Home-Metalman Sgt. Pepper

This saison from the Waterford brewery, Metalman, is spiced with sage and white pepper to give it an extra savory spicy kick. It pours a clear gold color with a fluffy 1 finger white head out of the can. The aroma on this beer is very intense and diverse. Immediately you get the sage along with a slight sweetness, some peppery spice, and even a little white grapey. The flavor follows similarly, but has a little less depth as the sage takes over in dominant fashion. It has a very herbal, spicy flavor with just a hint of grainy maltiness. It has a nice mouthfeel which isn't cloying, but has enough body to hold up with the heavy spicing.

Overall, this beer is very savory, almost like you accidentally spilled some kitchen spices in your beer, and by the end, it is a bit overwhelming and you are very ready for it to be over. Essentially it is spiced way to heavily for my taste, but I am a believer that any spices should be there but not in the foreground. If you want a beer that really tastes like sage then give this one a try, but if you are looking for just a hint of sage on a nice saison, maybe look somewhere else. An interesting concept, but just taken too far.

the Gasworks-Galway Bay Buried at Sea

Finally had a chance to make it to another one of the Galway Bay bars. This time I was at the Gasworks, which had much more of a restaurant feel than the Beer Market, which felt more like a hangout spot. Nevertheless, still a great place with 26 beers on tap, an impressive bottle selection, and even a hand pump for cask ale. I will definitely be back here soon to try some of their other amazing beers.

While it was a tough decision, I decided to go with one of the house beers, a milk chocolate stout, and I'm glad I did. It pours a brownish black color with no light coming through and a 1 finger bubbly receding brown head. The aroma is nice with coffee and chocolate coming out strong and no burnt grain astringency. The flavor is excellent very chocolatey and sweet with a rich luscious filling mouthfeel that turns creamy on the back end leaving your mouth with a lingering sweetness, but it doesn't become unpleasant at all.  This is a great milk stout, really excellent and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a sweeter chocolatey stout.

Home-5 Lamps Brewing the Liberties

This Irish beer, styled after a British Bitter, poured a deep gold color with a thin 1/2 finger fluffy white head, which actually had great retention and lacing as the beer progressed. It has a caramely, bready, floral, spicy aroma, which all comes together very nicely. The flavor starts out really well with a crackery malt character that shifts into a nice breadiness and ale fruitiness. There isn't a lot of distinguishable hop flavor, but there does seem to be a little bit more there than just the malts. it finishes nice and dryly with a bitterness that isn't really bitter, but is definitely not sweet, so it leaves you wanting more. Overall this is a tasty everyday beer and very enjoyable.

Our second day of the tour started bright and early with a carriage ride through Killarney National Park where our guide pointed out to us much of the local plants and animals, including the herd of red deer which roam the park with little regard for humans as there is no hunting allowed inside. This was a really enjoyable hour long ride and allowed you to take in a lot of the scenery in the interior of the park where cars are not allowed.

We next made our way to the town of Dingle, famous for being the place with the most pubs per capita in all of Ireland. It was a cute little fishing village with lots of restaurants and pubs along the waterfront. We had a few hours here, so Becky and I roamed the town before sitting down to a nice lunch and going into all the little tourist shops around.

After Dingle we made our way onto the Dingle Peninsula, which had similar views and roads unfortunately as the Ring of Kerry. Again we were blown away by the incredible scenery on the frequent photo stops. Additionally, we got stalled briefly when two cars tried to go in opposite directions, but reached a jam due to the roads being too narrow to accommodate any maneuvering around. This was finally solved after one car had to drive in reverse for a couple minutes until they reached a stretch of road wide enough where both could fit.

This two day tour was absolutely incredible and I am glad we saved it for our last trip around the island because it truly lived up to its reputation as the most beautiful place in Ireland.

Courtney's-Craft Beer of Kerry

This past weekend Becky and I took a 2 day Paddywagon tour to the Ring of Kerry and Dingle Peninsula down in the Southwest of Ireland, bordering the Atlantic. We overnighted in Killarney and found a pretty good beer bar in the city. They had a few decent taps, but also an extensive bottle list. It was a decently crowded place, but you could still have a nice conversation. I decided to get the flight which was 3, 7oz pours of local craft beers.

