What’s happening, when and where (with the odd ‘why oh why?’ thrown in)

Well, if you’re lucky enough to live in or around the beautiful yet hugely underestimated city of Norwich, it will be no surprise to you that we have some of the best real ale establishments in the land, run by extraordinary people, serving wonderful ales, many from the abundance of local breweries to be found in these parts.

But to some this has been a well kept secret – until now! The inaugural Norwich City of Ale Festival took place last May, with 31 pubs and 35 local breweries presenting a city-wide beer festival. Roger Protz opened the festival (and heaped it with praise), and Norwich was taken over by ale-trailers, beer tastings, live music, pub quizzes and a big red vintage bus!

So of course we are doing it again and at the moment are in the first stages of planning and meetings, and this blog has been designed to keep you up to date and informed.

And so…

Firstly, the £1 fee for the Festival Programme has been scrapped; it will be totally free of charge next year.

St Gregory’s Hall, the wonderful venue for the Opening Party, will play host to the City of Ale throughout the festival, and will be used as an information hub, a meeting place and a venue. Events proposed to take place at St Gregory’s include a stand-up comedy contest final, a pub quiz grand final, a political debate, live music and a fund-raising auction.

The Brewers’ Market will return at The Forum, on the first Saturday of the festival – June 2^nd.

We will be producing some promotional videos and set up a YouTube channel with the help of 3^rd year students from NUCA (Norwich University College of Arts), with the first footage being filmed at the Norwich CAMRA Beer Festival – which runs from 24^th – 29^th October (this is another reason Norwich is so wonderful – a beer festival not for the faint hearted and not to be missed!).

Perhaps one of the most interesting ideas to emerge from the meetings so far is a ‘Beer Writers Preview Weekend’ – we will invite beer writers and bloggers to the city for a weekend to be ‘wined and dined’ – or whatever the real ale equivalent is – they will be shown around our fine city, with plenty of pubs, ale and great food on the way (and then obviously tell the world how wonderful it is and to come to the festival!).

The next meeting is planned for November 3^rd.

“.. a brilliant event that has taken the enjoyment of beer on to a new plane” Roger Protz, Editor, Good Beer Guide