#2231 - High Climber Room (Logger Restaurant), Astoria, OR - 7/15/2013

I always stop for a "Spar," a "Logger," or a "Pastime,"  including this place, listed as in Astoria but well south of the city on Old Highway 30. The food here is typical diner fare and the bar is typical dive drinking options (although the bar is too light, neat, and new to feel like a dive bar). A few tourists stop to eat, but it's mostly older locals. Our stop was pretty much what you would expect for a roadside joint, with the exception of a cook (not sure if she was the owner or had just been there long enough to feel like she was) being unnecessarily bitchy to the bartender.

Logger Restaurant, High Climber Room, Astoria, OR

42929 Old US Highway 30, Astoria, OR 97103 - (503) 458-6886
Reviews: yelp - tripadvisor - urbanspoon

#2230 - Conestoga, Clatskanie, OR - 7/15/2013

Conestoga Restaurant and Bar, Clatskanie, OR

The Conestoga Restaurant and Bar is located "in downtown Clatskanie, across from Humps at the main stoplight." The iconic wheels were removed for safety, and now the red and white forms of the Conestoga wagon float mysteriously about the restaurant door. Inside is a diner, with a classic neighborhood dive in back. It's been cleaned up recently by some new owners, who improved the food, and will tell you about various types of businesses previously in the space, including, as it so often is in these small towns, the city mortuary.

85 N Nehalem St, Clatskanie, OR 97016 - (503) 728-3702
Web site: facebook
Reviews: yelp

#2229 - Quay Restaurant and Bar, Vancouver, WA - 7/12/2013

Stepping into the Quay Bar in Vancouver Washington's riverside Red Lion can feel a bit like stepping on board the Flying Dutchman. The feeling strikes you initially as you take in the considerable work done to make it appear that you are in an 18th century sailing ship. Slightly less ancient are the pop cover songs coming from the bands there on weekend evenings, as the 50-ish crowd hits the dance floor to early 80s rock. But the sense of doom does not come only from the dance floor -- the building itself is slated to be demolished as efforts move forward to build a new, much wider bridge here where I-5 crosses the Columbia River to Portland. And perhaps partially due to that impending fate, you can sometimes find your party sitting forlorn at a table and starting to wonder if there really were any servers in the place, or if those were just ghosts, now slunk back to their watery graves, the promise of foodstuff now just a haunting memory.

Quay Restaurant and Bar, Red Lion Vancouver, WA

As if to further make you doubt your senses, the Red Lion web site doesn't reveal a hint of the abundant ship decor in any photos or descriptions of the restaurant. Here's their description of the bar:

"Adjacent to the restaurant and overlooking the Columbia River, the bar has a pool table, and offers live entertainment Friday and Saturday evenings."

That's right. A pool table!

Quay Restaurant and Bar, Red Lion Vancouver, WA

The people are fairly nice, and the hotel, restaurant and bar are all adequate, but they feel like a golden opportunity lost. You should go to the Quay Restaurant to check out the sailing ship decor and the fine view of the Columbia River. If the buffet is open, you should definitely choose that option -- not because there is anything particularly great about the buffet, but because it's a bit dicey whether a server will happen by any time soon (a lesson learned on our first visit and reinforced on our second). If you like any music written after 1981, you might want to skip the band. Enjoy the location and trouble not your mind over what could have been.

Quay Restaurant and Bar, Red Lion Vancouver, WA

Red Lion's exciting photo of the Quay Bar's exotic decor.

100 Columbia Street, Vancouver, WA 98660 - 360-694-8341
Est. 1962
Web site: redlion.com
Reviews: tripadvisor - yelp - urbanspoon - examiner - barflymag

#2228 - Lady Luck's Cowgirl Up, Tacoma, WA - 7/12/2013

A large, old west themed bar, with serving girls that dance on the bar to country music.  They serve diner style steaks and standards, and decorate the knotty pine walls with beer corporation paraphernalia.

14114 Pacific Ave S, Tacoma, WA 98444 - (253) 538-4996
Est. 2004
Web site: ladyluckcowgirlup.com - facebook
Reviews: tacomaweekly - yelp - urbanspoon

#2227 #1152 - some random bar, Seattle - 7/10/2013

No, I wasn't so drunk that I can't even remember the name, they really did name this place "Some Random Bar." It's the first bar from Mike Maione, who decided to put his biology degree aside and move back to Seattle from Florida with his wife Jean Wallace and start a bar and restaurant in Seattle. The bar is in the former space of the short-lived C.S. Finnegan's, and seems a bit like a bar in the middle of some small town, that tries to bring a little bit of everything. They have Seahawks and soccer games -- and moved to the televisions so that you can watch from the bar with a neck injury -- and some interesting cocktails and food choices.  There's are eight beer taps with a "no crap on tap" policy and menu items like twice-cooked oxtails, lamb tongue salad, and chicken fried quail.

