City beer festival moves to pubs as halls repaired

Norwich Beer Festival will be held across the city's pubs this year

An annual beer festival running for some 50 years has returned as more of a pub crawl, organisers said.

Norwich Beer Festival, which started on Thursday, was forced to find alternative venues due to renovations to the Blackfriars and St Andrew's Halls.

Instead, 30-plus events have been set up across 40 city pubs.

Festival organiser Lucy Cousins said: "There will be a different feel. But we've got a few larger events that are happening across the 11 days, starting with a mini beer festival at the Beehive and a party [on Friday] at the Brickmakers, which will be rammed."

She said Redwell Brewery was also holding a larger three-day weekend event.

The roofs and walls of The Halls complex are being repaired

Every year the festival attracts about 18,000 people.

Ms Cousins said the festival had produced a guide with a map to plan routes, but said "please don't feel like you have to go to all 40 pubs".

"We always collect for charity," she said, explaining people attending the big halls would often donate leftover beer tokens to be sold for good causes.

"But this time we are letting the pubs involved choose which charity they wish to support."

The Beehive pub is one of 40 venues hosting the Norwich Beer Festival