#1514 - The Original, Portland OR - 7/16/2011

300 Southwest 6th Avenue, Portland, OR 97204 - (503) 546-2666

originaldinerant.com - talkeatdrinkportland - oregonlive - barfly - yelp

#1513 - Bulldog Tavern, Portland OR - 7/15/2011

1650 West Burnside Street, Portland, OR 97209 - (503) 894-8492

bulldog-tavern.com - barfly - yelp

#1512 - Marathon Taverna, Portland OR - 7/15/2011

A large bar with a curious mixture of classic dive bar patrons and 22-yo girls.  Chatted with Steve, who was reading a book at the bar, and has been coming here since '68 or '69, when it was The Acropolis.

1735 West Burnside Street, Portland, OR 97209 - (503) 224-1341
Est. year - Building constructed: year
barfly - mercury - yelp - urbanspoon  

#1511 - Kingston Bar and Grill, Portland OR - 7/15/2011

2021 Southwest Morrison St, Portland, OR 97205-1600 - (503) 224-2115
Est. 1982
kingstonsportsbar.com - barfly - yelp

#1510 - The Bitter End, Portland OR - 7/15/2011

1981 West Burnside Street, Portland, OR 97209-1918 - (971) 222-2000
portlandbitterend.com - facebook - barfly - yelp

#1509 - Tony's Tavern, Portland, OR - 7/15/2011

1955 West Burnside Street, Portland, OR 97209-1918 - (503) 228-4574
barfly - mercury - yelp

#1508 - Ella St. Social Club, Portland OR - 7/15/2011

A small club in an old mortuary in the Goose Hollow portion of town, the Ella Street Social Club hosts live music in an intimate, almost-speakeasy sort of setting.

714 SW 20th Pl, Portland, OR 97205 - (503) 227-0116
ellastreetsocialclub.com - barfly - yelp

#1507 - The Matador, Portland OR - 7/15/2011

1967 West Burnside Street, Portland, OR 97209-1918 - (503) 222-5822
thematadorbar.com - facebook - barfly - yelp

#1506 #S901 - Ba Bar (Capitol Hill), Seattle - 7/7/2011

Ba Bar serves upscale Vietnamese street food and some very fine cocktails in the former space of Watertown Coffee across from Seattle University.  I had a fantastic pork belly, along with a Sazerac and then a Gilded Age (Domaine de Canton, Noilly Pratt Dry, Stone Pine liquer, Ricard, maple honey).  Ba Bar is from Eric Banh, the owner of Monsoon and Baguette Box, named for his Chinese father ("Ba" = father), and designed to reflect the spirit of a Vietnamese quan (cafe).

Despite some early drama with the folks manning the bar, he has created a very comfortable space to enjoy just a drink and snack or a nice dinner.  (The bar is now run by Even Martin, formerly of Chantanee.)  12th Avenue seems to be becoming something of a bourbon mecca -- Ba Bar stocks 175 types of bourbon alone and Jamie Boudreau's Canon which opened right down the street shortly after Ba Bar.

550 12th Ave, Seattle, WA 98122 - (206) 328-2030
Est. July 7, 2011 - Building constructed: 1920
Other bars at this location:  None known
babarseattle.com - facebook - seattleweekly - eater - seattletimes - seattlemet - seattlemag - yelp

#1505 - Max's Bar and Grill, Yakima, WA - 7/5/2011

Update: Max's closed in 2015

1107 S 3rd St, Yakima, WA 98901 - (509) 457-8041
facebook - yelp - urbanspoon

#1504 - Vern's Tavern, Caldwell, ID - 7/5/2011

127 S 7th Ave Caldwell, ID 83605 - (208) 455-8012
facebook

#1503 - Victor's Hogs 'n Horns, Caldwell, ID - 7/5/2011

3110 Cleveland Blvd #B1, Caldwell, ID 83605-0721 - (208) 455-1956
victorshogsandhorns.com - facebook - yelp  

#1502 - Shorty's Country Western Saloon, Boise, ID - 7/4/2011

5467 North Glenwood Street, Boise, ID 83714-1335 - (208) 672-9090

shortyssaloon.com - facebook - boiseweekly - yelp

#1501 - Pengilly's Saloon, Boise, ID - 7/3/2011

A classic old saloon that accentuates the historical with the pictures on the wall and the 113-year-old Brunswick bar.


