Top 20 Booze experiences

17. Melbourne – The “Beer in an Egg” Beer 

St kilda Beach. Upon what was only intended as a walk along one of Melbourne’s best beaches we spied a drinking opportunity too good to miss. This one was all about the seating options and the photos!

Read our Melbourne top 5 for more info

16. Cadiz (Spain) – The “1 Euro” Beer

Even in May the risk of sunburn was high!

Not the most obvious city in Spain to visit, but like anywhere in the region, the people, culture and vibrance is infectious and you are sure to have a jolly time. With a happy hour that seemed to last forever we consumed many a 1 Euro ($1.20 – in 2009) beer before going on what can only be described as a non-destructive rampage of the city… including visiting a kebab shop that sold draught beer (would never happen in England!) and laughing a lot at one of our friends who had bought a suitcase with 8 wheels – “for when 6 wheels are not enough”. You’d have to watch the video to understand… and even then you probably had to be there…  – head over to the Plaza de la Catedral and keep your fingers crossed that its a happy hour day.

15. Barcelona – The “Fishbowl” Beer

Although there are less touristy parts of central barcelona, there is nothing like a massive fishbowl beer whilst soaking up the atmosphere of the catalan cultural hub. Enjoyed with a side order of Tapas and followed by a smattering of getting lost on the streets of the Bari Gothic in any number of the tiny cafe bars makes for a perfectly hedonistic day. – Just Walk around the Placa Reial area off Las Ramblas until you see someone drinking from the fishbowl!

14. Stanley – The “Falklands” Beer

Hotly contested for ownership by Argentina, and way off any regular tourist route, we figured that simply having a beer on the Falkland Islands was good enough to get it in the top 20. “A pint of John Smiths please landlord!” a very british experience in the south Atlantic.

13. Muroran (Japan) – The “Turning Japanese” Beer

My first visit to Japan, we decided to drop into a Karaoke bar, as you do. In Japan the Karaoke setup is a little different from western countries, you and your friends hire a private room by the hour and sing to each other. In this privacy, and with only a hint of racism we all sang the song “Turning Japanese” by the Vapors, whilst drinking local beer.

Looking over the crater

12. Santorini (Greece) – The “Volcano” Beer

The Island of Santorini in Greece is built high upon the cliffs of an inactive, flooded volcano. Aside from the architecture and the location/weather, the natural scenery is also fantastic! Not a regular backpacker destination, but if you are ferry hopping around the greek islands I would recommend this place! – Just choose any bar with a view. http://wikitravel.org/en/Santorini

11. Punta Arenas (Chile) – The “Supermarket Mission” Beer
Chile MUST be included when talking about boozy adventures around the world. This is a English pub we found in Punta Arenas where we were so impressed with the glassware I just had to take one home (its still in our cupboard). We did stay at this pub for quite a while and upon leaving discovered a supermarket where a dare was set…… where each of us had to buy 1 item from every single isle in a 10 min time frame. Random chaos was the result ……. I dont know what happened to the bag of stuff we think we went back to the bar and left it behind, Oh well!!!

Travel buddy Rich clings tight to the precious bounty

10. Hong Kong – The “7-Eleven Special” Beer

In many parts of the world, drinking on the street is quite acceptable. In Lan Kwai Fong there are a lot of expensive bars and clubs… so we decided to Food Fun Travel it up by drinking Special Brew (about 8%, extra strong lager) outside of 7-Eleven, and then heading to a bar once we were already half-cut. If you buy bottled beer from 7-eleven the cashier will even open it for you! Now thats service!

– http://www.lkfe.com/index.php?page=main

Time to party!

9. Parintin (Brazil) – The “Free Feathers Mardi Gras” Beer.

Now this one is a bit out of the ordinary as I was on a “crew tour” while I was still working on ships. On these we are meant to escort the ship passengers and make sure that all things go to plan. But when free caipirinha’s are on offer well the crew let loose quite a bit…….trust me the passengers were joining in with us! We watched a traditional Brazilian show with girls and guys all in skimpy feathery outfits shaking there famous Brazilian Booty. 

As you can see we couldn’t help but join in! 

8. Amsterdam – The “Prostitute Variety” Beer

What else is there to do but grab a few brews at the pub and then wonder the streets checking out the spectacle that is Amsterdams Red Light District. Here the streets are lined with window after window filled with an assortment of…….women. And it seemed like they were categorized too, young, old skinny, fat, all can be found here.

Finding a local cafe and indulging in a space brownie can make this an interesting experience also hehe ;-)

7. Bangkok – The “3 Litre Tower” Beer

Sitting in a roadside bar with our massive Beer tower caused quite a stir, certainly a good talking point for meeting random strangers walking by on the street! “How much is that?” They ask… 350 baht is the answer (thats $11.50). People watching with a 3 litre beer for next-to-no money in Bangkok. The beer towers are available all over Thailand, but this was the cheapest one we saw in the the Khao San Road area as it is off the main strip in a rather pleasant road full of bars and restaurants.

– Chada Cafe, Soi Ram Buttri (North West of Khao san road)

http://kml.soidb.com/bangkok/restaurant/chada-cafe.html

6. Singapore – The “5 Star infinity” Beer (Well… Cocktail!)

The rooftop area of Marina Bay Sands stretches as far as 6 football fields and most of it is the infinity pool. This is NOT budget in any way shape or form but I was lucky enough to go with work.

Certainly a great experience but a cocktail will put you back $18 SGD, I even dared to ask how much a beer tower cost…..$112 SGD hmmm maybe not!!!

