Alcohol in the news; Mirror Pond Pale Ale, a western find

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Mirror Pond Pale Ale, a western find

There is no better way to spend a winter vacation than at the base of a 12,000 ft mountain in the depths of the Colorado Rockies. Waiting for friends, I decided to wet my palate in a local bar where I stumbled upon a superb American Pale Ale.

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Mirror Pond Pale Ale is a twenty award-winning, clean finishing, sweet and malty beer that certainly lives up to its reputation... They produce eight beers on a regular basis and have three seasonal beers; thus far I have only sampled the one I speak of above, however, the smoothness of the pale ale assures me that any of their brews will stand as an outstanding craft.

You can't get it around here. Deschutes is very good. If you know someone on the west coast, Deschutes makes for a good trading beer. Beers that we can get locally but they can't (routinely) include Goose Island, Great Lakes (if you go up to Chicago), 3 Floyds (again, go to Chicago), Hoppin Frog.

If you do start to trade and want to get their best offerings, look for Black Butte or the Abyss, but be prepared to give up some of your best bottles for them.

If you would like to purchase Deschutes beer, here's a Colorado beverage store Total Beverage, that will ship. Shipping isn't cheap. The cost for shipping is around the same price as the bottles of beer, so a case of beer being shipped is very expensive. Ensure it's beer you really want. Bottletrek also carries west coast beers.