Brewers Row: a walking guide to Port Moody's brewery street

Port Moody likes to call itself the City of the Arts, but for a growing number of visitors it is the city of the ale trail. Brewers Row, a three-block stretch of Murray Street, packs six craft breweries into a five-minute stroll, and it has turned this inlet-side suburb into a genuine beer destination.

How Brewers Row happened

It started as an accident. Back in 2014, two breweries opened on the same street in what was then seen as a sleepy suburb. When a third joined them on Murray Street, people started paying attention. The strip picked up the name Brewers Row, and the rest is local legend: today the street is the densest little brewery crawl in Metro Vancouver.

What to expect

The appeal of Brewers Row is variety in a tiny footprint. The breweries take different approaches to brewing, so a single afternoon can run from classic lagers and pale ales to hop-forward IPAs, barrel-aged projects and sours. Beer beginners and certified hopheads both get fed here.

Food is handled flexibly. The breweries offer some food options of their own, and all of them encourage you to visit the food trucks parked out front on Murray Street. Bringing takeout from one of the strip's food trucks into a tasting room is normal practice, not an exception.

Well-known names on and around the strip include Yellow Dog Brewing, The Parkside Brewery and Rewind Beer Co., among the rotating cast of taps. Lineups change, so check each brewery's current hours before you go, especially on weekdays.

Make a day of it

Brewers Row works best as part of a bigger Port Moody day. A classic itinerary:

• Start with coffee and a breakfast panini at Caffe Divano in Klahanie.
• Walk the Shoreline Trail through Rocky Point Park, where you can watch paddlers on Burrard Inlet from the recreational pier.
• Rent a kayak or paddleboard at Rocky Point Kayak on Esplanade if the weather cooperates.
• Wander up to Murray Street and work your way down Brewers Row at whatever pace feels right.
• Finish with dinner at one of the restaurants on St. Johns Street or in Suter Brook Village.

Getting there without driving

This is a brewery crawl, so plan the trip home. The easy answer is transit: Moody Centre Station, served by the Millennium Line's Evergreen Extension and the West Coast Express, is about a 10-minute walk from the Murray Street strip. That makes Brewers Row one of the few proper beer crawls in the region you can do entirely by SkyTrain.

Rideshare and taxis also serve the area, and there is street parking around Murray Street if someone in your group is the designated driver.

Good to know

• Most tasting rooms are family-friendly to a point, but rules vary by brewery; some welcome minors until a certain hour, others are 19+.
• Dogs are welcome on some patios but not inside most tasting rooms.
• Weekend afternoons, especially sunny ones, are the busiest. Come early for a patio seat.

The names to know

The strip's lineup has evolved over the years, but the current cast on and around Murray Street includes Yellow Dog Brewing, The Parkside Brewery and Rewind Beer Co. Yellow Dog is the veteran of the strip and one of its most decorated, Parkside leans into a community-living-room vibe with a big patio, and Rewind brings a retro streak to its branding and tap list. Hours and tap lists rotate, so check each brewery before a weekday visit.

Eating your way down the strip

The food-truck arrangement is the Row's quiet genius. Instead of six competing kitchens, the breweries share a rotating set of trucks parked out front, so your group can chase tacos with a lager at one stop and a smash burger with a sour at the next. For a sit-down meal before or after, St. Johns Street, Clarke Street and Suter Brook Village are all within walking distance.

When to go

Sunny weekend afternoons are peak Brewers Row: patios full, lines at the popular taps. For a calmer visit, aim for a weekday evening or an early weekend start. Most of the strip is an easy crawl, but pace yourself: five to six tasting rooms in an afternoon is a marathon, not a sprint, and the SkyTrain home is part of the plan.

A little local pride

Brewers Row gets name-checked well beyond the Tri-Cities. National and international beer writers have put Port Moody on craft-beer maps, and the BC Ale Trail includes the Row as one of its featured brewery itineraries. For a street most people outside the region could not name a decade ago, it has become a legitimate draw, and the locals treat it accordingly: part tourist attraction, part extended living room.