made it out to research some more beer at a craft brew pub called Bungalow. Getting there took a subway ride to Shijo and a long walk in the snow. There was no sampler to be had here, so I worked my way through the darks on the list one small glass at a time while I gnawed on some broccoli.

Some Snow in Kyoto

Outside Bungalow

Smile Burger @ Kyoto

Smile burger is located just out side the exit of the Kiyomizu-Dera temple, as I walked by starving from kilometers of walking,  I couldn't resist popping inside. They serve a range of burgers and sandwiches and a couple types of beer, this might not be the place to take a date your trying to impress but if appears to have all the essentials if you just want a good meal. I got myself a salsa burger, which tasted amazing. The fresh bread, soft cloud of meet, and salsa flavoring all fused into a wholesome gestalt.

Outside Smile Burger

Kiyomizu-Dera @ Kyoto

After my breakfast at Tadgs Gastro Pub, I decided to travel east into the hills of Kyoto to Kiyomizu-Dera. The walk there took me through Gion, the most geisha district of Japan; and up through the streets of Old Town Kyoto. Old Town was actually built to service tourists visiting the temples of Kyoto several hundred years ago, however it has a traditional feel to it that's well worth seeing. 

Walking along the Kamo River

Gion

Tadgs Gastro Pub @ Kyoto

Tadgs Gastro Pub was located about a 2 minute walk from my hotel near the Kamo River. They have several local craft beers on tap and a wide selection of local bottled beers also. I chose to do a tasting of 3 beers and ordered a seared beef appetizer to help myself wake up. While I waited for the beer and beef to be prepared the eclectic music and a fresh snowfall outside helped calm my sake hangover.

Bar@ Tadgs

View of the snow outside

Galmegi Pub & Tap and Tapas Gastropub @ Busan

With it's location on the third floor of a building a bit off of the Gwangalli strip, Galmegi Pub seems like a decent place to sneak off to if you don't want to be seen while your getting loaded. It was nice to try some of the local beer here, however lots of them had a very similar taste, and my favorite turned out to be an import from the US. The food menu was mainly pizza, which I've personally not enjoyed as a compliment to craft beer, so I decided to skip having a meal here and move on to the next place. This place didn't strike a chord with me, however to be fair this also isn't their main venue, their sister place Galmegi Brewery is located in the back streets of Gwangalli and may offer a different array of choices.

Galmegi Pub from the street

Tegalalang Rice Terraces @ Ubud

The Tegalalang Rice Terraces are about 10 kilometers to the north of Ubud. As you traverse up or down the hillside here you are bound to bump into local rice farmers begging for money. Ultimately this excursion is a hike, and quite a steep and muddy one so don't wear sandals like I did.

View on the way down the hill

Shanghai Brewery

To start my day I decided to hop over to Shanghai Brewery in the French Quarter. This area is relaxed and clean, the trees lining the streets block any view of the skyscrapers helping you to forget where you really are. I located Shanghai Brewery after a couple minutes walking around the district, as usual I opted for a sampler, but after a couple minutes of trying to select 4 beers to fill the tray I was told that only 4 were available. Of what I tasted the dark was my favorite as usual, however nothing struck me as awesome. The fried fish burger on the other hand was quite impressive, I added bacon and a fried egg to top it off and when it arrived I inhaled it in about a minute.

French Quarter streets

Outside Shanghai Brewery

Beer Lao Brewery @ Vientiane

After pinning down a hotel on Francois Ngen to stay for the night, I worked quickly to locate an ATM and then a rickshaw. If I accomplished only one thing today I wanted it to be the Beer Lao Brewery. The rickshaw driver knew what I was talking about right away and 20 minutes later I was approaching the guard post outside the factory. The guard ended up having to communicate with the rickshaw driver in order to determine my purpose, but after filling out a line on the sign in sheet I was handed my Beerlao visitor badge.

Streets of Vientiane

Beerlao headquarters

Mushrooms, Ladyboys and Whopping Burger @ Vang Vieng

A night out in Vang Vieng has left me with the impression that maybe this place could be the setting for the next installment of the Hangover franchise. Binge drinking is heavily encouraged and if your not participating someone's sure to give you a free shot of Lao Lao to loosen you up, several of the bars I visited also showed me their special menu, these contained a variety of weed or opium laced items including everything from smoothies to pizzas, some also offered mushroom dishes to serve the more adventurous. The tourists are from all over the world and were interesting to meet but the people who choose to make Vang Vieng their home proved to be a truly special breed. I met several prodigal half brained beings who'd taken a break from their home countries for a life of passing out bar fliers by day and conducting drinking games by night, the majority of these type appeared to have had there soul melted down and trampled over by years of drug use. One less zombie-fied exception I met had come from Ohio to work here as a DJ, but when he arrived he was convinced he'd discovered a utopia here, absent the greed and inequality of the West, he said that as soon as his Laos citizenship was approved he planned to renounce his citizenship in the US all together and start his own business here. There were also the sadder cases like the towns local homeless that were scouring the bar street at 3am looking for a dropped coin or dollar, the immigrant ladyboys from Thailand that littered the bars in search of sex tourists, and the Laotian girl who could only speak in bird chirps and had become the subject of a bet between a group of drunk Aussies. All of these factors loaded into my brain somewhere behind the Beer and Lao Lao and caused my perspective of this town to skew dramatically throughout the duration of the night.

This morning, having lost the ability to speak in complete sentences and now suffering from small hand tremors, I figured maybe today I shouldn't try to attempt to much physical or mental activity. A herd of cows happened to be passing through town so I did a walk over the river to join them for a while, I followed them for about a quarter of a mile before veering into the riverside shack which serves as a bar to the sun bathers. Soon I found myself sitting on one of the riverside lounges drinking Beerlao as the cows walked past one by one.

Friendly cows