The first beer was Crean's Lager from the Dingle Brewing Company. It pours a crystal clear straw color with a clean malty aroma. When I took a sip I was very surprised at the mouthfeel. It had a surprising amount of body for a pale lager and filled the mouth pleasantly. It has a grainy pilsner malt flavor that finishes cleanly. It has your classic clean lager finish, and overall was a very enjoyable lager. The mouthfeel really did it for me, and this beer is probably one of the better lagers I've ever had.

Next was a blonde ale from Killarney Brewing Company. It has a light gold color, barely darker than the Crean's. It has a malty slightly fruity ale aroma. The taste is nice and light with a yeasty fruitiness which keeps it light in the mouth. There is also some sweet maltiness and a hint of wheat doughy graininess in the flavor. This is a decent sessionable beer, which makes this beer a potential gateway beer for some people.

The final beer was Killarney Brewing Company's IPA. It has a red color and smells strongly of oranges. While the aroma is on the sweeter side of citrus, the flavor is much more on the grapefruity citrus side with a strong resiny flavor developing in the mid palate. In addition to the hop flavors, there is some caramely sweetness, but that doesn't stop the beer from finishing dryly, but it is not bitter. This IPA was pretty middle of the road, and lacked intensity, but was still a pretty good drinking beer.

The first day of our weekend started out very early in the morning and with a long drive al the way across Ireland. We stopped first in Killarney and had a few minutes to walk around the town before setting off on the Ring of Kerry. Killarney has about 3 main streets, which makes this tiny town very navigable, but even though it is small it has a good amount of shops, restaurants, pubs, etc. As we made our way onto the Ring, the roads got even worse than the typical narrow bumpy Irish roads. In light of the nauseating drive, the views of the Atlantic were spectacular. There are cliffs on one side and beautiful ocean on the other. Along the way there are a variety of scenic stops, and at most of these, locals bring along crafts to sell, but some even bring some lambs for people to pick up and pet, which was a blast. The ride around takes the whole afternoon, but is really spectacular, and the Ring of Kerry is credited with having the most scenic views on the whole island.

The tail end of the drive takes you through the Killarney National Park with scenic views of lakes nestled in the mountains and the Torq waterfall, nestled in a green wonderland. That night in Killarney we had a decent dinner at a sports bar, which was good for the price before making our way to Courtney's and some fresh handmade ice cream to cap off the night.

Home-8° Big River

Described as a Tasmanian IPA, this beer is loaded with hops from New Zealand. It pours a light gold color with a voluminous 2 finger dense white head. The aroma is full of sweet hopiness, tropical fruits, marshmallows, mandarin oranges, and pineapple. This aroma is practically a fruit salad mixed with a slight grassiness. The taste is similar, but some of the sweeter flavors fall away to make room for a pronounced grassiness and fruity flavor. This beer finished nice and dryly and has a nice mouthfeel for a hoppy beer, light and crisp, but not watery at all. This being the second hoppy beer from 8° Brewing that I have enjoyed is a great sign that they know what they're doing, especially with the hops, and if I was looking for another super tasty, drinkable, hoppy beer, I would be happy to try one of theirs again.

Home-To ØL Let Maelk

This session milk stout is somewhat special because of the people who make it. To ØL is a pair of Danish guys who instead of brewing the beer themselves, design recipes and have them brewed at other breweries throughout the world. Many in the beer community have given "beer architects" the derogatory name of gypsy brewers because they don't have their own facilities. With that being said they alongside another famous brewer of this type Mikkeller have been well regarded for the quality of their recipes and some of their incredible experimental brews.

