Bikes and Beer seem to go together these days like Laverne & Shirley. So it’s no wonder that when I was trying to find a way to get around Eugene, Oregon on my day trip there by train from Portland, I found myself on a bike from a brewery. Falling Sky Brewing dons clouds in their logo and “let it pour” as a slogan, a nod to Eugene’s notoriety of being one of the nation’s cloudiest cities. I felt in my element riding around on a coaster bike with brewery branding all over it on a fall day with light drizzle. It came from their free bike share program: stop by their pub, put down a deposit, and get the bike – complete with a helmet and lock – for 24 hours. I felt a teeny bit guilty riding around to other breweries in town with it, but then again, it’s a service for the community, and I was a riding advertisement for Falling Sky all day long.

Falling Sky is trying to distinguish itself in a city that’s spawned some pretty well-known breweries. Ninkasi is among the fifty largest in the country. Oakshire is celebrating ten years of brewing and has expanded into some East Coast markets. Hop Valley was recently purchased by MillerCoors. But Falling Sky is something unique on its own – part brewery, part delicatessen, part homebrew shop, part pizzeria (they now operate out of four different locations). The brewery has created a small empire in Eugene in the span of just four years, and established their role in the community with efforts like charitable beers, the bike share program, and even a collaborative beer to promote mass transit. You might say that it’s all very… Oregon. And it is.

The beer here is also very Oregon. That is, a salute to the land around the brewery. Eugene is in the Willamette Valley, one of the biggest hop growing regions in the world. So it’s no wonder that they make their share of hop-forward beers, like the double dry-hopped Exposure IPA or the Polar Melt Pale Ale. But they also delve into a variety of styles from overseas, from English Bitters to German Hefeweizens, Czech Pilsners to Belgian Pale Ales. They’ve brewed well over 200 different beers, and that innovation means a visit one time may be far different from the next. But each visit is worth biking back for… lest you lose your $150 bike share deposit.

Falling Sky Brewing, 1334 Oak Alley, Eugene, Oregon