The Barrie Craft Brewery Invasion, Part 1

Here they are, live and in colour, the participants of the 2018
Barrie Craft Brewery Invasion. From left, back row, that's
Hago, Josh, Joe, Candice and Paul while up front is me and
Glenn. Once again, it was a quiet, dignified affair where beers
were slowly sipped and everyone maintained their composure.
Yeah, just shitting ya. It was loud and crazy and stupid and...

Everyone has a specific skill set. With some people, yes, it is difficult to imagine what it could possibly be but the fact is we're all good at something. Could be big, could be small, could be vague, it doesn't matter. It's your skill.

With an eye to that, let's look quickly back to a year ago when I organized the Whitby Craft Brewery Invasion for seven of us. I basically told everyone, "Let's meet at Buster Rhino's Southern BBQ (in Oshawa) at 11 am. We'll eat, jump into the limo (that I had arranged), head to the future site of Brock St Brewing at, like, noon and then go to Brock St, 5 Paddles, Little Beasts and Town Brewing. So... drinking, fun, yay!" 

So there you get a sense of my organizational skills. We start at this time, we go to these four different places one after the other and then... hey, we done! Maybe not a strength. A loosey-goosey approach at best. I have that "just let it flow" sensibility. Keep this shit organic and as always, the Universe will decide how the dice eventually roll. Truth to tell, in the end, it worked out pretty damn well.

This is Alex, the second-in-command brewer at
Barnstormer Brewing and Distilling up there in
Barrie. Mark had the good fortune of greeting us
when we landed there. Why? Because the first in
command, head brewer Matt, said, "They're all
yours, dude!!" Rank, it seems, has its privilege.

But in fairness to my congratulatory self-assessment - a rented limo, four craft breweries, copious amounts of drinking, well, that's tough to screw up. In fact, you really can't.

So this year, it was decided the same Core Seven - myself, Hago, Glenn, Paul, Josh, Joe and Candice - would do Barrie. It has three craft breweries with others nearby. BUT I left all the organizing to Hago. He lives 10 minutes outside of Barrie in Angus and knows the turf all too well. I bankroll the fun (with some help from foreign investors) and he organizes it. Pretty much a winning formula.

But here's the thing. Hago, a close friend very much loved by my son, David, is a military man. Has been for a little more than a couple of decades now. Done the overseas stints, including Afghanistan just after 9-11, with the Royal Canadian Air Force. In his world, you can't "just let it flow." His world is a little more precise. Regimented, if you will.

So he told me that he was hoping to take the game outside Barrie if we could. I mean, we'd be visiting Redline Brewhouse, Barnstormer Brewing and Distilling and, of course, Flying Monkeys Brewing in Barrie. He wanted to add Muskoka Brewing in Bracebridge and Sawdust City Brewing in Gravenhurst.

That's me, my older Uncle Glenn (the family shame)
and my younger bro Josh in our sweet ride that went
from brewery to brewery in Barrie, Bracebridge and
Gravenhurst on Saturday, December 8 - a year less a
day after the Whitby Craft Brewery Invasion. That's
a Brock St. Chocolate Milk Stout we are sharing and,
yes, my Ugly Mov is blue. The beer was damn tasty!

My response? "Go nuts, brother." And that's precisely what he did... in a very military way. So we soon all had Hago's itinerary in our hands (via social media). It read:
"2018 Barrie Craft Beer Invasion:
1130-1300 - Barnstormer Beer
1400-1545 - Muskoka Brewery
1600-1700 - Sawdust City Beer
1845-2045 - Redline Brewhouse
2200 - Flying Monkeys Brewery"

I laughed because I thought, besides Hago, I was likely the only other who knows military time. Our beer store schedule has to be entered into the computer that way and then it quickly converts to civilian time. I've had to explain it dozens of times to younger coworkers trying to write a schedule.

Hago walked me through it privately. He wanted to start with lunch at Barnstormer because he felt they had the strongest food component and you need to pad your stomach for a day like this. This is true. After all, they started a few years back as Barnstormer Brewing and Pizzeria. Their stone-baked pizza is legendary. The next two stops were out of town so we could come back to Barrie where we were all registered at the Four Points Sheraton hotel. End the fun and games closer to home. Makes sense. But this gives you a sense of his organizing skills.

It's the damnedest thing. Barnstormer does NOT sell this
sexy-ass IPA glass in its retail but they do use it in their
restaurant. So how did it end up in Oakville with me?
Clearly, someone stuck it in my parka pocket without my
knowledge. This I swear to you, Barnstormer, I will find
the culprit and punish him accordingly. By Odin's beard!

