Greenville Beer and Travel Guide

Greenville is a cute little growing city nestled in the northwest corner of South Carolina

GVL Tips: 

• I spend a lot of time in Greenville and it is a really nice city. It is kid friendly, dog friendly, pedestrian friendly and bike friendly.

• The city is pretty small, a weekend visit is the ideal amount of time!

Adventures & Ales Top Recommendations: ​

• The Eighth State Brewing: My favorite brewery in the Greenville area and arguably the best in the entire state! They have delicious beers, frequent events, lots of non-beer options, and rotating in-house food.

• The Whale: A fantastic craft beer bar with something for every palate! They have 20 taps and a huge selection of cans and bottles.

• Swamp Rabbit Café: I HIGHLY recommend visiting this cute little restaurant, the food is incredible! Located right on the Swamp Rabbit Trail if you are biking/running/walking it is a great spot to stop for lunch. I recommend you get a sandwich because the stecca bread is superb!

• The Community Tap: A fun beer bar with some killer beers on tap and wine and beer for purchase. Dog friendly!

• Sully’s Steamers: A great spot for bagels right in the heart of downtown.

• Lewis Barbeque: This renowned Charleston-based BBQ restaurant is superb. The food is delicious, bar drinks are great, and patio is lovely. Don’t miss happy hour from 4-6pm!

• Other Lands: A brewery and coffee shop with a small food menu. They have solid beers, but dirty glassware. The patio is nice + they are dog-friendly.

• Fireforge Brewing: A ton of beer options, smell menu of snacks, comfy seating options, outside space, really friendly bartenders, and it’s located right downtown!

• The Trappe Door: A restaurant and beer bar specializing in Belgian food and drink. This unique spot is in a dark basement setting in the heart of downtown Greenville. They have a great Belgian beer selection and tasty food.

The Eighth State Brewing Company

The Classic Tourist Spots Actually Worth Visiting: ​

• Falls Park on the Reedy: A pretty park with lots of places to sit and relax or wander around. The quintessential ‘Greenville’!

• Paris Mountain State Park: About a twenty minute drive from downtown Greenville but worth it! It is a $6 entrance fee for the State Park to gain access to all of the trails. Brissy Ridge was a good hike but didn’t have as exciting of views as I’d hoped. The Lake Placid Loop is a very chill walk around the lake where you can also see the dam. Sulphur Springs was nice but a little boring.

• The Commons: A ton of small local businesses under one roof! The food hall has The Community Tap (above), Methodical Coffee, SC Bake Room, Automatic Taco, Golden Brown and Delicious and more. Located on the Swamp Rabbit Trail too!

• Gather: Another food hall concept made out of old containers and fully outside. Pasta Addict is my favorite! Greenville Beer Exchange also has a space here.

• Swamp Rabbit Trail: A 22 mile trail running through Greenville along the Reedy River and through city parks. This trail connects GVL and Traveler’s Rest!

• Stay at the Hampton Inn downtown: This is actually a super nice hotel in a fantastic location at reasonable rates. Pro-tip you don’t have to valet or park in a garage, there is free street parking all around.

Swamp Rabbit Café

Other ideas:​​

• Liability Brewing: Tasty beers and lively atmosphere, especially when the weather is warm and the garage-style doors are open.

• Greenville Beer Exchange: A bottle shop and taproom with a wide selection of beers.

• Traveler’s Rest: A cute little town north of Greenville! An easy detour to explore.

  • Swamp Rabbit Brewing: Solid beers and small town vibes located in Traveler’s Rest

• Tetrad Brewing: An average brewery with chill vibes.

• Smoke on the Water: A nice spot for BBQ in the heart of downtown. The food here is delicious and they also have a nice outside area.

• Biscuit Head: A delicious breakfast spot out of Asheville. All things biscuit!

• Southernside Brewing Company: A solid brewery with a large outdoor space, full food menu and tasty beers. They are located across the river from The Commons.

• Grateful Brew: A cute 60’s vibes coffee shop and beer bar that is dog friendly.

• Fork and Plough: A farm to table restaurant with solid eats. They also are a market and butchery.

• Double Stamp Brewery: A solid brewery with a rooftop patio.

  • Home Team BBQ, the popular Charleston-based BBQ spot, is located right next door as well.

• Yee-Haw Brewing: The Greenville outpost of the Johnson City brewery. Half of the beers on tap are brewed in GVL, half in Johnson City. A cute outdoor space, while the inside has more restaurant-style vibes.

• Shoeless Brewing: A brewery in the homebrew supply store Grapes and Grains on the east side of the city. The beers here are solid and it is a popular local hangout.

