Wednesday, March 30, 2011

36 hours in State College and Belhaven Scottish Ale

Travel obligations cut my 4-day pass on the 25th-28th down to exactly 36 hours on the ground in State College.  I tried to spend as much of that time with family as possible, so my apologies to folks that missed me in that brief window.  We had a long afternoon luncheon with the new combined McPherson/Haviland family, complete with my grandparents stopping by on their way back north from Florida.  It was really nice to spend time with everyone before being occupied for over a year.

Sarah's father made the generous wedding present of transferring ownership of their 2008 Civic LX over to Sarah and myself so we could start our new lives without car payments and so I could have a vehicle down here in Texas whilst preparing to deploy.  Unfortunately, we had to get the car down here; something more than an afternoon drive.  We departed before lunch on Sunday and drove all the way to Nashville before finding a hotel.  The next day, our goal was to arrive in Killeen before Castle began at 9pm central and just made it.  Sarah made the drive with me so that we could share driving duty and so she could help me move into a cheaper motel off-post for the remainder of my time here before deployment.  She decided it wasn't worth it to fly back in the middle of the week, so she's staying until Sunday.

I had the good fortune to try Belhaven Scottish Ale on-tap in College Station as well as in bottles here on-base.  It is much better on-tap where nitrogen-pressure promotes a creamy head to develop properly like a Guinness.  The thick tan head lingers long over a smooth amber ale body.  Excellent all-around.  The bottles are better than average, but a sad substitute for this superb draught ale.  Pictured below is their nitrogen-draught can (which I have yet to try, but gives a better impression of the creamy head).

No comments:

Post a Comment