IT was a sell-out as hundreds of people gathered for the south’s biggest winter beer festival.
More than 80 ales and ciders were on offer at the Gosport Winter Beer Festival, which was held at Thorngate Halls in Bury Road.
The festival took place on Friday and Saturday, with live music provided by bands Swinging The Lead and Doghouse.
People of all ages enjoyed excellent quality beers and there were familiar and new faces at the festival, which is run by the Portsmouth and South East Hampshire branch of the Campaign for Real Ale.
Among them were Jordan Holland and Amy Risker, pictured above, who are both Royal Navy medics based at HMS Sultan in Gosport.
Nigel Firth-Penney, from Havant, the cider rep for the branch, said: ‘It’s the biggest winter ale festival in the south.
‘We have always had a really good range of beers and cider and always in top condition.
‘It’s all commercially-available beers – many from microbreweries.
‘People really look forward to it. We get more than one generation from the same family coming.
‘This is the 21st year we have run this and we have always had it in the same place.’
People came from as far as the West Country to enjoy the ales.
Branch chairman Geoff Marsh said he hoped the punters would now go on to support local pubs, which he said were struggling after being undercut by supermarkets.
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