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Beer Festival
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Today Newsletter, Last E-Mails.
24 Hours of Beer Festival: Sat/Sun Nov. 3/4
(More Details at Official
Festival website)
16-3 day(s)s to First Sip!
NOTE
These
are a couple of the final emails bantered around as
we prepared to launch this ship to Belgium and Holland!
October
16th
Subject:
Change in Itinerary?
Yo!
Gots
some questions 'n' comments for y'all.
First,
is anyone interested in switching Amsterdam from Thurs/Fri/Sat
at the end of the trip up to Tues (afternoon)/Wed/Thurs
returning Friday to Belgium for the weekend? George
Anderson wants to visit again the 2nd weekend, but only
if we're in Belgium. Also, this helps Erich and I be
closer to Brussels Sunday morning for our flight! Let
me know what everyone thinks of this.
Steve,
does this screw anything up planning-wise?
Next,
I called United airlines to confirm that, yes, my flights
have changed AGAIN! I still arrive and take-off from
Brussels at the same time, but I've got a couple of
different flight numbers and leave Denver an hour later.
This is the 3RD CHANGE!!! Please double check your itinerary
and get back to me with any changes.
Better
yet, the price has gone down $110 and they are going
to credit me with a voucher for the difference, so make
sure you double check pricing as well!!!
Finally,
Ian and my august personage tied one on for the team
at home last night. We each had about 10 beers, all
Belgians and a 6-pack of Staropramen (the Czech Pils
treated as an honorary Belgian beer for the evening).
According
to George's taste testing, we tried a large bottle of
Delirium Nocturnum. Quite delicious!
This
was followed by Belle-Vue Gueuze Lambic wheat, strange
but different.
We
finished off some nice Hoegaarden Belgian White and
proceeded to make our way through Duvel and completed
the journey with two 750ml bottles of Jaser's homebrew
excellence. I believe we had an F0 and another of similar
taste. John, what types of beers are these? Very hoppy,
classicaly wonderful!
Cheers,
BilFish
October
18th
Subject:
Switching schedule... C O N F I R M E D
Okay,
Everyone has now weighed in.
Urban
had the most widely-varied and verbose answer, Erich
the shortest. Looks like we'll be looking at Amsterdam
mid-week (going up there Tuesday afternoon, returning
Friday) and spending the final few days (Fri/sat/sun)
in Belgium. Obviously, Urban is staying longer, Jaser
is staying shorter, and the rest of us in-between somewhere.
We'll be dropping Jaser off for his big flight home
before we hit Amsterdam, sad to say.
George
Anderson, you are free to come back to join us in Belgium
if you'd like, but keep in mind we'll have a loose schedule,
I'm sure!
As
mentioned, we have a cool option for hotel in Amsterdam
and I'm still researching. Good location, looks like
we can get an apartment for the 5 of us for about $35/person/night,
a good deal. The apartment will have a full kitchen.
check out http://www.hotelhoksbergen.nl
for more details.
I
don't foresee tremendous booking problems at this time
of year and that we'll at least find SOME place to stay...
:-) So, there are benefits in holding off so that we
can stay loose on the schedule.
There's
another place in Amsterdam, called The Shelter. It's
a Christian hostel, and sure, it has midnight curfews
and no bar, but it's cheap! Only $8 a night!
3
days may seem like a lot for Amsterdam, but I expect
we can keep ourselves quite busy, even during the day!
Besides the obvious Heineken Museum (it was closed for
a 6-month renovation when I was there last year) there
is the Aalsmeer flower Auction, the Van Gogh museum
(incredible), the Rikjsmuseum (uhh, mostly big), Lots
of walking along canals and such if you want a thrill,
biking if you want to do the thrilling, parks, etc.
Finally,
I'd like to note that we are officially only 2 weeks
from departure time, so it's time to get rolling if
you haven't already!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Get rollin' on what?
