Beer and Back Again

Last week I promised a report from the cycle trip I was about to do to the part of Bavaria called Allgäu, which is roughly the area squeezed in between Augsburg in the north and the Alps in the south. Well, I lived to tell the tale of this epic round trip of sore bottoms and regional breweries. So, make yourself comfortable, open a bottle of your favourite brew, and read on.

We set off early the first day, so early, in fact, that we arrived at the first brewery ten minutes before the tap even opened - at 10am. The brewery was in the pleasant town of Tettnang, and called Kronenbrauerei, probably to distinguish it from the 187 other breweries in Germany known as, yup, Kronenbrauerei. The beers were a bit more original, a nice dark Bock and a feisty Kellerpils (unfiltered) set us nicely up for the ride to Isny where we arrived at beer o'clock.

Isny is another pleasant town, which is equivalent to saying that the brewery is easy to find. This one's called Stolz, which according to this splendid dictionary means "proud", "ego" or "boast", but probably comes from a surname rather than some elevated opinion of their own products. The Helles (light), Dunkles (dark) and the Pils we tried were all very drinkable, and in the glorious sunshine our spirits were high. This was clearly destined to be a great Easter holiday.

After meandering along some pretty straight roads for another couple of hours we arrived, not entirely accidentally, at another brewery in an obscure little village called Missen. The brewery was, despite the name of the village, impossible to miss since it occupied a very prominent spot along the hamlet's only road, imaginatively named the Hauptstrasse (that's the street, the brewery is actually called Schäffler). Here we tried both the Zwickl (unfiltered) and the Dunkles, again these were quality brews but not quite up there with the ones we enjoyed earlier in the day.

The final destination of the day was the village of Rettenberg. This place has no fewer that 4248 inhabitants and the TWO breweries brew no less than 14 MILLION litres of beer every year. That's 3300 litres per person, or about 9 litres per person, per day. Good thing they don't have to drink it all themselves, because if they did they would, according to my very accurate calculations, have more alcohol than blood in their bodies after a few months. For some strange reason, where breweries in Bavaria have tended to stay very local and/or closed down in their hundreds, these two have both grown to become big, regional players, supplying pubs, restaurants and shops all over the Allgäu. Anyway, I felt like a Norwegian in a reasonably priced beer shop as I rode into town on my two-wheeled horse with the sun setting picturesquely behind me.

With loads of work to do, we settled quickly at our comfortable guest house and headed straight out aiming for the Engelbräu brewery tap, where we arrived safely 37 seconds later. Their slogan is "the beer which is as heavenly as its name", and since this was Good Friday to boot we thought we were in for something extraordinary. We tried the Urtyp Helles and the Urtyp Dunkles, and for the first time that day I was a bit disappointed. Don't get me wrong, these were good beers, but they were nothing special. They were also served very cold, which pretty much killed the taste until late in the beer glass. After a quick dinner, we headed for the other brewery tap - Zötler - where we discovered that they offered a taster's selection of four different types in very cute 100ml glasses. The Bock and the Weizen were good, but - again - the Helles and Dunkles were simply a bit, well, too standard.

Day one was always going to be a tough act to follow. Besides, we had other things to do and places to see. Therefore, we didn't arrive at the next day's first brewery until lunch time. This was the Postbrauerei Nesselwang, situated in the village with the same name. The brewery tap had, in addition to decent Bavarian food, a "taster session" on the menu where you got to taste 4 x 300ml glasses of different beers, plus you got a little ratings sheet where you could rate the beer according to different criteria like smell (smells good: 10p, smells kinda good: 8p, smells a bit rough: 6p, smells like donkey shit: 4p), head durability, taste, bitterness and clarity. This was immense fun, and it was with great sadness we had to leave knowing that there was still several litres of excellent Bock beer available.

On the way towards Füssen (where the famous castle Neuschwanstein, clearly inspired by the Disney films, was built in the 1870s) we stopped at the Kössel-Bräu brewery, which was sadly closed for the Easter holidays, in a tiny hamlet-let called Speidel. Because of the lack of openness, we had to continue thirstily towards Füssen, where we arrived to find that all traces of the local breweries dotted around this part of the world had been wiped out by the big names (Paulaner and the like), including the town's own which closed in 2007.

On day three it was time to head north. We stopped briefly at the site of Aktienbrauerei Kaufbeuren, which looked nice enough, though we had already tried their beers before since they seem to be rather ubiquitous around the region. More interesting is the fact that smack next door lies another brewery, or rather an ex-brewery, called Rosenbrauerei. The magnificent main building stands there empty and decaying, a silent witness to the acquisitions and mergers that have killed off so many of the world's independent brewers.

Our final destination for the day was the Irsee Klosterbrauerei. This was once a monastery, then Napoleon or someone equally friendly kicked the monks out, after which the massive buildings just stood there for 170 years or so, until someone had the bright idea to start a brewery in 1970 because "the monks used to like beer". Now it's a big hotel, restaurant, beer garden, museum and brewery - all very pleasant. We methodically tried their beers and they were all good, but again served too cold. The main problem with the place was that it had somehow become a little bit fake. Everything was done very neatly and professionally to create the feeling of this being something authentic, but it was a bit overdone, and therefore didn't feel real. Actually, the main problem was their beer glasses. They had photos printed on them. They looked like postcards. I popped into the museum and saw their first generation beer glasses, from before the marketing people took an interest in such things. They were great.

The final day of this epic journey was very sunny, and we were in the delightfully named and eerily quiet village of Dirlewang before 10am. The brewery is called Hirschbräu, founded in 1806 and not much changed since by the looks of things (the website was also made in 1806 and placed over the entrance). Open during working hours only, it was firmly shut on Easter Monday, so we imagined that we were drinking one of the most local beers in Germany, and we imagined it was delicious.

Luckily, we didn't have far to go before we arrived in the town of Ottobeuren. The main feature in this town is a monastery complex so big the entire town could have fitted inside it. Or something like that. Just outside was the real surprise of the journey, namely a brewery that I didn't know about beforehand. This was because some exceedingly lovely person or persons had decided to re-open a long-closed brewery, namely the Hirsch Hausbrauerei. They now brew what proved to be my favourite beer of the entire journey, namely a complex, full-bodied Märzen which tasted so good I actually wanted to marry it, but my wife wouldn't let me.

There was still time to squeeze in a final brewery, the Kronburger Brauerei in Kronburg, where we found one of the finest beer gardens I have ever seen, appropriately packed with people enjoying the Easter sunshine and some well-brewed beers. I went for the Bock, and it was a great choice. Though it is possible I was influenced by the great weather and the atmosphere, I hereby declare it to be the second favourite of the journey - malty, full-bodied and immensely satisfying.

That was the end of the beery side of this journey, and all that remained for us was to bike home. I'd recommend a cycling trip like this to anyone who likes cycling, beer and nice scenery. I hasten to add that though this text has perhaps focussed a teeny tiny bit on the beer and brewery side of the trip, we also found time to drink some wine. And do some sight seeing in several castles and old towns. And cycle more than 300km in great weather. Now I shall rest both my liver and my legs for a few days.