The first Cozy Josie’s Brooklyn Beat Pub Crawl was last night, and it was a great time!  If you follow me on Twitter or at least read the tweets on the left side of this blog, you know some of the highlights, but let me fill you in on a seven hour epic journey through the neighborhood.

We started at 8pm at Cornelius, which is between Pacific and Dean on Vanderbilt.  The surroundings are kind of desolate, but the bar is gorgeous, reminiscent of an old train car like the ones its namesake (Cornelius Vanderbilt) owned in the 1800s.  They have quite a few tables as well as a long dark wood bar.  I had a seasonal cocktail called the Petal Pusher: gin, berry puree, creme de violet, and lime.  Very nicely balanced, sweet without being super sugary.  I wish I’d been hungry, because they also have a delicious-looking food menu, with everything from oysters by the piece to whole roasted fish and macaroni and cheese with bacon and truffle oil.  Price-wise, it was fancy but manageable; while my specialty drink was $10, beers on tap were $5.  The atmosphere was relaxed and not at all pretentious, and we’ll certainly be going back there.

After gathering a few more folks, we headed to Weather Up, which is on Vanderbilt between Dean and Bergen at an unmarked storefront (it’s the one with all the white tile in front).  The vibe there is definitely upscale and stylized; the bartender has a handlebar mustache and wears a vest.  I had a Ward 8, with bourbon and pomegranate.  It’s pretty hard to get away with not spending a lot here, since most of their cocktails are $11, but it’s a good “event” bar, the kind of place you might go for a first drink on your birthday.  Also, here’s where we met the only brave soul who didn’t know me personally and came out to the pub crawl anyway.  Great to meet you, Mike!  See you around the neighborhood.  (My friend Chris wanted me to mention that the bathrooms here are nice.  Same with Cornelius, nice bathrooms.)

By 10 or so we made it to Soda Bar on Vanderbilt between St. Marks and Prospect, which is one of our frequent hangouts in Prospect Heights.  They have good food and a kitchen that’s open late (this is where my gentleman friend and I ate at 12:30am when we finished moving him into a previous apartment.)  We drank beers on tap and ate onion rings, french fries, and cheese and potato pierogies.  Had it been nicer, we would have sat in their large backyard garden, but the table we grabbed inside was just fine.  We love Soda for being a solid, affordable neighborhood bar with great bar food.

Around midnight we traded some crawlers who had to be up early for those who had gotten off work late and headed to Franklin Park, the beer garden on St. John’s between Classon and Franklin.  My main goals here were dancing and Doc’s Draft Pear Cider, both of which we achieved.  Franklin Park has a large outdoor area and two indoor bars, one of which is in a much larger space with a fireplace and arcade games, and on the weekends, dancing!  No one there is a very good dancer, or at least the great dancers are outnumbered by dorky people, so everyone’s free to cut loose and have a good time as the DJ spins everything from Jackson 5 to 90s hip hop.  Crowds here and at Soda are much more diverse than at the first two places, which I always appreciate.

Finally, at 2:00 we made it to our last stop, good old Washington Commons.  I’ve written about “our” bar before, so I’ll just say that it was the perfect place to wind down from a long night.  Thanks again to everyone who came out, I had a great time.  And as we always say, we love going out in the neighborhood because it’s easy to get home.