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Visit to the 30th Derby Beer Festival

Thursday 12th July 2007

A party of seven caught the 9:33 train from Hinckley to Derby, arriving at the festival just before it opened at 11:30. It may be the 30th Derby Festival, but for me and most of the others it was the first! The beer list offered a total of about 100 ales plus Ciders & Perries available in three bars at the modern Assembly Rooms.

The queue outside at opening time

We went to the great Hall first, where most of the beers were. Unfortunately this was 'air conditioned' to a temperature to keep the beer cool & the customers shivering. The appearance of people on the stage making very loud noises persuaded us to move to the smaller Darwin Bar which we found to be much more agreeable.

Personally my overall impression of the festival was one of disappointment. The venue seemed too big, we seemed to walk miles seeking out beers & then toilets, and soulless - like a large modern theatre & considering that the festival advertised itself as 'the biggest & best in the Midlands' I also found the beer choices to be disappointing - there was hardly any mild & very few beers under 4%. For a festival of its size, 100 beers seemed too few - Leicester  had almost twice as many this year!

We decided to visit a few of the city centre pubs after the festival - again this was a first time for me. The first one chosen was the Flowerpot(GBG2007) an amazing pub offering up to 35! different real ales. Eighteen of the casks being behind a glass wall in a bar with the beer dispensed by gravity to taps below the the glass.

From here we walked to the Smithfield and then on to the Alexandra & the Brunswick - all GBG2007 pubs - where the selection and quality of beers were all excellent.

Outside the Flowerpot	Inside the Smithfield	Alexandra Hotel Bar	Bar of the Brunswick	Inside the Brunswick
Nuneaton CAMRA	The Smithfield	Buying a round	The Brunswick	Colin & Carol in the Brunswick

We then caught the train home arriving at Hinckley at about 8:30pm.

Words  by Alan Cooke
Photos by Alan Cooke & Norman Hall

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