This beer pours an opaque black with a lasting 1 finger brown head. The aroma is primarily of coffe and burnt grain roastiness. The flavor is not quite what you expect from a milk stout because it lacks the characteristic sweetness that sticks around in the mouth long after you've had your sip. It starts with a dry burnt grain taste, with only a hint of lactose sweetness on the back end, mellowing out those roasted notes and slightly prolonging the finish. Used in this fashion, the lactose takes on a different character, and instead of contributing a pronounced flavor, the subtlety of it here slightly adjusts the common stout flavors to create something more drinkable and less astringent. Overall, this beer tastes not nearly as sweet as your average milk stout, and might take you by surprise if you come in expecting a load of lactose.

This past weekend, Becky and I went on the final school-sponsored field trip to the Cliffs of Moher. We were fortunate enough to have a sunny clear day, giving us spectacular views out onto the ocean and of the Cliffs below our feet. Even though the drive was long, I understand why this is one of the top tourist attractions in all of Ireland.

Doheny & Nesbitt-Wicklow Wolf American Amber

Back at Doheny's again for another pint. This time I went on a Friday, and it was very packed, and I barely managed to find a seat tucked away in a corner of the pub.

This beer pours an orangish red with a 1 finger dense white head. There is a light fruity aroma on the beer followed by some maltiness. It has a bit of hop flavor before turning caramely in taste, but it never turns sweet because of the firm bitterness in this amber. It has a medium-light body that drinks fairly well. If you like a bitter amber ale this one is a good one to try, but if you tend to want them sweeter, you might not find this one to your liking. Personally, I thought this was pretty tasty, but by the end of this the bitterness was starting to get to me a little bit as I'm not to used to my amber ales having such a hop flavor and bite. That being said this is by no means an IPA in terms of bitterness, just more than your typical amber ale, which gives a nod to the American nature of the style.

Irish Craft Brews

For my birthday this year, Becky got me the incredible opportunity to go to a variety of beer bars in Dublin, sampling Irish craft brews with a real brewer here. It was an amazing night, I learned a lot, and today I'm going to share with you some of the cool beer bars around town and the great beers I had there.

The first bar we went to was the Beerhouse. It offers an inviting atmosphere and offers some great beer and pizza deals. This is the kind of place you want to go to really enjoy a well crafted pint, but still have a fun casual atmosphere.

The beer is 8° Mandarina Bavaria, a single hop IPA featuring this relatively new German hop of the same name. This orangish gold beer has a nice 1 finger head. The flavor is grassy, pineappley, and little bit like sweet oranges, maybe even mandarin oranges where this hop gets its namesake. Additionally, this beer had a slightly buttery aroma, but it was not out of place with the beer. The flavor is not quite as sweet as the aroma, leaning more towards a slight grapefruitiness while still keeping that sweeter mandarin orange quality. This beer was absolutely delicious, and packed in a lot of flavor, which just goes to show that if you showcase a great ingredient properly, you can come out with an incredible beer that tastes much more complex than the recipe. A perfect start to the great evening.

The next stop on the list was the Porterhouse, on of the older brewpubs in Dublin today, which just recently celebrated its 20th birthday last year. It has a great atmosphere, with bottles from around the world lining glass display cases throughout the restaurant. Additionally, they have a variety of their own beers, guest taps, and even a beer engine with some tempting cask ale. 

The beer we got there was their standard Plain Porter. While I have reviewed this beer before at home, it has a completely different experience and flavor profile on draught. The aroma has much more fruitiness like raisins or dark berries mixed in with the coffee. Being poured on nitro adds an additional dimension, making the beer creamier and rounding out the flavors much more effectively. The flavor is also a bit fruitier like berries or raisins again to add some complexity to the coffee and burnt grain flavors I previously found. It has a nice dry finish, making this an excellent example of a Dry Irish Stout. Definitely worth getting on draught at this amazing brewpub that really cares about its beers.

Our third stop on the list was the Bull & Castle, a fancy steakhouse, with an impressive draught lineup. As soon as you walk in it has a much fancier vibe. There are candles on many of the tables, it is dimly lit, and the dress code for the bartenders indicates to you that this is a fine steakhouse.

This beer was Rollover Session IPA by Whiplash. It has a very tropical smell with loads of mango and is a crazy hazy juicy beer. However, when you do drink it, it has a much maltier flavor than you might expect. Of course, I still wouldn't describe it as malty because the flavor is still loaded with tropical pineapple hop flavors. The finish on this beer is crisp and somewhat dry, making it very enjoyable and the best beer of the night. Absolutely delicious with loads of flavor jammed into a small package.

