folk fest

i managed to spend a little time on my vancouver folk fest weekend in the beer garden
serving up only big rock products, its not my favourite beer garden
but if that’s what’s on offer
and i get a mighty thirst
i’m gonna find a way to make it work!

for me, the way to make it work again this year was to go the route of the snake-bite
even though snake bites were actually on the menu this year
i still had to throw a spanner into the works and get my snake-bites with the traditional ale instead of the grasshopper wheat

judging by the fact that they ran out of cider by 4:00 on sunday afternoon, i’d have to say the cider and snake-bite options were popular!



mimi enjoys the balmy weather on sunday with a big rock grasshopper
chip off the old block double-fists it with traditional ale

folk festival

i love the vancouver folk music festival!
it is consistently the most amazingly well run event i have had the pleasure of attending.
major kudos to all involved!

last year they introduced a beer garden to the festival.
on principle i did not venture in to said beer garden last year.  i still don’t think that a beer garden has a place at a beautiful family event like folkfest, but since having it there did not in any way take away from the festival being my happy place, i thought i’d get off my high horse and give it a try this year.

sponsored by big rock brewery, the offerings were cider, traditional ale, grasshopper wheat and lime.
not being the biggest fan of the big rock product, and it being a fabulously hot sunny afternoon, i decided to explore another snake bite mix.
i paired the traditional ale with the cider.
and it was delicious!
perfect for a hot summer’s day.  refreshing, sparkling, not too sweet… it hit the spot!
i extolled its virtues so highly, most of my friends ended up ordering it as well, and liking it.
its a snake bite revolution!

would i have that mix again?
probably not if there were other products on offer
but definitely will have it again next year at the folk festival

post #101, or how lilith fair was not so fair

i could go on and on and on and on and on about how yesterday’s lilith fair was the worst festival i have ever attended from an organizational stand-point, but i will save most of that rant for all the poor people who i can subject to my live rant, with full facial expressions and arm-waving gestures.

here, i will bemoan only the beer garden.
organization should not be that hard a concept to harness for a major promoter.  but apparently it was.
i should not have spent 6 of my 8 hours at the festival in various line-ups, but i did.

the beer garden was not overly large
it was not well set up inside
it was not well situated in the park itself

two line-ups, which thank you to the lovely people actually working in the less than ideal conditions kept moving quite well – major kudos to them

first line up was for beer tickets
$7.50 each
limit of 5 tickets per person

second line up was for the beverages themselves
limit of 2 per person

both lines for most of the festival were insanely long and snaked their way around the entire beer garden

i spent an hour in these two lines to get my initial 3 drinks
and those initial three drinks were not beers
no my friends, i opted for cider and palm bay rather than drink the swill they were offering as beer
molson canadian or coors lite
those were the “beer” options

red wine, white wine
peach cider, wildberry cider
palm bay grapefruit or orange coolers
a much better array of alcohol for my $7.50

i did switch to beer after approximately 6 ciders and palm bays
the sugar was not making me feel too happy
and i will admit that the beer tasted almost delightful by that point in the night
almost…

on the plus side, the molson canadian cups were compostable

(oh for the people who run the vancouver folk festival to be consulted on all other music festivals the world over – those are people who make it look effortless to make everyone happy and run a well-organized event)