He had breaks built in, traveling time, the whole nine yards (hey, there's an Air Force reference right there.) Hago leaves nothing to chance, much less the Universe.

So we all met at our hotel at 11 am, everyone coming from different directions. We all did the greet-and-hug and waited for our ride to show up. It did - a humongous black GMC Yukon XL with Hago in the passenger seat and our driver for the day, Dan, behind the wheel. Dan is an Air Force buddy of Hago's, who apparently has the patience to deal with seven drunk people in a confined space.

I settled up quickly with Dan, figuring if I paid him upfront, he couldn't back down halfway through the trip after he realized how annoying we can be. Without tipping my hand as to the foreign investors, I paid Dan in rubles, explaining that given the political reality south of the Canadian border, they would probably be considered American currency soon enough. But this isn't about politics. It's about five stellar Ontario craft breweries! Moving along, then...

Young Josh, Durham's Carpenter of the Year, took this
picture after we landed at Barnstormer. As you can see,
the weather in Barrie tends to be on the snowy side...

So as I earlier noted, Barnstormer Brewery and Distilling (they make booze, too) was Destination #1. Once inside, we were greeted by Alex, the number two brewer there behind head brewer Matt Polowyk. Being as he had to deal with us, I told Alex I would promote him in this space as the new head brewer. He had a huge table/booth set aside and happily hung with us the entire time to answer any and all questions.

He explained to Joe what "barnstorming" actually was. After World War One ended, the American government found itself with a surplus of Curtiss JN-4 biplanes (double-winged). While they cost the government $5,000 per to build during the war, they were selling them off as cheaply as $200. So former military pilots and even civilians were snatching them up and subsequently ended up doing aerial tricks with them. "They would take you up in the plane," Alex explained, "and show you all the land around your area. But often, they would pretend they were going to dive-bomb your barn before pulling up." Hence, barnstorming. My question for Alex may have been a little tougher, mind you.

Glenn and Hago, who organized the 2018 Barrie Craft
Brewery Invasion, share a laugh at Barnstormer where
we had our lunch (read: padded our stomachs for the
oncoming deluge of tasty craft beer we'd be knocking
back over the course of the afternoon and evening.) 

You see, back in January, after an extensive Q&A with marketing manager Brad Ariss (who has since moved onto other things), I wrote a piece about how their 1940s pin-up girl logo Barnstormer Betty, deemed by some as sexist, was being phased out. While the logo has been effectively changed across the board to the cool aviation one you see on my glass above and Alex's hoodie below, Betty is still visible around the restaurant walls. Not over-abundantly so but definitely not retired, either. (In all honesty, I should point out that when Barnstormer retweeted my piece, a number of locals and other fans defended Betty, calling her harmless nostalgia rather than sexist imagery.)

That's still the plan, Alex told me, but the logo swap was the biggest concern and was dealt with nearly immediately. After all, it adorns all their merchandise, meaning Barnstormer Betty glasses, for instance, (I have one) are now collector's items. Redesigning the cans is taking more time, he noted. The thing is Betty was (still is) only on a few of their cans to start with but... one of them is their biggest seller, Flight Delay IPA. I suspect the Flight Delay redesigns Brad sent me have fallen to the wayside so we'll see.

Barnstormer brewer Alex and our own Josh pose for a
picture during our stop. Alex was pretty much the most
gracious and entertaining host our group could have
possibly asked for. A quick smile and TONS of little,
funny stories, he had us all smiling at the same time. 

That said, the logo is the face of the brewery you put out there - it's on all their sales reps' cards, after all - and that has the cool aviation theme. The cans... perhaps there's still a ways to go.

But Alex is a brewer and all of those concerns are decisions for the higher-ups to make so I very much applaud him for gamely tackling it - he really is an upfront, friendly dude. And he made sure our stay was both fun and memorable.

While someone else took our food order and the place was doing a pretty brisk business, Alex had to step up and be our drinks waiter. Something very much outside his usual routine, I suspect. But man, he stepped up. He wisely only took a few orders at a time - a couple of flight paddles were involved - but pulled it all off beautifully. (Looking back, I hope we didn't come off as the same kind of demanding, self-entitled pricks I hate as customers at the Beer Store because... ouch.)

But after we were finished eating and padding our stomachs for our afternoon drink-fest, Alex came back with a special treat - a beautifully smoked, deep, rich barrel-aged stout from the deepest, darkest recesses of the brewery. Holy cannoli, that was some tasty. And very warming. Alex, huge thank you from all of us. You kick-started our day perfectly!

