Utica, Lake Placid, and the Adirondacks (Long)

[LondonBeer]

Just got back from my trip to Lake Placid via Niagara Falls and Utica. If there are any beer bars in Utica I couldn't find them. Just north of Utica however is Marcy which has Marcy discount beverage. Small store but jammed to the roof with beer and soda. From there to Lake Placid every grocery usually had lakeplacid, saranac and sacketts harbour brewing beer with the odd magic hat thrown in for good measure. In Lake Placid the only grocery store is the price chopper on the outside of town and their selection wasn't any better. We went to the lake placid brew pub and tried the 46erpale ale, (named for someone who has climbed all 46 high peaks), ubu ale, (named after a customers dog), and their IPA. All were passable with the IPA being the best in my books. The adirondack steak and seafood company also has a brewpub. Tried their John Brown Pale Ale (named after the abolitionist), which was way more hoppy than the IPA at lake placid brewery but not as well balanced. their Pumpkin spice was quite good as was the stout. The prices weren't bad at either brewery until I took one of their glasses back to the hotel to pour my bottles into and realized they didnt hold much more then my bottle. (oh well). On the way back to Canada we went to Bessettes (sp) in Canton. Not quite as much selection as Marcy but oh well. Between the 2 I brought back 13 different IPA,s 4 different DIPA's and some other random beer. We would have been ok at the border but my wife had 2 cases of wine so it cost us $145 in duty with about $50 of that being for $300 in beer. The Border guard was surprised we didn't yell at him as he said most people are really surprised when asked to pay duty. I was Just happy to have more beer to try.