• 13 Stripes Brewing: Located Northeast of the city inside the old Taylor’s Mill, giving the brewery warehouse-y vibes. They have a large selection of beers, but no flights as a heads up.

• Brewery 85: A fun brewery with many German-style beers that come in fun mason jar pint glasses. Frequent events and food trucks!

• Tipsy Taco: A Tex-Mex restaurant with several locations in the area.

Paris Mountain State Park

Skip:

• Think Tank Brew Lab: A mediocre brewery near the downtown airport. They have large taproom and large outdoor space with a small food menu.

• Iron Hill Brewing: A chain brewery with a large menu of average beers.

• Spill The Beans: This is a coffee shop in downtown Greenville with bad coffee and worse service.

• Quest Brewing: A small little tap room with below average beers.

• Pangaea Brewing: A mediocre brewery in The Commons with a small food menu and average beers.

My Top Beers in February

February was a month full of fire beers! Between Super Bowl parties, a bottle share, beer releases, Queen City Brewers Festival, @wanderinghops coming to visit, and a trip to Greenville—I tried 145 different beers this month. There were some real delights!

In no particular order, here were the best beers I had over the past month:

Seven from The Veil Brewing in Richmond, VA

Seven is an Imperial Stout aged In Willett, Utopias, Maple And Weller Bourbon Barrels for an average of 21 months and conditioned on chocolate sandwich cookies, toasted coconut, Tahitian vanilla and truffle. I gave this a 4.75 on Untappd, meaning it was absolutely incredible.

Bourbon Barrel Aged Not Your Nana’s Pudding from Resident Culture Brewing in Charlotte, NC

Resident Culture put out several variants of this beer, and the Banana Pudding edition was my favorite! This is an Imperial Stout aged in Willett Bourbon barrels for 12-20 months then conditioned on wild Thai bananas, vanilla, and Nilla wafers.

Backpack Full of Cans from Monkish Brewing in Torrance, CA

Backpack Full of Cans is a Triple IPA with Citra, Motueka, and Simcoe hops. Another Monkish banger, no surprise there! Best paired with a fantastic book from Book of the Month.

Wormhole Junction from Newgrass Brewing in Shelby, NC

Wormhole Junction is a solera of elaborate imperial stout bases, with 37.5% aged for 37 months in Old Forester Bourbon barrels, another 37.5% aged in Willett Bourbon barrels for 23 months, and the final 25% aged in MGP Bourbon barrels for 18 months. After blending, the solera base was conditioned with a curated selection of Ugandan and Comoros vanilla bean. This was my top beer at Queen City Brewers Fest and extremely delicious!

Brabantiæ (2018) from Cantillon in Brussels, Belgium

Brabantiæ is a Gueuze that was finished in Port wine barrels. Upon description I would not think it would be quite my cup of tea, but this was superb. It was incredibly well-rounded and light.

Nucleate (2019) collaboration brew from HOMES Brewery in Ann Arbor MI, Speciation Artisan Ales in Grand Rapids MI and Transient Artisan Ales in Bridgman, MI

HOMES creates this beer each year in celebration of their annual Nucleate Beer Festival. They collaborate with different breweries each time, and the 2019 version happened to bring together my 3 favorite breweries in Michigan! This is a Mixed Culture Sour Ale with a blend of the house culture from each brewery, then refermented on strawberry, blackberry and raspberry and bottle conditioned with champagne yeast.

Three Times Three from North Park Beer Company in San Diego, CA

This is a collaboration with Omnipollo, Monkish, Trillium, Other Half, Troon, Brujos & North Park, and it is North Park’s version of the collab. Three Times Three is a Triple Dry Hopped Hazy Triple IPA with Citra, Citra Cryo, Motueka, Nelson Sauvin and Riwaka hops. After doing a side by side of 5 different versions of this beer, North Park’s was above and beyond the best! Our entire group at the bottle share agreed.

Microcosm IV, No. 4 from The Eighth State Brewing Company in Greenville, SC

Shout out to Jesse at The Whale in Greenville for sharing this wild brew! Microcosm IV, Number 4 is a Strong Ale Blend consisting of: 4-Year-Old Barleywine aged in a Laird's Apple Brandy barrel, 3-Year-Old Imperial Stout aged in a Maple BLiS barrel, 2-Year and 3-Month-Old Imperial Stout aged in a Single Pick Four Roses barrel and conditioned on roasted pecans, New Hampshire maple syrup, Tahitian vanilla and toasted coconut. The barrel flavor and adjuncts come through nicely without one note overpowering the others. A really well done beer. Also a special shout out to Neck and Neck (Batch 3) from Eighth State, which was another fantastic beer I had during my Greenville visit, but I had to narrow down the list. Check out my Greenville beer and travel guide here.

