A great finish to this year would be to check out an article that I wrote for Owen Ogletree's Brewtopia site about our trip to the Bavarian region of Germany. This short list aligns with the last article posted by Rick Fifer and is the second half of my trip which started with the several posts about solo traveling through Austria and the Bavarian Alps. Close the loop and finish out the year learning more about Travel Culture and Beer!
Top Ten Moments from 2017's Brewtopia Germany Trip
By Ransome Sheets
It wasn’t until I was sitting on a train headed into downtown Munich that it finally started to sink in; I had signed up for yet another Brewtopia beer trip, what has also come to be known as an “Owen trip,” and I was about to spend the next week exploring Bavaria in the best way possible! Attending a Brewtopia trip means that you are going on an adventure with a group of people traveling overseas to learn about great beer and its history from renowned brewers, historians, enthusiasts, and more, all led by none other than Owen Ogletree himself! Just the idea of potentially getting to see a famous German Abbey, go pub hopping in Bamberg, or visit the oldest brewery in the world, is enough to get my heart racing. The long-anticipated trip had finally arrived, and yet I had no idea what was exactly in store.
While I already had high expectations, the week that followed surpassed all my preconceived notions. Our group learned that Bavarian beer predates any other beer that can now be found, and this preservation of recipe, process, and history, shapes not only their incredible beer, but also the current Bavarian culture to which it inspires. Visiting brewery Aecht Schlenkerla in Bamberg was one of my absolute favorite stops, and the passionate brew master’s quote best describes what we learned about the region’s beer: “Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire.”
Thanks to this “Owen trip,” I have made some incredible new friends, attained priceless knowledge of Bavarian beer, and have a new-found appreciation for the preservation of fire. Since I have returned from the trip, I’m still caught in the haze stirred up by the amazing events that we experienced. I set out to create a list of my favorite events of the trip, and have struggled greatly to limit the list to 10 items! So that being said, here is my Brewtopia Bavarian Beer Top 10 List:
