Upcoming Event: Tagajo Beer Summit 2018

    This Friday, Saturday and Sunday there will be something called the Tagajo Beer Summit in the park in front of Tagajo Station on the Senseki Line, which is twenty one minutes and 240 yen from Sendai. The park is easy to find, on the same side of the station as the bus pool including the Kirin Brewery shuttle bus. This is not the side with the library, so if you see Starbucks, turn around.
    For the entry fee of 2000 yen for an advanced ticket, each patron receives three beers of their choice as well as an otsumami snack plate and some kind of event goods. the featured beers include Kirin Ichiban, Heartland, Kirin's dark brew, Yona yona ale, Budweiser, Guinness, Heineken, and Brooklyn Brewery. At least those are the labels pictured on the poster I found.

    I've seen all of these around in Japan, either at Yamaya or the convenience store, excluding Brooklyn Brewery. If the website is anything to go by, this may be, in my very Texan way of thinking, a yankee version of Shiner. For those who don't come from my home state or drink beers from there, Shiner is a small town in Texas that is known for one major industry and that is a small brewery where they make not just Shiner Bock, the beer of choice for beer enthusiasts in my college days, but also a number of seasonal brews and other variations. I have yet to drink a bottle I didn't like, but it's also been five years since I've had a Shiner due to lack of imports of that beer to Japan and lack of exports of me to my home state.

    The Tagajo Beer Summit runs from 5PM to 8PM on this Friday, the thirteenth, returning for the next two days from 11AM to 8PM. It looks to be a fun time with some nice beers if you have the time and money to enjoy it. Also, if the weather holds out.