5. Barcelona (2) – The “Wall of Guitars” Beer

The blurriness reflects the level of inebriation by that time…

By the time I arrived at this bar we’d already had quite a night around the Bari Gothic district in central Barcelona. We were lucky enough to have local friends showing us around and taking us to the non-touristy bars. They showed us to a bar that had acoustic guitars all over the walls… These were not display guitars like the ones at hard rock cafe, these were for customer use!

Random strangers join us in song!

People all around the bar were playing guitar at there respective tables. Being a musician by trade, and having had a few beers, our experience developed into me taking over the entertainment for the night and getting everyone else in the room to sing along with my song selections (including Livin on a Prayer as I recall), which fortunately was well received. Never before or since have I visited a bar where the instruments are multiple and available for public use, and I may never again as I have no idea what the bar was called. All I know is it was in the vicinity of Jaume 1 Metro station, if you find it, please email me the details, I can’t find any leads on google!

Read more about Barcelona in our Barcelona Top 5.

4. Singapore (2) – The “Monsoon” Beer

It had been raining… just a bit!

Getting caught out in a monsoon for hours with no way to get anywhere without getting soaked is quite daunting, especially when you have to get to the airport in a few hours… One of the Free attractions on Sentosa Island is Mainland Asia’s most southernly point (hotly disputed by Malaysia, for good reason as not only is Singapore an Island, but so is Sentosa!). Still we decided to check it out anyway as we like to take advantage of fun stuff that is free! It was starting to drizzle as we crossed the rope bridge, by the time we had taken the obligatory “point” photo the rain was really starting. We hid out under a wooden platform to wait for the rain to ease. It Didn’t.

Rocking the garbage bag!

After over 2 hours and a little sleep, the monsoon rain was not stopping. We made a run for it to the nearest man-made structure, about 500 meters away, and were soaked through by the time we reached it. Luck would have it, it was a bar! As a sacrifice to the rain gods we decided a beer was essential. Deciding the rain was not gonna stop, and being as we had a plane to catch, we fashioned ponchos from black garbage bags and headed out into the elements once more…

– Bora Bora Beach Bar, 82 Lighthouse Beach walk, Palawan Beach, Sentosa.

3. River Kwai (Thailand) – The “Floating Hotel” Beer

Location Location Location. Sometimes the best thing about enjoying a beer is simply the location you enjoy it in. We all love crazy stories too, but when it comes to supping back a cold brew lying on a lounger of our personal Jetty of a massive floating hotel after riding the current from one end of the hotel to the other, the serenity makes up for the adventure. Read the FULL STORY of our experience staying on a floating hotel in Thailand. Google maps is a little unreliable for finding this place, and you can only get there if you are staying in the hotel and have to take the private longboat transfer (which is fun!). http://www.riverkwaijunglerafts.com/

2. Venice – The “You shouldn’t have more than 3… but we did” Beer

“Pub” that was all the motivationwe needed to head inside

We were tempted down a side street by a lone globe, glowing brightly with the word “Pub” on it. A classic british pub in Venice playing quality music as we walked past, it was noted down for later investigation… Upon said investigation we discovered that they served 9% Harp lager. The bearded barman strongly advised that 3 pints of the devils nectar would be more than sufficient for the average mortal. Not wanting to be put off by the recommendations of someone with a beard and years of experience drinking as his only qualifications, we ploughed on rather swiftly through 4 pints of Liquid danger. Many hours of being lost on the windy streets of Venice followed, after a few brushes with cold wet canal death, we called it a night. http://www.devilsforestpub.com/

Keenan (Left) put in a shocking performance!

1. Rhodes (Greece) – The “2 Litre Boot” Beer

The ultimate speed drinking challenge. Our Greek host informed us that any good drinker could see away the whole boot in a sub-10-minute time and he’d be happy to show us if we would by him a 20Euro ($25) Boot… Figuring that any local making such a claim would almost certainly succeed we declined and decide to use our cash to try and complete the challenge ourselves.

Holding the Torch for Team UK was Super Steve with an excellent time 9.35 Mins. Team Australia not faring quite as well as Keenan spent the best part of 2 hours drinking his beer…lol. Apparently he was not competing. Our epic (and loud) efforts attracted the attention of other travellers in the bar, who decided to take on the gauntlet, with disastrous consequences… because they beat Steve :-( Team America, represented by the largest man in the bar (possibly in Greece) just pipped steve to a silver medal with a time of 9.10min… but the surprise winner of the day’s frivolity was a middle aged woman from Canada. The Self titled “hockey mom” (Because having kids who play Hockey means you have to be insanely good at downing beer, apparently) put away the boot in 8.45min… The men in the room felt enormous shame for their gender. (Watch the Full Video)

– Pretty much any bar in Rhodes Old Town has boots. We favour those with a roof terrace and sunshine! Check the price before sitting down (You should be able to find one for under 20Euros).

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THE WORST (Most Disappointing) BEER:

The Face says it all!

1. Whitsunday Islands – The “Mis-Leading, Piss-Weak Deception” Beer

Our “unlimited beer and wine” cruise around the whitsunday islands had stunning scenery but left a very sour taste in our mouth – the taste of carlton mid (3.5% “mid” strength beer). We felt slightly deceived when unlimited beer and wine turns out to be White wine ONLY and light beer ONLY and you can’t touch the grog until lunchtime, 5 hours into the cruise. Not that I’m saying you should get wasted at 8am on a catamaran when you have snorkelling and such to do, but don’t tell us in the promo pack that we can drink what we like and then force the small print on us once its too late to choose a different cruise!

There are proper booze/party cruises in the Whitsundays, but the camira Sailing Adventure is not one of them. Read the FULL STORY about our day on the Camira.
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We’d Love to hear about your best (or worst!?) drinking experiences. Please leave comments below if you have a great “Beer Abroad” Story!