Beer 197: Raspberry Trail Ale and Jet Lag

I'm in for a world of hurt tomorrow. I don't adjust well to time zone changes and I'm currently and solidly on Pacific time despite being back home. I've lost my sense of what time it is completely. Tomorrow's 5:30 a.m. wake up call is going to be ugly.

Instead of dwelling on that mess, let's talk about a beer I had while we stayed at River's End in Jenner (CA).


The Marin Brewing Company's Raspberry Trail Ale poured a bright straw color, which you can't see at all from this photo. It had a full, white head that left a bit of lacing behind. The smell was strong raspberries and had a malt sweetness.

The flavor was nutty malt, very smooth with a medium body. The raspberry is mostly in the nose and not the flavor, which is fine by me. If you're a regular reader, you know I love a good fruit beer...as long as the flavor tastes natural. And sometimes natural means lighter flavor so this one rates high with me. The Raspberry Trail Ale was the perfect beer to sit outside and sip on this particular night.

As I sat there in the middle of nowhere, the lack of ambient light made visible more stars than I could see in our planetarium at work. I'm not going to lie...it kind of gave me heart palpitations. I get incredibly nervous when there isn't a high quality hospital nearby. I'm just weird like that...

Cheers!