Exploring Colorado

 Originally posted: September 12th 2012

 People travel from all around to visit Fort Collins and check out all the wonderful breweries that the city has to offer.  As an employee of Funkwerks who works in the taproom I get the benefit of encountering people from all around.  Nothing is better then chatting with individuals that go out of their way to check out what Funkwerks has to offer, especially when they are visitng from other breweries. So as soon as I had the chance, I made time to do the same thing- Nicole (who also works at Funkwerks) and I took four days off together to travel through beautiful Colorado and cram in as many brewery visits and activities as possible.

We drove from Fort Collins to Palisade where we stayed the first night.  Palisade was great to us.  Not only do they have multiple wineries and a meadery that we had the luxury to walk to from our carefully planned hotel, but we also hit up the wonderful Peach Street Distillery and Palisade Brewery that are right next to each other. How convenient. The people working were informative and helpful and gave us advice on the must-sees of Palisade as well as Grand Junction.

The next morning, as early as we could possibly get out of bed, we hit the road because we knew we had a lot of stops before we hit our final destination of Durango.  The next stop was Grand Junction and since we were on a time crunch we only stopped at Kannah Creek Brewing Company, and I'm glad we did.  The service was great, the food was fabulous, and the beer was delicious. They even let us peek in the back and check out their brewery set up too.

Jumping back on the road we drove through Montrose, where we stopped at Horsefly Brewing Company before taking off to Ouray as our next stop. Ouray is where Colorado drastically changes

from Fort Collins.  The landscape was something pictures just cannot justify. The Ouray Brewery was fun and laid back and had swings that we sat on right at the bar.  We heard all about the Million Dollar Highway and how beautiful and scary the drive could be.  So what else could we do but hit the road and check it out. I drove, and admittedly I am scared of heights, so I took my sweet time as I clenched the steering wheel through most of it.  The day was beautiful and the hour drive to Silverton flew by.  We stopped at the Silverton Brewing Company where we met some nice people and checked out the cute shops. 

After budgeting our time we realized that we needed to get to Durango so we could settle in for the night. I have heard nothing but wonderful things from people about Durango and I could not have

agreed more. We spent the next two days eating great food, drinking awesome beer and soaking up the wonderful weather. We ate breakfast at Carver Brewing Co, dinner at Steamworks and enjoyed beers at Durango Brewery and Ska Brewery. We could not have planned it any better. 

After all that fun we headed back on our eight-hour drive to Fort Collins. We had to squeeze one more place in so we stopped to have lunch at Rockslide Brewery in Grand Junction.  It was sad to have to end the trip, but the Front Range is a pretty good deal too.

The conclusion of my travels was not only that Colorado is a beautiful state, but the camaraderie that the other breweries showed us was so awesome that it made me respect and like this industry even more.  I recommend everyone who loves beer and chatting it up with great people take some time to take advantage of this great state and all it has to offer.  Thank you to all the wonderful breweries that showed us a good time on our mini vacation.

Cheers Colorado! And thank you for making great beer!

~Laura