Homebrewbeer.net's Boston Beer Tour Part 3

All roads lead to beer...

Check out Part 1 and Part 2 if you haven't already done so...

My original plan for the Boston Beer Tour included some stops at historic pubs along the way. A great way to sample some of Boston's bar scene, while learning a little about Boston's past. But, the best laid plans of mice and men...

After our Boston Brewery (Sam Adams) tour, we skipped Doyle's Cafe and high-tailed it across town to the Harpoon Brewery. Some of our fellow travelers were too anxious to wait for the next tour. I was a little annoyed at my master plan being altered, but that's par for the course when it comes to group activities and group dynamics.

The gang in the Harpoon tasting room.

Beer Tour Tip # 1
If you're really into beer, and the plan, beware who you take with you. And if your friends are single guys, keep in mind the single females that are with you will have more influence than you will. That maybe true if the genders are swapped, but I couldn't be sure. If anyone has any insight, feel free to chime in.

What did we miss? Not really sure...
Doyle's Cafe has supposedly seen quite few famous people, including politicians, enjoying a good pint. It's also served as the backdrop for different TV shows and movies. My thought was it was near the brewery, it's recommended by the brewery, it's a well known cool place to grab a brew and some good bar chow, and it's historical. Why not stop in? I thought a bite to eat would slow the pace of the day down just enough so we could get Harpoon with out the fear of too much beer, too early in the day. But "they" wouldn't have it... So off to Harpoon we went, while I bit my tongue...

It was intended to look like we were holding the sign up,
instead we look like Barker's Beauties from the Price is Right.

We got to Harpoon a little early for the next tour. Too early for the anxious females in our group, although they were in a hurry to get there and skip Doyle's Cafe. If we stuck to my plan, we would have had a good lunch and then made it to Harpoon for the slightly later tour at exactly the right time, but NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

When we last left our hero, he was battling the diabolical Lobster...

A brief interlude
We were there early enough to walk down the street and grab a beer at a small deli, but not early enough to sit and eat. The funny thing was, they wouldn't serve us beer unless we ate something. So we ordered a small order of coleslaw and a handful of plastic forks.

May I have this dance?

We didn't eat the coleslaw, but after a few dances with the giant lobster in front of the place, we drank the beers over a brisk walk back to Harpoon. This was a little challenging as we had to avoid the attention of the nice Boston Police Officer in the next parking lot who would probably take issue with us drinking beer on our walk. We got back to Harpoon just in time for a quick pit stop and then we were ready for the tour.

Behold the power of beer!

What ever you do, don't push the red button!

"You mean the brewery is all mine now Mr. Wonka?"

Onto to the Harpoon tour!
Now to be clear, Harpoon doesn't really do tours, not really. We could look at brewery floor from behind a red rope, and the folks that worked there gave us a run down of the company's history and current state of affairs. After that, they opened the tasting room and gave us nearly unlimited free samples of 12 different beers they had on tap. (Remember kids, drink in moderation, it's about quality and no quantity!!!)

Harpoon has this cool wall of beer set up.
Beer cans from a tone of different companies, it was beautiful, I had to take a few photos.

Man! We look a little light in the loafers in this pic!

It was at this point that Dave, Erik and the ladies chipped in and purchased me a cool Harpoon tap handle as a thank you to me for planning the day. What a cool surprise! Frankly I was touched... I felt like Sally Field wining the Oscar, "You like me, you really like me!"

"You like me, you really like me!"

Just a cool photo I took of a ship just out side where we had lunch

The gang at lunch, and more or less the untimely end of my Boston Beer Tour...

When the party, I mean tour, was over, we went to a restaurant down the street, instead of the Bell in Hand, the next stop in my original plan. Apparently the girls were in a hurry to eat, and then move on. Much to the chagrin of my buddies, they had other plans for the evening. Plans that didn't include the rest of my beer tour, or any of us, but did include visiting an ex-boyfriend and crashing at his apartment after a night on the town with him. We discovered all of this as we ate our lunch. They were rushing us, so they could move onto phase 2 of their diabolical plan.

"Don't make me destroy you!"

Now don't get me wrong...
Dave and Erik weren't trying to have a romantic interlude with our female friends. And the girls were a lot of fun, I'm exaggerating here for comic effect. (mostly) A little artistic license if you will. But they did kind of alter our plans significantly and they did end up more or less ditching us for the ex... But to be honest, we all had a hand in ruining the day. It all happened the night before...

Beer Tour Tip # 2
Don't go out really late the night before an all day beer tour. Because that's exactly what we all did the night before this tour. A friend's sister was leaving for her home country the next morning, so we treated her to an American night out on the town. Completely stupid. The lack of sleep, the heavy meal, it all kicked in, and it was time to take a nap.

The plan is all history now...
I had planned on taking the lead from this guy, and finishing the day off with a historic walking beer tour. We weren't going to take his tour, but we were going to wing it and do it on our own. Instead, we ended up getting a couple hotel rooms, napping and then hitting a dueling piano bar near Fenway (LOL!). The next morning we drove home. Anti-climactic isn't it?

On our way to the hotel we drove by "Cheers"...

Looking to the future...
I still think the over all plan is a solid one. And I will make another attempt at the historic beer tour starting with the Bell in Hand. But I think I'll hold off until next year. Now, I have my eyes focused on Connecticut and New York City.

Stay tuned!

And they lived happily ever after, the end...