Barfly Steve had business down in Washington, so I decided to jump on an Amtrak train and crash in his hotel
for a few days. The trip started off bad when I missed the train out of Egg Harbor City and thus was delayed
for about two hours until the next train came. I just had a few beers while I waited, to pass the time. After
finally boarding the train, I headed to the snack car and grabbed a Sam Adams. It was a bit pricey at $5, but I
expected as much. For the rest of the trip I just drank the bottle of Jack I had in my bag.
After arriving at the Hotel Monaco, in the middle of the city, I went to a bar located right behind the hotel called
Austin Grill. It was a tex/mex restaurant and they had every type of tequila I could ever imagine, most of which
I probably couldn’t afford. A little before 5:30, I left the bar and met Steve in the hotel for the daily wine
tasting. This translates to, “drink as much wine as humanly possible in an hour.” Below are pictures of the bar
and the hotel. The hotel used to be the Washington D.C. post office like a hundred years ago or something.
head out to a bar located on K St that I found on the internet. The hotel was on F St. so the bar was 5 blocks
away. It was after about three blocks that I remembered that Washington was a complete and utter shit hole.
After dark it is impossible to walk anywhere without being harassed by scary people every 20 feet. And this
was a very expensive nice area of Washington! The bad areas are like demilitarized zones.
So, to make a long story short, I decided it would be best to just go to Coyote Ugly, which was only 1 block
from the hotel. There was a good crowd in there because of some poker tournament upstairs and of course, the
bartenders danced on the bar, which is always a good thing.
The next day I decided to do the tourist thing and see the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence and
all of the monuments and stuff. The Spy museum was pretty cool and I would recommend it. Here are some
of my typical, crappy touristy pictures.
behind. When they got closer I realized it was none other than German Chancellor Angela Merkel, coming to
visit G.W.! I wanted to get close to the White House to get a good view of the meet and greet, but the police
and secret service made us move back a good distance. Oh, well.
get drunk on Beringer Merlot and Chardonnay, before heading down the street to Gordon Biersch Brewery for
dinner. It was a really nice place with a good atmosphere, but the prices were still reasonable. The white trash
factor was 0. They had a ton of homemade beers on tap and I tried as many as I possibly could. Here are a
couple of pictures from the bar. For some reason, Steve looks like a little crazed, like Jack Nicholson, in “The
Shining”. Come to think of it, this would explain the two little girls I keep seeing around the hotel and that lake
of blood by the elevators. Not to mention that corpse that seduced me in room 237.
fine upstanding bar. When I walked in, a man in a suit escorted me to a nice table, with a tablecloth, a candle
and some flowers. This seemed like a very classy place until I looked up and...gasp…there were naked women
dancing! Being the philanthropist that I am, I felt a strong urge to help these single mothers and struggling
college students. Plus, I spent like $1.35 to get here so I decided to stay for a beer or, um, ten. Although they
allow the girls to be fully nude here, lap dances are illegal in Washington. Unfortunately, all of the bars in D.C.
close at 2:00, so I had to go back to the hotel for the night afterwards. I’m spoiled living near AC, where the
bars are 24 hours. I didn't bring my camera with me, so here's a link to their site.
On the train home the next day, I had a two hour layover in Philly, so I grabbed some lunch at Bridgewater’s
Pub in the station. Not only was the food really good, but they had a lot of different beers on tap, most of
which I’ve never heard of. If you’re ever taking a train through Philly, I would recommend stopping by. I
really didn’t expect to find a bar like this is a train station.