Redhill Beer Festival

Which was actually at Merstham Village Hall. The hall was never packed, having at most 120 punters at a time, the festival having been limited to 150 punters at a time by the Hall committee. The food on offer consisted of huge baguettes, sausage rools, Scotch eggs or crisps, with free food for workers.
Things were very quiet on the Membership and Products side (of which myself and Claire were in charge) – probably due to the bad location of the tables on the stage, which some punters thought was out-of-bounds. However we did manage to sell 10 CAMRA memberships, the baby’s bibs, a teddy, and quite a few East and Mid Surrey Pub Guides (these are excellent, despite what Bruning-skimreader says!). I was restricting myself to a half a day, so had to choose well and sip it very slowly. The B&T Edwin Taylor Stout was the beer of the festival for me. We sold out of beer by 7pm on the last day, but still had plenty of cider left over. I don’t think Surrey folk are big cider-drinkers. In the end we gave away the cider in takeaway containers, before returning the empties.
It was good to catch up with all the gossip from the Welsh contingency (Claire, Kathy, Daigy and Keith) as well as to see the East and Mid Surrey crowd again. Everybody seemed to enjoy themselves – apart from the kind of people that always pick holes. Thanks to Sally Gingell in particular for doing most of the work to make the festival such a success!