Beer Town Austin

The second Saint Arnold Austin Pub Crawl was F-R-E-S-H fresh! New bars. New format. New pint glass.

After the success of the first crawl, Saint Arnold implemented a format similar to the one they use in Houston (I think?), allowing us to visit the first three bars in any order. It worked. I don’t think I waited in line longer than a minute or two.

We decided to head east first to the Liberty Bar and get our punch cards. It was fairly sparse when we arrived, but not long after our friends showed up, we noticed the line slowly growing. Then this guy joined up with us. I think it was a strategic move on his part so he could copy and paste our account of the night.

In addition to the reliable Saint Arnold Amber, all the bars had the “award winning” Summer Pils on tap. I admit I did not have any of this last summer. For me, pils are a “right place, right time” beer. This was the time and the place. I pretty much stuck to it the rest of the night. Outside on the patio the flies were after our beer faster than we were so we hit the road pretty quickly.

On our way west we took a detour at No. 19 Bus, a double decker food bus. We fueled up on Chicago dogs and free Live Oak HefeWeizen. If you’re in this part of town I suggest you check it out.

We made our way under 35 to the Texas Embassy (probably my least favorite stop) where Lennie Ambrose, Saint Arnold’s Events and Marketing guy, was meeting crawlers as they headed downstairs. In addition to the Saint Arnolds, I spotted Independence’s Stash IPA. Good to see this making it’s way into more places; it’s tasty (one may or may not have snuck into my cup).

We had to make the third stop before 9:00 p.m., so with little time to waste it was off to Side Bar. This place was dark. I liked it. I could see myself drinking some Lone Star here if I ended up near 6th Street. With more Pils in our bellies, it was off to Shangri-La to claim our pints.

We ran into Saint Arnold’s Austin/San Antonio beer man Frank Mancuso passing out the glasses (no short supply this time).  It’s always nice to chat with Frank. If you haven’t met him at an in-store tasting, beer party or the Ginger Man, you just aren’t getting out enough.

All in all it was a good evening. We heard about 350 people partook in the event. Shangri-La had good energy and none of the early bars were all that crowded, but it may have been because we started on the east side (word was Side Bar was hit kind of hard early).

Thanks to the Saint Arnold crew for putting on another fun event. There was talk they may try to do these with the release of every season. If that’s the case, I can’t wait for Oktoberfest!