Here the Barrie Brew Crue lands at Muskoka Brewing in
Bracebridge last Saturday. At this point in our journey, we
are still pretty well-behaved as the drinking had just begun.

Okay, from Barnstormer, we hopped on Highway 11 North, destination Bracebridge to visit our friends at Muskoka Brewing. Turns out we could not have landed on a better day as the brewery was hosting its annual Winter Village, whereby dozens of local artisans set up throughout the brewery with their crafts, home-made food and any number of potential Christmas gifts. I gotta tell you, it made wandering through the brewery just that much more festive and cozy. Gave the day a real sense of the community up there, which, in turn, as visitors (tourists even) gave us an idea of what living there is like. Neighbourly certain comes to mind, as does warmth on a very chilly day.

We all scattered in different directions once inside - well, after I got my Mad Tom IPA first, of course. Eventually, after stopping at pretty much every booth in there and talking to as many people as I could (some of them were small local businesses, others simply individuals with a skill), I eventually found the Barrie Brew Crue in a corner near the brewery's booth.

The camera around Hago's neck actually belongs to Muskoka's
Digital Marketing Specialist, Sarah Girdwood, the lady on the
left. After hearing that Hago taught a Photography course at
CFB Borden outside Barrie, she lent him her camera and said
come back with three pictures. I saw them. One was the typical
artsy-fartsy photo but two were great portrait shots of Sarah.

At a nearby table was Sarah Girdwood, the brewery's Digital Marketing Specialist. So Sarah, as such, is also the social media person for the brewery.

When I started chatting with her, she mentioned that she had originally started at Lake of Bays Brewing, just up the highway in Baysville.

"Oh yeah?" I told her, "(Lake of Bays sales rep) Tim Glazin is a buddy of mine through the Beer Store."

She laughed and replied, "We used to call him Grlazin' Donuts." Gotta be a play on his last name because believe me, Tim is a regular size dude, more into classic cars than doughnuts. That said, I'll bet he's somewhat proficient at spinning donuts in the snow with a classic ride.

But since I had Sarah caught at her booth, I turned on the voice recorder in my phone and tried to pin her down on a long-time Muskoka Brewing mystery. I asked her point-blank, "Are you the person who writes the comments in the Mad Tom Twitter account?"

Sarah made sure no one in the Barrie Brew Crue
walked out empty-handed, gifting us all with a
Muskoka Winter Survival Pack, a new glass and
an Ebb & Flow Session Sour, which had just been
released. Always cool to get a brand-new beer!!

You see, the @MuskokaMadTom Twitter account is famous (infamous, some might say) for its snarly, belligerent and blunt responses to Ontario craft beer drinkers. Always in capital letters, too, so you, of course, get that sense of both being yelled at and scolded. He's a cantankerous old fart, that Mad Tom - the original "You kids get off my damn lawn!" guy. So naturally on Twitter, Hago and I poke the Mad Tom Twitter bear as much as possible with a sharp, pointy stick.

Sarah hummed and hawed at first before finally noting with a big smile, "I cannot reveal that at this time for secrecy issues. If he knew I revealed his identity, he would beat me with a stick." (It always comes down to a stick up there in northern Ontario.)

After short deliberations, Hago and I decided that, no, Sarah was far too hospitable to be Mad Tom. That was soon verified after I posted the question on Twitter. Mad Tom himself was quick to reply: "JUST WHAT I NEED, AN IMPOSTER. THE CLOSEST I'D GET TO YOU BUFFOONS IS NEVER. CAN'T WAIT TO BURN YOUR STUPID ARTICLE." Well, okey dokey, then. I mean, it's online but if you want to light your smartphone or laptop on fire, then go right ahead. And if someone could video that?

As I am the only smoker - correction: make that cigarette smoker - in the
Barrie Brew Crue, I found myself outside for smoke breaks. Fortunately,
Muskoka Brewery knows how to keep us smokers warm with their cozy
fire-pits. Something about this just says, hey man, you're up north now!

After reading that, Glenn replied, "Yeah, no way that can be Sarah. She's going to LOVE our stupid articles."

Anyways, much like Alex at Barnstormer, we wanna give Sarah huge props for being such a great host at Sawdust City and keeping us entertained. (Amazing how easy that is when you have beer on hand.)

Next up in Part Two, hopefully tomorrow as I'm starting it now but also day-drinking, is our continuing journey to Sawdust City Brewing in Gravenhurst, then back to Barrie for Redline Brewhouse and finally the nightcap at industry legend, Flying Monkeys Brewing. But Scooby Doo Gang, that's it, that's all and I am outta here. Until tomorrow, I remain...