MARQUETTE — The highly anticipated U.P. Fall Beer Festival is coming up this weekend.

Local breweries are busy preparing for this sought out event. This 8th annual event kicks off on Saturday and has a great variety of vendors from the area.

Blackrocks Brewery, the Ore Dock, and Vierling are just to name a few of the vendors who will be at the event.

“It’s always one of the biggest festivals that Marquette has, it’s well appreciated. We got four beers going down there, we got our famous blueberry wheat of course the Brewer Chummly’s has a few special items,” said Vierling Restaurant Owner/Operator, Terry Doyle.

These special items have not yet been announced and will be a surprise for festival attendees. The biggest challenge that local restaurants face once the festival ends, is the dinner rush, which isn’t a bad problem to have.

“It’s so easy to drink so many samples and then you may find you get a little inebriated, so people should drink responsibly. The challenge is the dinner hour when everyone leaves the festival and wants to come in and have dinner and so on and so forth,” said Doyle.

Tickets are still available and cost forty dollars, they can also be purchased the day of the event at Mattson Park for an extra five bucks.