Not sure quite what to make of this one, but here it is anyway.

Smithsonian magazine’s food and beverage columnist Alastair Bland has launched “Find the Beer! A California Trail of Ales,” a game wherein he leaves a beer stashed at various locations around northern California. Your job is to find the beer and replace it with a beer of your choice. He has just one request: use a glass bottle, not a canned beer, since cans can deteriorate under harsh weather. He specifies the locations, sort of. Several of them are in our immediate area:

• Around the Big River Bridge on Highway 1 in Mendocino County, where he has stashed an Anderson Valley Brewing Barney Flats Oatmeal Stout.
• In Napa County on the Trinity-Oakville Grade section of Dry Creek Road, where he has stashed a Lagunitas Undercover Investigation Shutdown Ale.

The other locations are Muir Woods Road in Marin County; Old Highway 1 near Pacifica; and just of I-5 near Shasta Lake. See his post for more specific directions.

Why?

Why not, I guess. Bland explains this kind of game has been the rage on France over the last year and he’s been stowing beers all around Southern France, including along the route of the Tour de France. Now he’s decided to expand the game to the U.S.

He asks that you comment on his site to explain what you found and what you left. Let us know too, please?

– Sean Scully