Biking for Beer

Overview

2007-08-08T12:46:00.000Z

A Real Ale bike ride

It's all over! 2766 miles, 36 days, 50 or so counties, 21 breweries, and a lot of rubbish weather.

(The photo above is actually us at the end. Not much jubilation but then Land's End is a bit rubbish.)

We started on June 2nd at Land's End and finished on July 10th after a 5 week odyssey through the dismal and depressing June weather. It was meant to be a LEJOGLE taking in the 4 compass points of the mainland, but we missed out Lowestoft due to severe weather warnings so only 3 compass points were seen. We did visit Lizard Point (south), Dunnett Head (north) and the Point of Ardnamurchan (west) as well as Land's End twice and John O'Groats.

The Diary is currently being written and can be found by using the links on the left of the page.

You can find out who we are by clicking these links, firstly myself, Tom, and my cousin, Sam, (beware it is mostly nonsense). And you can find out why we did it here Why????????

Charity

* click on this photo to be magically transported to the charity page*

One of the aims of this trip was to raise money and awareness for our two chosen charities - the Dorset and Somerset Air Ambulance and the British Heart Foundation. You can read more about them, as well as our reasons for supporting them, by following this link - charity and you can donate to these excellent causes by clicking on the links above. Much more donated offline than online at the moment, but if you are reading this and find the diary (when I get that far) interesting or amusing please give a fiver to one of the causes.

Other Bits

We visited 21 breweries during our trip, from Dog House Brewery in Cornwall to Inveralmond Brewery in Perth. Visit the breweries page to find out more about this element of the trip

2766 miles, 50+ counties, 20 miles of climbing...........................
The whole route can be found by clicking this link and it has maps and profiles of each day

Other Nutters

LeJog Fundraiser - 6 women from Oxfordshire raising cash for Cancer Research, Epilepsy Action and Helen and Douglas House. Much better reason for doing the trip than ours. Take a look.

Georgie's Trip - A solo, self-sufficient, effort for Macmillan Cancer research. Inspiring.

Jonny Muir - Yep, this bloke must be proper nuts. He finished last year, but I thought I would include it as it is very interesting. 92 counties, 92 peaks, 92 days. Possibly unique and certainly unusual.

Other Links

Ultimate Land's End to John O'Groats list

Final note
Email me at tsheasby81@googlemail.com if you have any questions about the trip or have anything you would like to add. All feedback welcome.

And feel free to leave a comment in the comments box just below this sentance.
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Breweries we couldn't get to

2007-07-25T17:34:00.000Z

Unfortunately we had to miss out a few breweries. This was very annoying and certainly would have been avoided if possible, but the weather was really against us on some days and simple route-planning failed to allow for a couple of visits. Many thanks to the breweries on this list for replying, mostly they are smaller brewing concerns but a few larger companies took the effort to respond such as Caledonian. One day I will get round to visiting them all..............

These are the breweries that offered to accomodate us but we didn't get to see:

Cairngorm Brewery - Aviemore
Tryst Brewery - Stirling
Bridge of Allan Brewery - Bridge of Allan (near Alloa)
Caledonian Brewery - Edinburgh
Grain Brewery - Suffolk
Bartram's Brewery - Suffolk
Wagtail Brewery - Suffolk
St Peter's Brewery - Suffolk

click on the names to be transported to their websites.

*note: Cairngorm's 'Trade Winds' was one of the very best bottled beers we had throughout the trip.

Dog House Brewery

2007-07-25T17:31:00.001Z

Dog House Brewery

*more to follow

Dog House Brewery

Skinner's Brewery

2007-07-25T17:29:00.001Z

Skinner's Brewery

*more to follow

www.skinnersbrewery.com

Red Rock Brewery

2007-07-25T17:25:00.000Z

Red Rock Brewery

*more info to come

www.redrockbrewery.co.uk

Ringwood Brewery

2007-07-25T17:23:00.001Z

Ringwood Brewery

*more info to come

www.ringwoodbrewery.co.uk

Chiltern Valley

2007-07-25T17:19:00.000Z

Old Luxter's Brewery

No photos yet, will try to get one soon

*more info to follow

www.chilternvalley.co.uk

Hoggley's Brewery

2007-07-25T17:17:00.001Z

Hoggley's Brewery

*more to come

www.hoggleysbrewery.co.uk

Frog Island Brewery

2007-07-25T17:15:00.001Z

Frog Island Brewery

*more to come

www.frogislandbrewery.co.uk

Wylam Brewery

2007-07-25T17:10:00.000Z

Wylam Brewery

*more to come

www.wylambrew.co.uk

High House Farm Brewery

2007-07-25T17:04:00.000Z

High House Farm Brewery

Very foolishly I forgot to take any photos at the brewery itself so here is a picture I stole off their website.

