Wednesday 12th of June 2013 01:19:10 PM

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Spinnakers is a venerable Victoria institution that must be visited and is well worth the visit. The building looks like a large, slightly overgrown, house right next to the Inner Harbour (on the north side, away from the tourist part of town). A gift shop (baked goods, house-made chocolates and malt vinegars, etc.) is the first room you encounter as you enter. Next is a small bar and the restaurant reception area. Continuing straight ahead is the large, multi-level dining area with full south-facing windows. Outdoor deck seating wraps around the exterior of the dining area.

Going up the wooden stairs just to the right of the reception area takes you to the taproom. This consists of two rooms and an outdoor deck. The first room is dark with mostly tall dark wood tables with chairs or stools, two pool tables off to one side, two dart boards, some large screen TVs, and a small bar with a few stools. The second room is bright with full windows facing south overlooking the Inner Harbour and the Olympic Mountains. The floors are quarry tile and there are a number of marble-topped tables. On each of our latest visits, there has been a very comfortable and lively pub atmosphere.

The beer selection is good and has broadened from Spinnakers early focus on English-style beers. They do, however, always have several well-kept cask beers available.

The food is quite good, with some pub classics (fish & chips) and some nicer, upscale choices on a rotating specials menu (our spot prawns were delicious). A special item on the dessert menu is a sampling of chocolate truffles, each paired with an appropriate beer (it's included in the price of your stay at the Spinnakers Guesthouses).

Wednesday 24th of August 2011 08:09:14 AM

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A great brew pub (Canada’s very first brew pub) in an awesome location right on the water with a big and really nice patio. They have a great selection of beers including cask ales. I have not been there in awhile but from what I remember from my last few visits the food was also pretty good. And from what I can remember my favourite beer from the last time I was there was the dunkel.

Thursday 1st of October 2009 05:23:38 PM

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After taking a water taxi across the bay we arrived to Spinnakers Brewpub and wow what a view of the entire bay. The beer better be good and after trying the taster tray I was impressed. This was going to be our final meal and beers on our Victoria BC trip. The English bitter was buttery and tasty. The dark ales where also very good and the porter was one fine brew. This place made there own malt vinegar with the beer malts so they had about 5 different flavors from English ale to porter malt vinegars. We found out you can also stay here and over look the bay all night. I am thinking next time we might try to stay here. We found the service to be very good and the food was also excellent. We will be back.

Sunday 26th of July 2009 12:18:10 PM

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This Place Rocks, Great beer and great food! Lots of great beer on beer engines, and they make thier own beer based malt vinegar, IPA malt vinegar on a nice piece of beer battered local salmon, oh yea!

OK, I need 75 words to make this a quality review so I will say we are staying in a hostel in downtown Victoria, the brewpub was a nice 30 min walk across the bridge and along the water, and an even nicer walk back after an IPA and double IPA, yum!