A bevy of entertainment to be found at beer festival
Brett Cursons might be the biggest drinker of craft beer in the world.
That’s what business partner Emma Puletaha thinks and that’s why it made sense for the two to create the Taranaki Beer Festival, returning for its third year this weekend.
“Taranaki is really starting to understand beer festivals now and get amongst it,” Puletaha said.
“It’s just growing every year,” Cursons added.
On Friday and Saturday night, 27 brewers from around the country will descend on TSB Stadium in New Plymouth.
The pair said the intermittent closure of Mt Messenger this weekend, which sees just five narrow windows for traffic to get through, had caused them a few issues with out of town breweries and they had considered cancelling.
Breweries were now planning their trip around the road works, but Puletaha said they had still lost ticket sales from it.
Despite the festival’s title, it’s not just about beer.
There’ll be cider, gin, vodka, and rum producers, 0% alcohol options, plenty of water stations and wrestling.
Yes, that’s right, wrestling, which Cursons was particularly excited about it.
“You really get into the story and it’s really fun. It’s a good laugh.”
“A crew of about 20 are coming from Manawatū and they’ve got a heavyweight title sponsored by Panhead. It’s something different.”
There will be a range of local food vendors available too and plenty of games for punters to have a crack at.
Dude Where’s My Guitar will be playing cover songs all night and outside there will be a DJ.
“It is a beer festival but there’s a lot of entertainment as well,” Puletaha said, adding, tasting samples from brewers will go for $3 and a 250ml pour will be around $7 or $8.
Her advice was to stick to the tasters. “We suggest everybody drinks tasters so they get to try a lot of different things.”
“For newbies, it creeps up on you a bit,” Cursons added.
The Taranaki Beer Festival is on at TSB Stadium in New Plymouth Friday from 6pm to 11pm and Saturday 5pm to 11pm.
Tickets are $47 from Ticketek.