Trolley Trail Barhopping
This past Saturday (May 27) my friend Brandon and I spent the most of the day (about 15 hours) barhopping along Wornall and the Trolley Track Trail.
We met for breakfast at 9:15am at Sharp's [map] in Brookside. After filling up we made a stop at Brandon's house where we each kicked it off with a bottle of Wild Huckleberry Wheat Lager that he brought back from a recent trip to Montana. We then headed down to 89th & Wornall to start off our journey.
10:30am: Flo's Poke-a-Dot Lounge. [map]
Flo turns out to be a man... short for Floyd. This bar has a classic painting of a nude woman on black velvet hanging on the wall. We were the only customers under the age of 60. As we were close to finishing our beers, a napkin was suddenly slid in front of Brandon. Before I could look to see what was going on, Brandon leaned over to me and whispered "How fast can you chug your beer?" "Pretty fast," I replied. "Do it," he said. We chugged. Why? An old man to his left had just pulled out a plastic bag filled with 2 pounds of shrimp and started passing it around. Now I love shrimp, but I'm not going to eat it from a plastic bag brought in by some old guy at a bar. We made excuses about beeing full and bolted. As we started to back out of the parking space another old man knocked on the car window, holding a fistfull of shrimp. "What the hell am I supposed to do with this?" laughed the old man, fleeing the bar in an unsuccessful attempt to escape the shrimping.
Who'd have thought the oddest event of the day would happen at the first bar we visited?
Beers drunk: Bud Lite (me), Bud Lite (Brandon)
10:50am: The Grand Saloon. [map]
This places has free BBQ on Saturday afternoons around 4:00. We discussed Ray Harryhousen and in particular The Kraken, and a special personal meaning of "The Wrath of Khan".
Beers drunk: Miller Light (me), Bud Select (Brandon)
11:15am: Walsh's Corner Cocktail. [map]
This place was decked out in an Irish decor but didn't have any Irish beers on tap. We were the only customers in the place.
Beers drunk: Natural Lite (me), Natural Lite (Brandon)
This is where we parked the car for the day and did the rest on foot. From here on out, we followed Wornall and/or the Trolley Track Trail north hitting up all the bars we saw.
11:25am: The Village Lounge. [map]
The movie "First Knight" was being shown on all the bar TVs.
Beers drunk: Michelob Ultra Amber (me), Miller (Brandon)
11:55am: Jake's Smokehouse BBQ. [map]
I can't remember if we went here with the intention of eating or just to check to see if they had any beer. Well, we didn't eat. :)
Beers drunk: Guiness (me), Guiness (Brandon)
12:20pm: DeAngelo's. [map]
This place has a cool split-level bar, with a big screen in one corner and a pool table in another.
Beers drunk: Miller Lite (me), Bud (Brandon)
Our next stop was Cash America Pawn [map], not because we needed more booze change but just because we wanted to have a look around.
On the way to the next bar we stopped at Taco Bell for some cold drinks to recharge ourselves and to use what could be the world's tallest urinal. (I'm 6'4" and almost had to stand on my toes.) [map]
1:00pm: Tommy Farha's. [map]
The place with the white hearse in front.
Beers drunk: Michelob Lite (me), Michelob Ultra (Brandon)
We then made a side trip into Waldo Pets to look at all the cool fish and reptiles. [map]
Drunken visits to pet stores rock.
Our next stop was the Berliner Bear. [map]
Now, we already knew before going in that they had lost their liquor license in part due to the fallout from an incident there in the Spring of 2005. But we played dumb and went in to ask for beer anyway, because we just had to go in and see for ourselves the place where this happened last year:
1:55pm: Lew's Grill & Bar. [map]
Beers drunk: Coors Light (me), Coors Light (Brandon)
2:30pm: 75th Street Brewery. [map]
Beers drunk: Muddy Mo Stout (me) Weed Whacker (Brandon)
3:00pm: Kennedy's. [map]
The place where the men's restroom is the entire second floor.
Beer drunk: Harp (me), Harp (Brandon) (I think)
3:30pm: Fin's Waldo Bar & Grill. [map]
All the TVs here were showing "The Patriot"
Beers drunk: PBR (me) PBR (Brandon) (I think)
4:00pm: Bobby Baker's Lounge. [map]
At $4 a draw this was the most expensive beer we bought all day. Unfortunately for Brandon this fell on his turn to pay.
Beers drunk: Guiness (me), Guiness (Brandon)
4:20pm: Tanner's. [map]
We took a little bit of a break here and had some lunch.
Beers drunk: Flying Monkey (me), Flying Monkey (Brandon)
5:45pm: Back at Brandon's house to watch some TV and get our second wind.
Beers drunk: Wild Huckleberry (me), ?? (Brandon)
7:00pm: Governor Stumpy's. [map]
We spent a lot of time here playing bar trivia.
Beers drunk: Stella Artois (me), a Margarita (Brandon) (ok, technically not a beer)
Bye-bye, BrandsMart...
8:40pm: The Gaf. [map]
A bartender told us on a prior visit that they may start serving tapas here soon. Our bartender today was a recent transplant from New Zealand.
Beers drunk: Smithwick's (me) Strongbow (Brandon)
9:10pm: The Brooksider. [map]
Beers drunk: Bud Lite (me), Bud Lite (Brandon)
9:35pm: Charlie Hooper's. [map]
Beers drunk: Miller High Life (me), Miller High Life (Brandon)
We were now pretty hungry and worked out way towards the Plaza. We first went to The Peanut [map] only to find it way too packed, so we used the restroom and then slipped out the back door. We continued on to The Plaza. Our next attempt was O'Dowd's [map] but they had a cover charge and neither of us like to pay just to buy beer. Next try was California Pizza Kitchen -- closed. We then tried another place and it was closed too. Finally we tried Pizzeria Uno, success!
11:05pm: Pizzeria Uno. [map] Important note: they are open until 1:30 and never stop serving food.
We got our supper here.Beer drunk: None -- we tried and tried and just couldn't get any more beer into us.
Brandon's wife picked us up at midnight and took us back to their house, where my girlfriend arrived a moment later to take me back home.
STATS:
Total bars visited: 19 (but only drank at 17 of them)
Total beers consumed by each: 19
Men's room visits: Too numerous to count
Questionable shrimp avoided: 2 lbs.
My beers:
- Wild Huckleberry (x2)
- Bud Lite (x2)
- Miller Lite (x2)
- Natural Light
- Michelob Ultra Amber
- Guiness (x2)
- Michelob Lite
- Coors Lite
- Muddy Mo Stout
- Harp
- PBR
- Flying Monkey
- Stella Artois
- Smithwick's
- Miller High Life
Brandon's beers:
- Wild Huckleberry
- Bud Lite (x2)
- Bud Select
- Natural Light
- Miller
- Guiness (x2)
- Bud
- Michelob Ultra
- Coors Lite
- Weed Whacker
- Harp
- PBR
- Flying Monkey
- ??
- Margarita* (not technically a beer but we'll count it)
- Strongbow
- Miller High Life
It was a great day and a lot of fun. Amazingly, no hangover! Pacing ourselves helpedf, as did actually eating some food this time, drinking lots of water, and not adding any hard liquor to the mix. I'm looking forward to doing it again!