Whaddya mean? Well, I'd say ensure that:
•
Passports are ready to go
• Plane tickets are confirmed (and paper if possible)
• You have a backpack or other packaged item for carrying
goods
• You've considered photographic needs (keep in mind
that if you're lazy or cheap, Dan and I will have two
digital cameras (mine 3 megapixel, his 4 megapixel)
going at all times with a combined 500 pictures or so
of capacity, which we'll share with everyone.
• You've considered what you'll be wearing. I'll have
a last edition of the newsletter next week with my final
packing list for the upcoming journey. You can see the
list from my last EuroTrippin' experience at http://travelpete.com/planner/packing.shtml
Cheers,
BilFish.
October
20th
Subject:
Training Session Starlog #27491-b
Okay,
With 12 days to go before departure and 14 before the
festival, it's time to elevate to "pre-race" training
schedules!
Even
so, last night I took a bit of a breather (hence the
"-b" suffix) and had nothing more than 11/12 of a Dutch
Heineken, primarily to ensure my body wouldn't forget
its role and to get it ready for more Dutch beer. It's
similar to when competitive swimmers jump in the water
pre-race to get adjusted or when mountain climbers move
slowly up Mt. Everest to become acclimatized.
However,
Thursday night I had another good training session (again
assisted by Señor Wilson, kudos for another steadying
performance). We started with the New Belgium Brewing
Co (of Colorado) Trippel Belgian-style Ale which was
nice, and similar to the La Chouffe homebrew by Jaser
(if not as fun and fresh and alcoholic).
We
moved on to my newest Michael Jackson's World Beer Tour
beer-of-the-month club offering, Vrak (pronounced and
meaning "wreck"). It's a Swedish non-traditional wheat
beer made from yeast pulled from bottles pulled from
a ship wreck pulled from the Arctic Sea that was put
there in 1918 or so. Quite nice flavor for a doomed
beer option.
We
swapped into other beers, me taking a hit of Czech Staropramen,
Ian (and new friend Tota on the scene) taking a hit
of the infamous Hoegaarden. From here it gets a bit
chronologically hazy and we ended up at the students'
bar called the Ace High. As fine a little dive bar as
you'll ever hit in a small mining-school college-town,
we got some $5.00 pitchers of beer from Golden's 2nd
Largest Brewery (Golden City Brewery). They are working
on becoming the largest brewery, but it could be some
time! (hint: what large, uncaring domestic brewer with
stale Nazi-era ties brews beer from Rocky Mountain water
here?).
Inbetween
bouts of training recovery, I added a few photos to
the Who's Going page. It now includes Señor Dan Rowley's
ugly puss. We now have pictures of all participants
except Mr. Chad Wright, who remains elusively distant
and hard to find. Only DickHead Terrorists have been
less-photographed, I hear. Of course, I'm hoping for
different fates for the two.
Finally,
I've got some ideas on how to meet up at the airport.
I'm awaiting final word from Señor Urban on how he and
his women-on-the-ground want to handle the situation,
but here's an idea for how the 5 of us arriving in Brussels
in the morning can meet up. Please vote for your favorite
sequence. Idea #
a>
The first person to arrive can simply stay in the terminal
and wait for the others to arrive. This requires everyone
to know each other's flights arriving in, so please
look through Edition #12 of the Newsletter and I'll
follow up with an email. Bill is expected to arrive
at 7:20am, Erich and Jaser at 8:15am, and Dan and Chad
at around 8:00am.
But,
if it turns out we cannot stay inside the terminal where
all our flights arrive and still get our luggage, we
should...
b>
Meet just after the area where Customs spits us out.
(i.e. go through the GREEN line and then stop once you
are outside the secure zone).
c>
If Urban's friend(s) will be meeting us at the airport,
we should continue to wait here for them. If not, we
should get some cash, hop on the train, and take the
15-minute trip into town, where we will meet up with
Urban and Friend(s) at some pre-arranged point around
1pm-ish or so.
Cheers,
and good morning.
BilFish
REMEMBER
Life is like a box of chocolates — especially
in Belgium! Mmmm.
Regards,
BilFish
Editor, Belgium Today!
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