Hopulist Issue Eight

WIDELY REGARDED AS THE CRAFT BEER CAPITAL
OF ONE OF THE WORLD'S PIONEERING CRAFT BEER
NATIONS, WELLINGTON IS HEAVEN ON EARTH FOR
THOSE WHO CHERISH A GOOD DROP. HOPULIST
TOOK THE CITY'S BEER TRAIL TO DISCOVER WHY IT
SHOULD BE FIRMLY ON YOUR BUCKET LIST.
By David Guest
To the untrained eye Wellington could be
viewed as a pretty unassuming capital
city. It lacks the iconic Instagramable
monuments or attractions that are ‘must-sees’
for visiting tourists that many other capital cities
boast. There’s no Eifel Tower, no Statue of Liberty,
nor Buckingham Palace. The weather is pretty
crappy most of the time – one of its nicknames
is Windy Wellington owing to its position on the
Cook Strait. It’s not even that easy to get to for a
large portion of the global population – most of
us are looking at a 20+ hour journey via multiple
flights to get there. But what New Zealand’s capital
lacks in the typical, it makes up for tenfold in the
atypical.
Wellington is probably one of the best alternative
capital cities in the world. It’s brimming with
culture, it’s friendly and it’s a place where art and
expression are welcomed with open arms. It is also
home to more than 30 craft beer breweries, which
tells you a lot about its vibe. As you no doubt well
know, by their very nature craft brewers are small
and independent, often family-run businesses that
are run by local people for local people, giving
back to the communities from which they spawn.
Wellington’s brewers are no different. They aren’t
in this game for the money or the fame, they’re
in it for a whole range of far more wholesome
reasons. Within the 171 square miles that make
up the city there’s a bit of everything – a brewer
that was set up in honour of a family’s loved one
sadly lost to breast cancer, a brewer that saved
a classic industrial building from demolition by
moving its brewing kit in, and even a brewer that
is named after and sponsors the conservation
efforts for one of New Zealand’s badass endemic
reptiles that is still hanging around from when
dinosaurs ruled the Earth. In short, Wellington
is an absolute melting pot of passion, quirkiness
and damn-near obsession with craft beer, so when
we got the chance to spend 48 hours within its
boundaries, we made every drop count.