Thanks to Stan and Jay for letting me host this month's Session. It's been a great experience reading through everyone's posts. Without any delay here are this month's posts.

Past Festival Experiences
Rick of Lyke 2 Drink takes a stroll down memory lane with revisiting to the 1993 Capital Region Microbrewers Festival.

Brewmaster Matt of Sports Beer Wine Life Maybe Not In That Order looks back on the festivals he's experienced and a word of caution about attending them.

Jon at the Brew Site shares his Oregon Beer Festival experiences.

Keith at Brainard Brewing recalls his recent experience helping at a local beer festival.

Up in Canada Stephen at That's the Spirit attends the Mondial de la Biere festival in Montreal

From across the pond Ally at Impy Malting tells us about her first Great British Beer Festival. Thom at Black Cat Brewery also joins in with his experience at GBBF and says how not to attend a beer festival.

Then on the continent Andreea of Glorious Food and Wine and Belgian Beers takes us away to the distant festival of no, not in Beligum but the first Czech beer festival.

Festivals - Changing Relationships and How to Improve Them
Jay at Brookston Beer Bulletin talks about his changing relationship with beer festivals over the years.

Alan at the Good Beer Blog tells us how he 'hates' beer festivals. But perhaps really just a bit of sour grapes, er barley.

Lew Bryson explains how he doesn't quite enjoy festivals as much as he once did, but he does now look forward to the after party.

Jim at Lootcorp 3.0 tells of his Love-Hate relationship with festivals and what he'd like to see at them.

The Beer Nut looks at what makes for a festival then takes the topic for a bit of a turn to the strong beers, for those who were clamoring for more of a beer tasting this month I suspect the Beer Nut's post will help satisfy the need.

Rob at Sophisticated Brews and Sustenance in the Windy City expounds about what he would like to see at a beer festival.

Rob at Pfiff! explains “that if every small town had an annual festival held in the environs of a historic building with ample patio space, under some of the first sunshine of the early spring, where you could relaxedly catch up with the locals while gawking at the out-of-towners, grilled brat in hand, you might not even need the beer to make it worthwhile" but why would you want to do it without the beer.

Andy at Beer Buzz gives us his take what is takes for a good festival.

Bailey and Boak, last month's Session host, tell what they would like to see in festival.

Last on how to improve the current beer festival scene my own humble offering.

Future Festivals and Festival Advice
Stan, founder of the Session, mentions the future beer festivals he'll be attending.

Al at Hop Talk offers us advice on how to find beer festivals.

David took the topic to explore how beer events are changing in his local area of Fredericksburg, VA.

Bill at It's Pub Night explains to us how to navigate the Oregon Brewers Festival (aka OBF). This is a festival that has been on my must attend list for quite some time and while I may not put his advice to use this year I plan to test it out next year.

Heath, writing at Bottles of Barley, gives us his two simple rules about beer festivals.

Dave at Hair of Dog Dave sends in an announcement for Pizza Port 11th Real Ale festival.

Last for now but certainly not least Captain Hops sends us out with some beer festival haiku.

When I decided on the topic of Beer Festivals for the Session I didn't know exactly what to expect. I thought a few tales about great past festivals and at least one report on a Great American Beer Festival, but I got something a bit different. More often it was more about the dissatisfaction with the current beer festivals. I'd hoped this discussion would show the best part of craft brewing, but perhaps it more shows the growing popularity of craft beer and where festivals need to work harder to improve.

Next month's host of the Session is Rob at Pfiff so check there in the coming weeks for the topic announcement.

ps - Apology if my descriptions are a bit brief on this month's Session got a bit of cold today.

pps - We have a late addition to this month's Session Josh at Beer Dinners brings us the recent SAVOR event in DC with a video post.

Another addition to the list Troy at Great Canadian Pubs and Beer adds his experiences into mix.