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Michigan Breweries July 2022 tour

Craft Brewing is booming to the point where most major cities have multiple microbreweries, brew-pubs, craft beer specialty bars, and larger nationwide distributed hometown beers. Michigan claims a major part of that revolution as Michigan's own Bells and Founders have built global followings (it is not uncommon to find Bells or Founders in bars in Europe, Asia, and Latin America (I have not personally been to Africa, Australia, or Antarctica to verify ubiquity, but it has to be close). 

This July StringGrrl and Eric did their damnedest to hit as many Michigan Breweries as we could. From Traverse City down to Saugatuck we hit the following:

In Traverse City, a Brewery tour by canoe, kayak, or SUP (stand-up paddleboard) is pretty easy to try difficult in execution if only because on the day we tried it we were operating on less than 6 hours of sleep for the weekend (Blissfest) and managed to drink enough that we needed to "Disco-nap" before attempting to drive back to Detroit Area.


If you park your ride at the Boardman Lake access you can directly paddle to Rare Bird or Right Brain in a matter of minutes. The walk from where you park to the Filling Station is a short stroll past the RR tracks. 

Filling Station Flight of mostly Pale Ales

Chose to get the Big Can of Rare Bird to drink as we paddled to Right Brain

Flight of Stouts from Right Brain

Wall of Stout, at Right Brain
Not every beer needs to be an adventure to obtain, the adventure can be limited to just the new tastes or style of beer one tries. A trip to the grocery store is about as mundane way to spend an afternoon, but if you live in Grand Rapids or Lansing areas you know that the local Horrocks Markets will have excellent beer selection in bottles, cans, and on tap. Just walk in, pick your gorceries up and walk to the bar and order a beer or three and you are in business. The bar tender said we could taste upto 3 beers per visit for free, then we picked our faves and drank them outside (with some tasty treats we bought from the grocery aisles). 
OmaKam toasts craft beers served in the BierGarten behind her local grocery store. GREAT TAPLIST

Grand Haven is home to beautiful sand beaches, ProntoPups, and Odd Side Ales. On a recent trip to Grand Haven one morning, StringGrrl and Eric made a visit to all three. The State Park was restricted the day we arrived. High winds and aggressive undercurrents made swimming in the Big Lake too dangerous and the DNR put up the red flag.Fortunately, ProntoPups and Odd Side were both open. 
Grand Haven State Park as seen from the Pier

A flight from Odd Side

The Boardwalk in Grand Haven

ProntoPups are only $1.75 each and tasty (* edit, the owner is a MAGA Nazi apparently, sorry. We choose not patronize any longer after finding that out.)

Good Beers at Oddside, a flight of mostly Sours with one Coffee beer to confuse the palette

Saugatuck Dunes and Holland's Big Lakes Brewing were the last stop of this sprint through several West Michigan Breweries and StringGrrl wraps up her tour with OmaKam and here extended set of stays in GR. 
Note to Self, when a beach has the word "dunes" in it, that translates into long walk to get to water

More Fruited and Sour Beers, this time from Big Lake

Brought some home to continue

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