The final beer of the evening was enjoyed at the Beer Market, a beer bar owned by the Galway Bay brewery. Including an impressive selection of their own beers available nowhere else. They also have many others from all over the world, giving everyone an opportunity to find a beer they will enjoy. 

Galway Bay's Touching the Scald is a brown porter that does indeed pour a very chestnut brown color, much lighter in color than most porters. There is loads of coffee in the aroma, but also a slight nuttiness. The flavor has those coffee flavors, but also brings in a lot of roasted burnt grain flavors. It is slightly astringent, but not to the point where it becomes unpleasant. It didn't have a huge body, which made it a nice beer to end the night with. It was full of complex flavor, but still quite drinkable.

I hope you enjoyed hearing about all these different beer bars around Dublin, and if you are visiting here definitely give them a try. While whenever you think of Ireland, you think of Guinness, there is a lot more out there. Ireland has a growing craft beer scene full of interesting styles and tastes for everyone. I'd encourage everyone to step outside the typical Irish option and try something from one of the cool local breweries.

Slainte!

Home-Kinnegar Rustbucket

This rye ale pours a hazy orange almost apricoty color  with a strong 1 finger head. It has a very fruity aroma of pineapple, pear, and apple, with some floral and grassy notes mixed in. When you drink it you get a very fruity pineappley taste with a bit on rye spice and tanginess. Another flavor I tasted more strongly as the beer warmed up was a caramely toffee like flavor. Additionally, this beer has a very slick mouthfeel that almost slides down your tongue before finishing in a moderately bitter fashion. This beer is pretty enjoyable, and is a good example of how rye can give a very slick mouthfeel, but it doesn't have that much rye in the flavor or aroma otherwise, just a hint. Additionally, the nice hoppy aroma is pleasant, but probably distracts from some of the spicy rye aromas that could be found if the hops were less present. I would probably classify this as a rye pale ale instead of a rye ale, just so the consumer knows that it is relatively hoppy.

About a week ago, Becky and I took a tour of the Boyne Valley, an often overlooked area by tourists, and it was a lot of fun. We first went to the Hill of Tara, the place where the kings of Ireland sat in ancient times. This grassy hill has a figure 8 shape carved into the top with one half being the coronation site for the kings and the other being where they lived. Our next stop was the Anglo-Norman Trim castle, made famous for its use in the movie Braveheart. This castle is very well preserved as is the surrounding wall and moat, originally designed for its protection. We next made our way to Loughcrew, the site of a 5000 year old passage tomb, and you get a chance to go inside. This site is a bit more primitive compared to the more famous Newgrange, but the views from the top cannot be beat. All you see for miles are tree lined farms, hills full of sheep, and small villages nestled here and there. Afterwards, we made our way to Monasterboice for the best examples of Celtic high crosses, ornately decorated with biblical scenes, used by monks to share the faith with the illiterate indigenous population. Our last stop on the long day was in the medieval town of Drogheda, which has fallen on a bit of a slump as of late, but still has some interesting shops and sites, including the mummified head of Saint Oliver Plunkett. Overall, it was a very enjoyable tour and nice to see some historical sites often missed by the crowds of tourists.

Home-Whiplash Farami

This coffee oatmeal stout pours jet black with a one and a half finger dark head. The aroma has lots of coffee, a little nutty, and has a minerally quality similar to black olives. As soon as you drink it, the first thing you notice is the big mouthfeel. It is very thick and chewy, and you definitely get a strong contribution from the oats used in the brew. The flavor starts roasty up front, developing into a bakers chocolate flavor that is slightly smoky too. On top of that, the coffee builds until it has a very strong, rich coffee taste in the finish. This beer is big and full-bodied, but doesn't finish in a cloying manner, but quite nicely actually. Overall, it is somewhat like a mocha with a bit of that oat chewiness up front. It was a very enjoyable beer, and one of my favorites of my time in Ireland thus far.

