Denver, CO
Before I fill you in on the next post - I am working on the issues with the RSS feed for the blog so hopefully if you chose to "subscribe" (using the button at the bottom of the page) you will soon receive emails if there are new posts! I thought I had it all set but it appears I need to do a little more investigating.
Now back to the trip...
Our second day in Denver was our first non-travel day of the trip and boy were we more tired than we realized! Mike woke up earlier with the dog and grabbed coffees and pastries from Black Eye Coffee which hit the spot. Then we swung over to a dog park downtown and ran some errands including picking up some new dog toys for our little destroyer.
Back in our LoHi neighborhood we decided to grab lunch at Avanti - a restaurant "incubator" (or food court) housed in shipping containers! This was just a couple blocks from our airBnB and we got some Italian food with a side of curly fries. The vibe was very chill, mostly young people - seemingly young professionals taking an extended lunch break! There was a bar on each floor and the second floor offered some nice views of downtown Denver.
Following lunch we cruised over to the nearby dispensary Simply Pure where, as expected, the super friendly staff helped us figure out what we were looking for and we left stocked. After sampling our goods we took a long nap while watching a not-that-great documentary about John Lennon. Spoiler alert - he dies. We also coined the phrase "nap-limating" as we excused our waste of the afternoon on high altitude acclimation!
We were hungry when we woke up so we decided to go to an interesting restaurant called There which turned out to have great pork buns! Afterwards, we decided to take a stroll over the highway to stop by the sign-less My Brother's Bar.
If local history is correct, My Brother's is Denver's oldest bar. The saloon got its start in 1873 and over the years turned into Paul's Place — where Neal Cassady, the inspiration for Jack Kerouac's On the Road, might still have an outstanding tab. Until it was recently sold, the bar displayed a letter posted on the bar's wall that Cassady sent a pal while sequestered in the Colorado State Reformatory: "I frequented the place occasionally & consequently have a small bill run up, I believe I owe them about 3 or 4 dollars. If you happen to be in that vicinity please drop in & pay it, will you?"
The bar itself is a great corner pub and its history lends it plenty of charm. Our white haired and bearded bartender mentioned to us that one of the server's kids thinks he's Santa Claus. Little did we know he would turn out to be our Santa Claus too! He noticed I was having Jameson and club sodas and asked if we had ever tried Green Spot Irish whiskey which we hadn't and we were treated to a taste on the house! It was the smoothest whiskey I think I've ever had and highly recommend giving it a try if you see it around!
Buzzing a little more than we bargained for, we decided to call it a night and laughed our way back to our little pink home. We slept well and woke up ready to head onward and upward into the Rockies!
