(CNN) Australian journalist Peter Lalor is something of a beer aficionado. He's written about brews for almost 25 years, but he balks at paying more than $10 for a pint.

"I like nice beer and nice wine, but I don't pay silly prices," he told CNN in an email.

That might've been true until he went for a beer at a hotel bar in Manchester, England. He expected to pay $6.76. He was charged more than 10,000 times more than that.

"See this beer? That is the most expensive beer in history," he tweeted with a photo of the budget-busting beverage.

Peter Lalor has had a lot of beer. Good beer, too. But he's certainly never had a drink worth more than the cost of a new car or a year of college tuition.

The ordeal started Sunday night after he dropped off a friend at a train station and stopped at the Malmaison Hotel. He asked for something British. To his dismay, the bartender suggested a Heineken. So he settled for an IPA (that ended up being Scottish).

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