Raspberry Beers

Today we have another battle of the beers. This time, they are not exactly the same style, but both have lots of raspberries included in the brew. One beer is Boon's Framboise, a lambic from Belgium, and the other is Founder's Rubaeus from America.

The framboise is a very wine colored beer with a thin, dissipating, pinkish head. There is lots of raspberry on the aroma, but also a bit of cherry. Additionally, there is a bit of oak on the nose, combined with a hint of fresh meringue. The flavor is pretty tart and has a decently strong woody bitterness. It has a fairly light body, nowhere near as thick as the Lindemans version, and the raspberry in the flavor primarily comes through in the tartness. Overall, this beer essentially tastes like red wine, especially with the fruity, woody character in the flavor. If you gave this beer to someone in a wine glass, chances are they would not even consider that it was beer.

Founder's Rubaeus on the other hand, is quite different. It pours a bright, pinkish red with a thin dissipating pink head. It smells like raspberry bonbons, or some other raspberry flavored candy. Additionally, it has a bit of a medicinal cough syrup quality to the raspberry character. While the aroma is interesting, it is in the flavor that things definitely turn towards the worse. It has a very strong cough syrup like taste that sticks in your mouth. There is also a bitter raspberry taste in there, making this beer extremely unpleasant. I even considered dumping it down the drain after a few sips. It is overly sweet, medicinal, and frankly a bad example of what raspberry can do to a brew.

As you might assume, the Belgian wins by a landslide because it was a semi-enjoyable beer with depth of flavor and not too over the top in any one area. The Founders on the other hand was horrible, and if anyone sees it in stores, I highly recommend against purchasing it.

Bestia-Hedon Helmut Buza

Our third night in Budapest, we made our way to this amazing bar/restaurant, located practically at the footsteps of St. Stephens. The service here was phenomenal, they had a strong beer menu, and even a variety of craft cocktails available too. Unfortunately this is the kind of place where you wish you had a reservation, for we ended up at the bar for dinner, but we did get to watch the bartenders make some crazy concoctions, which added to the fun as well. Here, I got the traditional goulash, which was pretty tasty, and although it was intended as more of an appetizer, it ended up being enough, for I need room for the chimney cakes later.

This Bavarian style wheat beer. had a very refreshing weissbeer smell. There was a nice banana smell, as well as some spiciness which could be a mix of noble hops and some of the yeast phenolics. This beer has a very soft mouthfeel, which opens with a nice banana flavor before developing into a bready wheat flavor, finishing slightly sweet.. It was a very refreshing beer, and although it had a big mouthfeel from the wheat, it still felt fairly light bodied and went down very easily. The only disappointing thing about this tasty brew was its head retention, or lack thereof. While it may have been fine, had it not been a wheat beer, but something of this style should really have a much nicer long lasting head. Nevertheless, I love this beer and would get it again.

The our second full day started with a trip to the Terror Haze, a museum detailing the vicious rule of both Nazi inspired parties and the Communists in Hungary. This sobering place is incomplete without the audio guide because there is very little signage in the museum. Plan to be shocked by the atrocities, but the museum is well worth your time and was one of the best museums I have been in.

Next we made our way to Hero Square, a plaza built to celebrate the thousandth anniversary of Hungary and the Magyars. Nearby is a park and the Szechenyi Baths.

Our last morning in Budapest was spent wandering around the Parliament building, searching for souvenirs, walking the main shopping street, and eating more Chimney Cakes before our flight home to Dublin. Budapest was an incredible way to cap off this massive trip, and I am happy to say that I have finally finished detailing it for you.

Shortly, I will have a host of new Irish beers and others up that I have had the chance to drink while I was busy posting all about the trip. Some day I will be all caught up.

Cheers!

Jonas Craft Beer House-Reketye LAB

That same night at Jonas Craft Beer House, I got to try one of the weirdest styles of beer around, the Gose. These salty sour beers make the ultimate drinkable summer beer, so long as you aren't to confused as to how something that tastes this is still beer.

