In the years of doing Philly Beer Week, the week (plus) long celebration of America’s Best Beer-Drinking City, I’ve learned one important lesson in how to make it through: pace yourself.  With over 1,000 events in ten days, you can’t possibly hit up everything.  In fact, you won’t even be able to make it to many of the events that sound appealing because they either conflict with each other or you need to rest or stay sober one or two nights.  Instead, the best practice is to make it to a maximum of perhaps one event a night (ok, maybe two, if you do the other one during the day).  Go through the list, pick and choose some favorites and enjoy those without feeling bad about missing others.

The second most important advice: find events for brewers you don’t experience often or for specialty beers.  There are so many great regional brewers, and most have special events throughout the week.  Likewise, there are many brewers from other parts of the country who produce beers we don’t typically get here in town.  Take advantage of their presence.

Philly Beer Week has become the largest beer festival, in terms of events, in the country devoted to craft beer.  Let’s all enjoy.