*more to come

www.highhousefarmbrewery.co.uk

Fyne Ales

2007-07-25T17:00:00.000Z

Fyne Ales

*more to come

Fyne Ales

Inveralmond Brewery

2007-07-25T16:57:00.000Z

Inveralmond Brewery

*more to come

www.inveralmond-brewery.co.uk

Harviestoun Brewery

2007-07-25T16:53:00.000Z

Harviestoun Brewery

*more to come

www.harviestoun-brewery.co.uk

Hesket Brewery

2007-07-25T16:49:00.000Z

Hesket Brewery

*more to come

www.hesketbrewery.co.uk

Dent Brewery

2007-07-25T16:44:00.000Z

Dent Brewery

*more to come

www.dentbrewery.co.uk

Spire Brewery

2007-07-25T16:39:00.001Z

Spire Brewery

*more to come

www.spirebrewery.co.uk

Quartz Brewery

2007-07-25T16:32:00.000Z

Quartz Brewery

*more to come

www.quartzbrewering.co.uk

Moorhouse Brewery

2007-07-23T18:18:00.000Z

Moorhouse's Brewery

A lack of photos at the moment but more info will appear shortly

www.moorhouses.co.uk

Little Valley Brewery

2007-07-23T18:00:00.000Z

Little Valley Brewery

Above is head brewer and co-owner Wim van der Spek standing next to a very attractive midget.

*more to come

www.littlevalleybrewery.co.uk

Wood Brewery

2007-07-19T20:21:00.000Z

www.woodbrewery.co.uk

Don't seem to have any photos from Wood Brewery so you will have to make do with this photo of the locality. It's either Wenlock Edge or somewhere close.

Ludlow Brewery

2007-07-19T20:16:00.001Z

www.theludlowbrewingcompany.co.uk

*more to come

www.theludlowbrewingcompany.co.uk

Wye Valley

2007-07-19T19:33:00.000Z

www.wyevalley.co.uk

Butcombe Brewery

2007-07-19T14:30:00.000Z

www.butcombe.com

No photos yet, should have one soon

Butcombe Brewery was started when Simon Whitmore, formerly Managing Director of Courage Western and before that with Guinness worldwide, set up in old farm buildings at his family home in Butcombe, 10 miles south of Bristol, in September 1978. As with a number of breweries it was a redundancy payment that paid for the brewing equipment. In 1978 the brew length was just 10 barrels, and the company had just 30 accounts, one lorry, and one employee.

The brewery was extended to 20 barrels in the summer of 1982 and subsequently to 45 barrels, and again in the autumn of 1992 increasing the brew length to a whopping 85 barrels! The Brewery now produces in excess of 22,000 barrels of beer per year, or almost 7 million pints of 4 brands only… Butcombe Bitter at 4.0%, Butcombe Blond at 4.3%, Butcombe Gold at 4.7% and Butcombe Brunel at 5.0%.

When we visited Butcombe we found a very efficient and industrious plant, now standing at a huge 150 barrel brewlength. It certainly seems like they are moving in the right direction and the focus appears to be local although the sheer quantity of beer they produce means they sell a lot further afield than Somerset.

Cheddar Ales

2007-07-19T02:56:00.000Z

www.cheddarales.co.uk

Cheddar Ales started up in 2006 when former Butcombe brewer Jem Ham decided to take the plunge and be his own boss. A sizeable unit with plenty of room for expansion is situated just outside Cheddar and a 20 barrel brewplant was rescued from Dublin for the purpose of filling that space.

2 beers are currently being brewed:

Potholer - a zesty 4.3% Golden Ale
Best Bitter - a very moreish 4% session bitter

No doubt the range will be expanded at some point in the near future, but why run before you can walk. It will be good to return to Cheddar Ales in future to see how the new brewery is getting on. The beers are certainly good enough, we wouldn't say they are the best we had on the trip but they are both very drinkable and well worth trying again. Hopefully soon. Mmmmmmmm................................beer.................................

One of the very sensible things Jem has done is to comission a simple, but very effective, website that looks good and tells you all you need to know. Actually there is probably room for a bit more info, but I still think it is one of the best I have seen.