It poured a hazy straw color with a frothy white head and has a very distinct Play-Doh aroma (never thought I would say that about a beer). Additionally, it smells a little buttery, bready, grassy, and a bit like green olives. Sure enough, when I got to the taste, it was salty and sour. It is slightly puckery, but not overly sour by any means. The saltiness lingers throughout and, once you get used to it, becomes quite pleasant. To finish, it is very dry and refreshing, although, if you had just been randomly handed this beer without being warned on the saltiness, you would be very surprised indeed.

Our first full day in Budapest opened with a trip to a coffee shop not too far from our hostel called Espresso Embassy. This place is slightly hisptery, but not pretentious at all, and the coffee was excellent. They served your standard cafe drinks, but also had a few pourover options as well, which really drew me to the place.

Afterwards, we made our way to the ornate St. Stephen's Basilica, one of the crowning jewels of the city. The ornate exterior is absolutely beautiful and makes you just want to sit there a while and take it all in. Furthermore, they have the mummified hand of St. Stephen himself for those interested at a peek.

Our busy day next took us to Buda Castle for some of the best views of the Danube, although it is a little easy to get lost up there while trying to get to the top, or on your way down. At this point in the day we were also realizing how large of a city Budapest is. While you can walk it, be prepared for quite a bit of exercise, and the hot temperatures really drained us a bit too. After the castle, I, in need of some serious sunscreen, led us on what felt like a wild goose chase to find some. No grocery stores had it, and when we finally found a pharmacy, they only had the expensive medicated kind. Unfortunately, I had to stomach the only high cost of Budapest and buy my primo sunscreen.

As it was getting on towards lunch, we made our way to the Central Market Hall, which has butchers, veggie farmers, and spice dealers on the bottom floor, and souvenirs and ready to eat food on the next floor. The food aisle was very crowded and seats were hard to come by. Eventually, we both got some tasty Hungarian lunches. While this place may sound nice in tourist videos, I really did not enjoy it that much and the upper floor especially felt like a bit of a tourist trap.

Next, we summited Gellert Hill, reaching the citadel at the top in good time for some more excellent views of the whole city. On top there are even a few stands selling local treats or handmade crafts and purses. One could probably walk around on top of the hill for a long time, but we were ready and eager to make our way to the Gellert Baths, which I talked about in my last post.

After the baths, we made our way to a Thai restaurant, which like everything in Budapest, offered such value at shockingly low prices. Even funnier is that when we got there, we saw a picture hanging on the wall with Matt Damon, so if anything we can say we ate at the same restaurant as him (even if he was there a long time before we arrived). To finish out the long day, we made our way to Jonas to try some delicious beers.

Jonas Craft Beer House-Reketye Repeta

Jonas Craft Beer House is a unique location, situated essentially inside a mall along the Danube River in Budapest. It is dark with lights hung around the place, and while it has music playing it isn't too loud to enjoy your conversation. Additionally, the bar serves beers almost entirely from one brewery, Reketye, which share the same owner. They also have a wide variety of handmade sodas and craft cocktails as well.

This American Pale Ale pours a crystal clear orangish gold color. It has a very strong aroma of some sweet citrus and a bit of pine. Another interesting note was that it had a slight spicy solventy aromas, which I remembered well from a homebrew I made with a lot of East Kent Goldings hops, but you can never really know for sure if that is what they used as well. The beer enters the mouth very lively with notes of grapefruit peel and pine. Again that solventy spicy taste appears, and the beer overall finishes with a good strong bitterness. I really loved the mouthfeel on the beer because it is so drinkable and crisp, which is the way I generally like my hoppy beers.

One of the highlights of Budapest are its many thermal baths, and over the course of our stay there, Becky and I visited three of these. Day 1 was the Kiraly baths. They are the oldest of the baths, and the smallest. It looks very sketchy from the outside and very rough around the edges, but you forget all of that as soon as you make it into the bath area. A strong sulfur smell fills the air along with steam rising from the thermal pools. It has one main circular pool which has pretty warm water. Flanking it are a very hot pool and a freezing cold one. Furthermore there are a couple of saunas and a steam room, thick as pea soup. Here too, because it was the cheapest of all the baths, we got massages which definitely released a lot of the tension that builds up after having to carry our heavy packs around often. When we finally left the place, I felt like I was floating and incredible relaxed.

