'Creative plumbing' delivers beer

A woman said she thought she was in heaven when she turned on the kitchen tap to find a plentiful supply of beer.

Haldis Gundersen was planning to do the washing up when she made the unusual discovery at her apartment in Kristiansund, west Norway.

But two flights below, workers in a bar faced the more disappointing realisation that water was flowing from their beer taps.

A worker had connected a beer barrel to the apartment water pipe by mistake.

"I turned on the tap to clean some knives and forks, and beer came out," Ms Gundersen told Reuters news agency. "We thought we were in heaven."

But the beer was flat and tasted odd, she said.

'Really creative'

Downstairs at the Big Tower Bar, workers realised what the problem was - a new barrel had been misconnected to Ms Gundersen's water supply.

"The water and beer pipes do touch each other, but you have to be really creative to connect them together," said Per Egil Myrvang from the local beer distributor. He helped employees to rectify the problem over the telephone.

Ms Gundersen bore no grudge. "If it happens again, I'm going to order Baileys," she said.

In Norway, the sale of alcohol is controlled through a state monopoly and beer prices are some of the highest in the world.