ale seizer

In addition to wine sampling, we also stocked up with some Canadian beer, both for the RV trip and while we were on Vancouver Island. As with most places once you get beyond the bog-standard generic lager-y stuff (Molson, Labatts, Moosehead etc. etc.) there are some interesting smaller craft breweries making some more flavoursome stuff (usually labelled "IPA" or "Pale Ale"); as luck would have it a lot of these do 12-bottle variety boxes with a selection of their products for you to sample. Here's the selection we bought while stocking up the RV on the way out of Vancouver:


That's a box from the Okanagan Spring Brewery and a box from the Granville Island Brewery. We also bought a supplementary box of Alexander Keith's IPA along the way (it's thirsty work driving an RV) - this isn't particularly local, as it's brewed in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

When we got to Vancouver Island we stopped at a liquor store on the outskirts of Nanaimo to stock up - both the boxes we bought here are from breweries based on the island, one from the Lighthouse Brewery and one from the imaginatively-named Vancouver Island Brewery.


I think overall the Vancouver Island Brewery box was my favourite of all the ones we tried - the Piper's Pale Ale and the Sea Dog Amber Ale in particular were excellent. We also visited the bar at the Dockside restaurant when we were on Granville Island - they brew their own beer, and very good it is too, the Cartwright Pale Ale in particular.