YOUR AD HERE »

Lake Dillon Brew Festival returns Saturday

Krista Driscoll
kdriscoll@summitdaily.com
Held annually at Marina Park overlooking Lake Dillon, this year’s Lake Dillon Brew Festl will feature around 25 Colorado breweries.
Tripp Fay / Special to the Weekender |

If you go

What: Lake Dillon Brew Festival, presented by the Dillon Business Association

When: 1-5:30 p.m. Saturday, June 20

Where: Lake Dillon Amphitheatre and Marina Park, located on Lodgepole Street at the end of Lake Dillon Drive, Dillon

Cost: $30 per person for unlimited samples from more than 25 Colorado breweries; $5 to enter the event if not drinking; children 12 and younger are free

More information: Parking is free throughout the town of Dillon, and food will be available for sale at a la carte prices. Visit http://www.townofdillon.com and click on the event link to learn more.

Participating breweries

•Backcountry Brewery,

• The Bakers’ Brewery,

• Boulder Beer Co.

• Breckenridge Brewery

• Bristol Brewing Co.

• Broken Compass Brewing

• Butcherknife Brewing Co.

• Dillon Dam Brewery

• Echo Brewing Co.

• Elevation Beer Co.

• Elk Mountain Brewing

• Great Divide Brewing Co.

• Fate Brewing Co.

• Kannah Creek Brewing Co.

• Lone Tree Brewing Co.

• Odell Brewing Co.

• Oscar Blues Brewery

• Palisade Brewing Co.

• Pikes Peak Brewing Co.

• Pug Ryan’s Brewing Co.

• Renegade Brewing Co.

• Ska Brewing Co.

• Strange Craft Beer Co.

• Wynkoop Brewing Co.

• Tivoli Brewing Co.

The Lake Dillon Brew Fest returns to the shores of Dillon Reservoir on Saturday, June 20, with beer samples from more than 25 Colorado breweries. Here’s a rundown of a couple of the out-of-town breweries that will be attending the festival and what they are planning to pour for High Country beer aficionados.

Taste something Strange

Strange Craft Beer Co. in Denver started bottling its beer in October and is using the Dillon festival to introduce Summit County to all of its bomber-format offerings, said Tim Myers, head brewer at Strange. The lineup includes Farmhouse Ale and 1,000 Barrels Imperial IPA, as well as the best-selling Breakfast Grapefruit IPA and award-winning Cherry Kriek.



“With Breakfast IPA, we’re trying to go for a big citrus character,” Myers said. “We used a lot of Amarillo and Citra hops, and we finished the beer on grapefruit to nudge it over the top and give it a little extra kick. It’s our current No. 1 seller at the brewery.

“The other one of major import is our Cherry Kriek. It is a World Beer Cup gold medal winner for fruit beers, and we say with the Montmorency tart pie cherries in it, it’s like drinking a slice of cherry pie.”



This will be the fourth or fifth year Strange has attended the Lake Dillon Brew Fest, and Myers said it’s one of the most beautiful beer fest locations in the state.

“We just started expanding into Summit County,” he said. “We’re available now at a few restaurants on tap, and we started selling our bombers at Basecamp, so we’re excited to let the Summit County crowd know they can get our beer now without driving down to Denver, which is why we’re bringing all of our bombers this year.”

Punk rock in your IPA

Rob Day, accounts manager for Butcherknife Brewing Co. in Steamboat Springs, is bringing along three Butcherknife brews to sate the Dillon Brew Fest masses. The first is the brewery’s Hefeweizen, which Day said has been blowing up in the Denver market, followed by the Buddy Werner Brown, a 4.5 percent alcohol by volume, 31 IBU easy-drinker developed this winter in conjunction with the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame to honor the Steamboat ski legend.

Rounding out the trio is Butcherknife’s Amputator IPA, a hulking brew at 7.2 percent ABV and 68 IBUs, with a malt backbone to balance out the bitterness of the hops.

“The Amputator is actually named after a punk band in Steamboat called the Amputators that are great friends of ours. We try to keep everything based off of Steamboat, in a way, but not super cheesy; we try to come up with cool things,” Day said, adding that the name is fitting for the brew. “It’s a simple-drinking IPA with a lot of alcohol it in that can definitely ruin you if you have more than a couple.”

Butcherknife is currently pushing its products in Front Range markets and is looking to expand distribution into Summit County soon, so this weekend’s festival is a chance for the brewery to get its name out and its products in the hands of local beer drinkers.

“I’ve never been to Dillon Brew Fest personally myself,” Day said. “I’m looking forward to seeing what the event’s about. I’ve heard nothing but great things about it.”

Alpine Bank, Best Western, The Brewing Science Institute, Colorado Brewers Guild, Dillon Ridge Liquors, Dillon Business Association, Krystal 93, Pug Ryan’s Brewing Co., Summit Ford, Slifer Smith and Frampton Real Estate, the Summit Daily News and the town of Dillon sponsor the Lake Dillon Brew Festival, and a portion of the proceeds from the event will benefit the Colorado Brewers Guild, a nonprofit association that works with the state legislature on behalf of Colorado’s breweries.


Support Local Journalism

Support Local Journalism

As a Summit Daily News reader, you make our work possible.

Summit Daily is embarking on a multiyear project to digitize its archives going back to 1989 and make them available to the public in partnership with the Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection. The full project is expected to cost about $165,000. All donations made in 2023 will go directly toward this project.

Every contribution, no matter the size, will make a difference.