Every March, the Driftwood Spars in Trevaunance Cove - our current Summer Pub of the Season - holds a beer festival, themed in recent years as the Barrel of Laughs Beer Festival. This is so named due to the comedy and music acts in the evenings.

Jan Curtis, our Social Secretary for west Cornwall, organised a social on Friday 15 March not for the entertainment but for the beers on offer. Mostly travelling by bus or electric bike, we avoided light rain going down Quay Road to see the seaside, the brewery and the pub.

Entering the beer festival, we were met by the bar team led by new Head Brewer Tim Lawrence (on the left) at the festival bar.

There were four casks on the stillage plus a variety of keg beers on tap and also four ciders in bag-in-boxes. A pleasant surprise was Cousin Jack from Mine Brewery at St Ives Consols which is a brewery that I have not seen on many bars yet. I had some Valley of Eden from the much-respected Bristol Beer Factory brewery which featured honey and bubblegum flavours in addition to those listed on the card.

Down in the main bar there were several more beers on handpump, including Driftwood Spars Stippy Stappy, my first beer and a true IPA at 5.5% alcohol. In the New World IPA style, the citrus was gentle and not overpowering.

Another Bristol Beer Factory beer on handpump was Fortitude with a pleasant toffee flavour.

We settled ourselves down to try as many beers as possible. We were joined for a chat by Driftwood Spars owner, Lou Treseder.

There was much discussion about some of the unusual beers on offer, but we all agreed that they were very tasty, not least the Driftwood Spars Mike Drop - a Belgian Quadrupel at 10.5% alcohol which was fantastic in spite of looking like mud! This was former Head Brewer Mike Mason's last brew at Driftwood before setting up his own brewery in Threemilestone called Mason Brewery.

My last festival beer was Tim's Dry Irish Stout which was superb although I understand a little sweeter than he intended. Fine by me!

Before the dash up to the bus I could not resist a quick half of one of my favourites - Alfie's Revenge, the former national Winter Beer of Britain!

Cheers, Steve Barber