Next Auckland area meeting: 12th September (plus other ideas)

Many thanks to all who came along to our last meeting at my house on Saturday, and thanks for all the interesting homebrews and commercial beers you brought. We had a great afternoon.

The next meeting will be on the regular second Saturday and so will be on Saturday 12th September at 2pm at Galbraiths Alehouse. It's a while since we went along there and interesting things are afoot, so I thought we should pay a visit. I'm in discussions with Keith about a theme for the meeting and we have a couple of ideas up our sleeves which I'll confirm nearer the time. Please let me know if you're planning to come along.

Thinking slightly further ahead I've been having wild notions of a SOBA weekend away. The Wellingtonians organised a successful trip to Nelson in March, and I'm thinking of something along the same lines. My vague plan would be:
Saturday - drive to Rotorua, visit Croucher brewery and UNDERGROUND bar. Stay overnight in Rotorua.
Sunday: drive to Tauranga, visit the brew bar there (whose name eludes me at the moment). Return to Auckland in the evening.
optional Friday addition: drive down to Hamilton, have a few beers at the Ruakura Campus Club. Stay over in Hamilton ready for departure to Rotorua in the morning.

If I'm going to organise this event I'll need to get an early indication of who might be interested. Ideally I'd like to organise something in October but it might take a little longer to get together. I'm envisaging that people would carpool and probably organise their own accommodation, although if we have enough attendees we might be able to coordinate something. Let me know if you'd be interested in coming along.

Cheers & beers,

Martin