10th Anniversary Collaboration #7 Smoothie Sour from Other Half Brewing in Brooklyn NY, Mortalis Brewing in Avon NY, J. Wakefield Brewing in Miami FL, Hoof Hearted Brewing in Marengo OH and Omnipollo in Stockholm, Sweden

For Other Half’s 10th Anniversary they released 10 different collaboration beers, only one of which was a Smoothie Sour. Other Half’s IPAs and Stouts are usually my favorite, so my expectations were not overly high when I cracked this can, but wow was I wrong. Collaboration #7 blends anejo tequila aged seltzer into the base beer along with strawberries, lime, a hint of tangerine puree, and some soft serve ice cream. It was tart, yet sweet. Full of body, yet smooth and light. Fruity, yet tequila-y. Sheesh!

Check back next month for my top beers in March! —Cheers, Alexis

My Top Beers in March 2023

March was a packed beer month with a few days in Hendersonville and Asheville, NC and then a week in Greenville, SC—check out my Greenville beer and travel guide here. I tried 198 different beers in March, a lot of which were consumed while watching March Madness, at Altered States festival from The Eighth State Brewing Company (check out my recap here) and at bottle shares.

In no particular order here are the best beers I had in March:

JFK2LAX: SFO Layover collaboration brew from Monkish Brewing in Torrance, CA and Other Half Brewing in New York, NY

This is a Triple IPA with Citra, Simcoe and Motueka hops. I am a huge fan of the JFK2LAX series and this edition was a delight! I rated this a 4.75 on Untappd because it was so ridiculously good.

Damage: Batch 100 from Root and Branch Brewing in Copiague, NY

This is a multi-oat/wheat Triple IPA from one of the best IPA breweries in the country. Root + Branch crushed this brew and I am very happy to have one more can of it in my fridge. It is extremely smooth and flavorful.

The Morbid Comfort of a Welcome Regression from Burial Beer in Asheville, NC

The Morbid Comfort of a Welcome Regression is a Triple Dry Hopped Triple IPA with Simcoe, Vic Secret and Eclipse hops. Anytime Burial drops a new Triple IPA I am excited but this one was superb. It has that classic Burial hint of sweetness without being overly boozy.

Triple Vegan from Fidens Brewing in Colonie, NY

Triple Vegan is a Triple IPA with Citra, Galaxy and Nelson hops. As you may know, it is the triple version of their iconic brew The Vegan. Coincidentally I just had the original brew, The Vegan, yesterday and it pales in comparison to Triple Vegan. This is rich in flavor and incredibly easy to drink.

Hyperbolic from The Eighth State Brewing Company in Greenville, SC

Hyperbolic is an Apple Brandy Barrel Aged Imperial Stout aged 1 year and 11 months in a Laird's Apple Barrel with toasted coconut, cassia bark, and Madagascar vanilla. It was tough for me to choose just one Eighth State Stout to include on this month’s top beers list, but Hyperbolic soared above the rest. Apple Brandy Barrels are always my favorite! I enjoyed this at their Altered States festival.

Fostering Divine Culture collaboration brew from Resident Culture Brewing Company in Charlotte, NC and Divine Barrel Brewing in Charlotte, NC

Fostering Divine Culture is an Imperial Stout aged in Laird’s Applejack barrels for 22 months then conditioned on rum barrel chips, wild Thai banana, toasted coconut, and vanilla. This was brewed in celebration of Divine Barrel’s 5th Anniversary. I enjoyed it at Community Tap in Greenville and I snagged a bottle at Resident Culture’s taproom once it dropped!

One Thousand Years from The Veil Brewing Company in Richmond, VA

From The Veil: “One Thousand Years was the 1000th batch of beer ever brewed at The Veil back in early 2019. The recipe is an amped-up recipe inspired equally by Pallbearer, Circle of Wolves, Sleeping Forever, and one of our favorite Imperial Stout collaborations. It spent 12 months in Laird's Apple Brandy barrels and then another 12 months in Buffalo Trace bourbon barrels.” In my eyes this is basically a cuvee of The Veil’s best brews and it was absolutely phenomenal!

Sequence Collaboration Brew from Homage Brewing in Pomona, CA and Highland Park Brewery in Los Angeles, CA

Sequence is a barrel aged Saison with spent Matsumoto peaches, spent nectarines and Osmanthus flower. Eighth State was pouring this at one of their events before the festival. Sequence is refreshing, flavorful and unique.