We couldn’t come to Greymouth and not visit the famous Monteiths Brewery where Fiona’s favorite Cider comes from 🙂

The tours are on three times a day and are $50 for two which includes some tasting and some complimentary drinks and discounts on West Coast Tourist attractions and some Monteiths clothing.
The coupons all come in a nicely packaged West Coast passport for each person on the tour.

Click on the Images for Hi Res

We checked in at the only central Motorhome Park, Central Motorhome Park and it is behind a Challenge service station almost across the road from Monteiths. Very handy!

The park is very reasonable at $20 a Motorhome but includes showers, free wifi and has water and a dump station. It is walking distance to everywhere so is VERY handy.

Monteiths is across the road and down a side street, less than 5 minutes walk and was very easy to find.

We arrived there right on time for our mid afternoon tour and soon after our guide Nick introduced himself and after donning some hi vis vests, we were shown given a quick background on how it all came about in the mid 1800’s. Originally the Brewery was in Reefton and wasn’t moved to Greymouth until the founders son moved it in early 1900’s. Fascinating history and I understand that after being owned by DB, it is now owned by Heinekin. Another good beer.

After the history run down, we were shown the process on a giant board and then shown the different Stainless Steel Vats that are used to process the Beers. Very modern and it all looks amazingly efficient. After this we were shown the bottling plant and then the original safe with some historic books with the original shareholders etc. They also still have all the original processing equipment there that was used before all the high volume products were moved to DB.

Afterwards, we were given lessons on how to pour a beer correctly and then we got to taste some .. Yum. Fiona and I had a couple of drinks each with some chips before we ambled back over the road to Rafe. All in all, a really interesting, fun afternoon and also not in any danger of dehyration 🙂

Seriously though.. well worth doing if you’re in the area.