It's hard to tell if this place is going to catch on and make it, but the owners are very nice and it's a kind of place you root for.

2604 1st Ave, Seattle, WA 98121 - (206) 745-2185
Est. July 9, 2013 - Building constructed: 1903
Previous bars in this location: C.S. Finnegan's Irish House
Web site:  somerandombar.com
Reviews:  thrillist - seattlemet - cornichon - yelp - thestranger

#2226 - Rainier Bar and Grill, Enumclaw, WA - 7/7/2013

Rainier Bar and Grill, Enumclaw, WA

In 2005 new owners converted this historic dive to a cleaned up bar and grill with more contemporary pub food and cocktails. They refer to it as a "gastropub" which should be understood to mean nothing particularly fancy, but a large menu of restaurant quality food, definitely a cut above typical dive bar fare, with better than average burgers, sandwiches, wraps, and seafood options, along with fairly standard beers and cocktails. These are served by a friendly staff working in front of a nice, antique Brunswick-Balke-Collender back bar, and the place is said to be packed on weekend evenings.

The Bohemian, and former Rainier Wine House, in the current
location of the Rainier Bar and Grill, Enumclaw, WA

Historical notes: The Facebook page claims that the location hosted the Rainier Wine House as far back as 1904, the Bohemian Bar shortly after that, and a Rainier Beer wholesale distribution site founded in 1913 -- and features a photograph of a wooden building featuring the "Rainier Wine House" and "Bohemian" signs. The current brick structure was built during state-wide prohibition in 1917. Wally Duchateau writes in the Enumclaw Courier Herald that it was a "a speakeasy in the 1920s, a card room in the 1930s and 40s and a favorite watering hole for loggers in the 1950s." However, in the Sigrid city directory for 1934, available in the Enumclaw Plateau Historical Museum a few blocks away, the location is already listed as the "Rainier Bar." Thus it is likely that the location returned to a licensed tavern very soon after the Federal Beer and Wine Revenue Act took effect in April 1933. Duchateau's description continues, "During the 1960s, it appealed to Enumclaw’s fledgling hippies and in the ‘70s it was home base for a few would-be punks and Cobain followers. In other words, it had always been a small-town alcove for fellows and gals who were, more or less, sort of rebellious, unorthodox, and a bit out of step with the local culture in general."

Bacon Cheeseburger, Rainier Bar and Grill, Enumclaw, WA

It's a nice place to grab a beer or a meal, and it is pleasing to see them keeping the history alive with old photographs and other touches. But I do confess that I suspect I personally would have prefered the previous incarnation(s), given my fondness for dive bars and for scenes "a bit out of step with the local culture in general."

Brunswick-Balke-Collender antique bar at the Rainier Bar and
Grill in Enumclaw, WA

Close-up with added contrast of the Brunswick label on the
back bar at the Rainier Bar and Grill, Enumclaw, WA

1623 Cole St, Enumclaw, WA 98022 - (360) 825-6363
Est. 1934 or earlier (i.e. as a bar in the current building) - Building constructed: 1917
Previous bars in this location: Rainier Wine Co, Bohemian Bar
Web site: facebook
Reviews: urbanspoon - sportsandfood - yelp - patch

#2225 - Naches Tavern, Greenwater, WA - 7/7/2013

The Naches Tavern is said to have been built in 1919 and appears to have begun under that name during prohibition. A photo below is dated June 1926, and features what may be the current building, though substantially remodeled. The tavern is in the unincorporated community of Greenwater, which has a population of a little over 200, although you would never guess that many from the few mossy residences you can see from the road. It is pretty much the perfect mountain tavern, its log-cabin based structure entreating you from the road into the woody interior, with a large stone fireplace and various relics donated by locals collected on the walls. It sits at the eastern base of Chinook Pass, north of Mount Rainier, at the confluence of the Greenwater and White rivers, and welcomes a convivial mix of locals, snow boarders from Crystal Mountain, bikers, hikers and various roadtrippers. The food is pretty standard bar fare, and the drinks are dive bar standards. It is said that the entire town gathers there on Christmas for a communal party.

Naches Tavern, June 1926 - Tacoma Public Library

58411 Washington 410, Greenwater, WA 98022 - (360) 663-2267
Est. ? - Building constructed: 1919
Previous bars in this location: None known
Web site: facebook
Reviews: hdrcreme - chinookscenicbyway - yelp - courierherald - dailysunnews - yahootravel - tripadvisor - urbanspoon - bikerfriendlybars - friendlymoth