The next day was the Gellert Baths, the most expensive of the 3. It features a more well lit interior and a much larger area. It has a large swimming pool area and two separate rooms of thermal baths. Each thermal room has two big pools, one warm, the other very warm to almost hot. Additionally, there is a steam room and a freezing cold bath. Gellert also has an outside area with a wave pool, which unfortunately was out of season when we were there, as well as a warm pool. It also has a traditional Finnish Sauna, which is extremely hot, and a freezing cold pool to dunk yourself in upon exiting the sauna. While the interior of Gellert was prettier, the size made it kind of easy to get lost, and with the wave pool being closed, it was not worth the additional cost.

The final one was the Szechenyi Baths, the most popular for tourists. It has a swimming pool, and two outdoor thermal pools, but one was mysteriously drained, resulting in only one warm but very crowded outside pool. The inside had many many different pools, but only a few different temperatures, which for me defeated the purpose of having so many different rooms. It had tons of saunas and steam rooms throughout the place, but most were crowded too. The inside also had a distinct hot dog smell, which was very off-putting and ruined much of the experience.

Kiraly costs 1/3 of either Gellet of Szechenyi, and at that rate was definitely the best value. The other two did not add enough to make it worth the extra fee. Additionally, we like how compact Kiraly was, making it easy to transition from pool to pool. However, if the weather were warm, the Gellert Bath and its big wave pool would have been pretty fun, but I wouldn't recommend Szechenyi since it is very busy, full of tourists, and offers little to justify its expense.

Unfortunately no cameras are allowed inside the baths, so I have no pictures to share, but it really was an incredible experience and very relaxing too.

Les Brasseurs-Amber

Les Brasseurs is a brewpub we visited after making our way to Geneva, and unfortunately this place wasn't the best. Compared to other brewpubs, this place seems to put little emphasis on making quality beer and ultimately was more like a sports bar atmosphere. The beer didn't come out of taps, but rather out of a soda fountain and the people working the bar didn't really seem to know much about beer either.

This beer was attempted to be modeled after a Belgian Abbey style of beer and unfortunately falls far short of that lofty goal. It pours a hazy orange with a 1 finger off-white creamy head. It smells somewhat Belgian yeasty and a bit like coriander as well. The mouthfeel is very creamy upfront with  medium-light body to follow. The taste is a bit like crackery tortilla chips that turn slightly sweet near the finish. Overall this beer was very disappointing, lacked quality flavor, and was served in a fairly careless manner at this subpar establishment. I wouldn't recommend this place to anyone.

The highlight of our first day in Geneva is that Becky signed up to go paragliding off a mountain, and even though I didn't fly, the views from the top were still breathtaking, allowing you to see the whole city, the lake, and more mountains in the background. That night we picked up some sandwiches from the local grocery store and ate them in a park on Lake Geneva, which at sunset is very beautiful.

The next day we first made our way to Saint Peter's Cathedral, which gives you the opportunity to climb to the top, offering a nice panoramic view of the city. Afterwards, we stopped into a nearby chocolate shop, for some interesting and very overpriced chocolates. This place had some very interesting flavors including cognac, lime, and others. We walked through many of Geneva's little parks and enjoyed the nice weather.

One of the highlights of the day was getting gelato and walking out to the Jet with it. It really was the perfect summery day, to the point where I actually got a bit of a sunburn. Additionally, because the wind was just right, it blew the Jet in such a direction that it actually created an arcing rainbow across the water.

The last thing we did that day and arguably the highlight was get traditional Swiss fondue, which even though it was very expensive was incredibly good. The melted cheese covers the bread, inviting you to eat it right away, but beware, it definitely is worth the wait to let it cool a little, so as not to burn your whole mouth on the first bite. Overall, there isn't too much to do in Geneva if you don't have the money to shop at all the fancy stores, but it is a pretty place and the weather made it very enjoyable.