Get your drink on, and exercise—at the same time!
It’s a lovely sunny Sunday in San Francisco. But the effects of Saturday night’s boozy indiscretions are making your head pound and you just want to dive headfirst into a bloody mary. But who wants to sit inside a dark bar on such a gorgeous day?
The solution to this dichotomous quandary is simple: get on a bike and head to the Mission, where you’ll find a high concentration of open-early, bloody-mary-serving, microbrew-pouring bars.
This past Sunday, the boyfriend and I spent the day doing exactly that. I dusted off my rusty Scwhinn, packed a messenger bag with a deck of cards, a cribbage board, a couple of extra layers of clothing, a bike lock and a bottle of water and we hit the sunny streets, bound first for the Zeitgeist for bloody marys.
Zeitgeist • 199 Valencia Street @ Duboce, San Francisco (415) 255-7505
Zeitgeist isn’t for everyone. It is easy for some people to be put off by the old, dusty interior, the scarred bar, the broken tile floor, the musty windows, the dozens of motorcycles parked on the sidewalk out front, and the heavily tattooed but fabulous and sweet bartenders. The jukebox is loud, the beers are cold and the bloody marys are just perfect for a Sunday morning. We procured libations and repaired to the beer garden, which at the Zeitgeist, is more of a beer parking lot as it is a huge yard filled with long communal picnic tables, whimsical and slightly psychedelic murals, an old tow truck transformed into a exhibit of pretty succulents. The billowing, fragrant smoke of the outdoor barbecue makes your mouth and your eyes water and I’ll tell you, the burgers that come off this grill are among the best you’ll find in the city and they’re cheap.
Kilowatt • 3160 16th Street btw. Guerrero & Valencia San Francisco (415) 861-2595
A quick ride down Valencia landed us at the Kilowatt, a bar that is virtually unchanged over the course of its long life. Dark and pleasant, good music on the jukebox a super friendly bartender and an excellent selection of beer made our short time here quite worthy. But we were eager to try someplace we’d never been. So after one delicious Hop Rod Rye (Bear Republic), we were back on the bikes. A trip down to Folsom landed us at a magical little bar that was new to us.
Homestead • 2301 Folsom @ 19th Street San Francisco (415) 282-4663
Which brings us to stop number three. Homestead is a little bit like your grandma's house in that pleasant, cozy, non-smelly way. It has pretty fuzzy red wallpaper, lovely wooden details and a sparse yet classy ambiance. The bartender was ever-so sweet and the crowd in the bar was clearly local, neighborhood types and my only complaint about them is that they seemed to fear the jukebox. The BF and I were the only ones stepping up to the musical plate. Which I guess isn't all bad. Their beer selection doesn't suck, but it isn’t great either. But they have a variety of yummy liquid snacks in the pretty bottles behind the bar, and I'll be planning an outing to this little place soon, sans bicycle, and tie one on proper with a couple of 209 martinis. Here we ran into some friends who were on their way to yet another bar we’d never been to, so we were back on the bikes to race them there.
Sadie’s Flying Elephant • 491 Potrero Ave @ Mariposa, San Francisco (415) 551-7988
Sadie’s was one of those places I’d always heard about, had always wanted to go, but had never been. I hate to say it, but it was somewhat disappointing, especially after the cozy loveliness of Homestead. I’d always been led to expect this sort of funky bohemian punk rock dive. But it was just a dive. Nothing particularly original about it. However, I did hear they recently changed ownership, which can alter the soul of a bar. I may return if I was in the neighborhood. The free popcorn was definitely a plus.
Dirty Thieves • 3050 24th St btw Lucky St & Treat Ave San Francisco (415) 824-5954
Formerly Treat Street Cocktails, Dirty Thieves is one of the great Thieves empire that consists also of Thieves Tavern and Whiskey Thieves, both fine drinking establishments. While I wasn’t immediately aswoon with Dirty Thieves, it’s got potential. It didn’t help that they were out of beer gas thereby limiting our sudsy options. Also, Young Frankenstein was on the TV at full volume. Now, I loves me some Young Frankenstein, but I wasn’t really in the mood to watch TV you know? I kind of wanted to, I don’t know, hang out in a bar and drink beer and listen to music. All of these desires were thwarted, so it wasn’t the most successful stop of our afternoon. But it is surely a pleasant place and I have high hopes for visit number two.
Gestalt Haus • 3159 16th St btw Guerrero & Valencia, San Francisco (415) 560-0137
This, was our final and most fabulous destination for our day-long bike bar hop. We had begun at one in the afternoon and found ourselves in this comfortable, dark German-beer-hall-meets-SF-bike-shop bar, happily considering not only a good selection of beer, but also a choice list of sausages. They offered their beers not only by the everyday pint, but also the .5 liter and the liter. Had this been the beginning of our day, we may have indulged in a couple of the huge liter mugs, filled to the brim with fine German beer or one of the craft brews they had on tap. As it was, we were pretty toasted and it was to be pints only for us. The sausages were delicious and served on organic rolls with optional sauerkraut. The bartender was friendly and attentive and the locals were friendly. Perhaps a mite too friendly…
Thus we concluded our bar-crawl on bikes. We rode home, uphill, gasping and drunk and swearing to do it all again very soon. The best part was, not only did we save on cab fare, but we got some exercise to counteract all of the beer.
