Bicycling Among the Breweries (And Wineries)
While hardly as famous as the wine regions of France and Italy, southern Ontario boasts a robust viticulture industry on its Niagara Peninsula, stretching roughly from the city of Hamilton to Niagara Falls. More recently, that same district has become a bit of a beer region, as well.
It only makes sense, really. Ask any winemaker and they will tell you that it takes a lot of good beer to make a great wine – a clear reference to the after work imbibing habits of thirsty winery workers during harvest season – so why not keep the beer fresh by having the breweries close at hand?
As are most wine regions, Niagara is a fairly bucolic, agriculturally-driven area with winding country roads and charming small towns and cities like Beamsville and Niagara-on-the-Lake. Or, in other words, a region well suited to bicycle exploration.
A good first stop for the cycling beer enthusiast is Silversmith Brewing, a brewery and modest beer hall built into a church that dates from 1890. Open from 10:00 am daily, this accomplished young brewery not only boasts a laid-back taproom well-suited to the early hours, but even produces a beer named Bavarian Breakfast Wheat, not to mention in impressively to style Black Lager schwarzbier ideal for fueling the ride ahead.
A scant few minutes down the road towards Niagara-on-the-Lake – longer, of course, if you want to get a few kilometres of cycling in first; I’d suggest a diversion to the Konzelmann Estate Winery near the shores of Lake Ontario – resides Niagara Oast House Brewers. Housed not in an actual oast house – traditionally the building in which hops were dried – but in a barn that suits well the objectives of the brewery, that being the creation of what are often termed ‘farmhouse style’ beers such as their peppery Saison and slightly nutty, sherry-evoking Bière de Garde. A most hospitable taproom and vineyard-adjacent terrace completes the picture.
After some further wine country touring, perhaps taking in the Stratus or Marynissen wineries, it will be time to exchange bicycle tires for shoe leather and park your ride in town, proceeding thereafter to the very young but thus far highly impressive Exchange Brewery.
Housed on the main drag of NOTL, as the town is informally known, the Exchange specializes in wood-conditioned beers, employing a brewer formerly of the similarly specialist Jolly Pumpkin Brewery across the border in Michigan to guide their way. And what wonderful guidance Sam Maxbauer has provided, producing beers like the innocent-sounding but deliciously complex Golden Ale and musty, nutty and peppery Session Saison.
It’s all enough to make you forget about your bicycle, and equally forget that most of the people you’ve passed on the road have been visiting for the wine rather than the beer. Hard to imagine why, really.
Silversmith Brewing, 1523 Niagara Stone Road, Virgil
Niagara Oast House Brewers, 2017 Niagara Stone Road, Niagara-on-the-Lake
Exchange Brewery, 7 Queen Street, Niagara-on-the-Lake
(Borrowed from my book, Will Travel for beer: 101 Remarkable Journeys Every Beer Lover Should Experience. For purchasing information, please click here.)