Road Trip!

Over the years, your blogger had had the opportunity to visit about a dozen different breweries, from local craft brewers like River Horse and Weyerbacher to the national brands like Coors and Anheuser-Busch. Every visit, official or not, has been a lot of fun, and sampling fresh beer is a great way to spend an afternoon.

We've just had the opportunity to visit Ballast Point, at their flagship location in Miramar. While it's located in a not-very-scenic corporate/industrial park, the inside is ultra modern, reflecting the fact that this particular venue (one of six Ballast Point locations in the San Diego area) is only a couple of years old. There is a restaurant and gift shop, to go along with the brewing facility.

What was particularly interesting was the more than a dozen R&D beers on their menu. These may or may not actually be available for sale one day, but they are delicious. Among our samples were the Manzanilla Pilsner, Twelve Guinea Wee Heavy, California Kolsch and Sour Wench, which is a Berliner Weisse with Blackberry.

Following our tasting, we took a tour of the brewery. Southern California brewers benefit from being able to have fermenters outside the building, and Ballast Point takes full advantage of this added space. While our shelves have been missing some of their selections, we can tell you that they are working at capacity to replenish the stock. We also made sure to let them know of the Sculpin shortage. Their canning (pictured here) and bottling lines were humming right along.

The Southern California weather might not have been pleasant on our trip, but the warm hospitality of the Ballast Point team made up for that.

Later in the day, during a stop at San Diego's Liberty Public Market, we discovered a Stone Brewing restaurant/micro brewery, which meant more beer!

Since this was an unexpected discovery, we limited ourselves to simple choices: the brown ale and Xocoveza! It was cold enough that the outdoor tables had portable heat lamps, so these two heartier choices were perfect. And a quick trip to the bottle shop gave us something to look forward to later.

In our view, the best road trips balance the planned activities (our visit to Ballast Point) with time for new discoveries (the Stone Brewing venue). Whether you're doing a weekend out here in New Jersey, or something a little more exotic, there are great breweries (plus wineries and distilleries) waiting for you.