513 Main Street, Boise, ID 83702 - (208) 345-6344

myspace - facebook - uncleboise - boiseweekly - yelp

#1500 - Bittercreek Alehouse, Boise, ID - 7/3/2011

A fairly typical modern brewpub/gastropub, with an emphasis on local ingredients and beers.


246 North 8th St, Boise, ID 83702-5816 - (208) 345-1813
Est. Feb 1996
bcrfl.com - facebook - boiseweekly - slashfood - beeradvocate - boiseweekly - gayot - yelp

#1499 - Barbacoa Grill, Boise, ID - 7/3/2011

Barbacoa is a fun, wildly theatrical restaurant and bar serving wildly theatrical, high end, Latin American food.

The food tastes quite good.  The cocktails are unsophisticated and overly sweet, but you can opt for something from the extensive wine collection.   Watching the servers walk past with various plates is a bit like watching a circus -- each dish formed into wild swirls and elevated onto vertical skewers.

The weekday we attended, the upper floor was not open, which friends informed me was a pity, though there is plenty of sensory overload on the main floor alone.  There is also a nice veranda, which looks out onto a small lake in the adjacent Parkcenter Park.

276 West Bobwhite Court, Boise, ID 83706-3966 - (208) 338-5000
barbacoa-boise.com - thebaldgourmet - idahostatesman - nwfoodnews - gayot - yelp

#1498 - Ha'Penny Bridge Irish Pub, Boise, ID - 7/2/2011

855 Broad St., Ste. 250, Boise, ID 83702 - 208-343-5568
hapennybridgepub.com - facebook - boiseweekly -  yelp

#1497 - Lucky 13 Pizza, Boise, ID - 7/2/2011

3662 S. Eckert Rd, Boise, ID 83716 - (208) 344-6967
lucky13pizza.com - facebook - boiseweekly - yelp

#1496 - The Dutch Goose, Boise, ID - 7/2/2011

Update: The Dutch Goose closed December 30, 2020.

3515 West State St, Boise, ID 83703-5555 - (208) 342-8887
Previous bars at this location: The Big Pine Bar/Tavern
dutchgoose.com - facebook - thehamblogger - boiseweekly - yelp

#1495 - Pete's Tavern, Nampa, ID - 7/2/2011

At Pete's Tavern, Nampa, ID - July 2011

We were in Nampa for a celebration of the 100th anniversary of my cousins' ranch house in the area, and looking to kill a bit of time.  I had no particular reason to think Pete's Tavern would hold much of interest for other than the fact that it has my name.  What a splendid surprise to find that this place in the old part of Nampa is full of character and pregnant with history.

The current owner, Linda, informed me that it's been a bar since 1945 and is in a building constructed in the 19th century (I thought she said 1869, but Nampa wasn't around until the 1880s, and most buildings in this area were destroyed in the great 1909 Nampa fire).  Before it was Pete's, it was the Owyhee Lounge, and before that it was a butcher shop, a Chinese laundry, and a speakeasy.  

The walls collect various local history, including a Playboy centerfold which we were informed was the daughter of a local doctor, thus causing a local scandal. The bar cat lounges at the end of the bar, in front of a neon sign with some strange letters that can lighten your wallet a bit if they get you too curious. Things got even more interesting when Linda took us in back, to a portion called "The Cave."  This has indeed been made to look like a cave inside, and contains vestiges of its illicit past in the massively thick door and sliding peephole.  

Back for another visit in June 2021,
with friends Mike and Janet Thompson

Finding this place was a great bit of bar history serendipity, but I was later to find out there is even more to it. In the north Idaho town of Pierce I was chatting to a bartender who came from Nampa and she told that there was also a set of underground tunnels, which still had some old game equipment. She suggested I ask the owner Gary (Barr -- Linda's husband) if he would let us have a peek down there.

On a return visit in 2021 we failed to track down Gary and get down there, but one of the locals shared some pics (unfortunately the gaming equipment is no longer there), and added his personal experience to the stories of the space being haunted, telling us that the closer he got to one corner, the colder and heavier his body felt.

11 12th Avenue South, Nampa, ID - (208) 466-9280
Est. 1945

Web site: petestavern.net - facebook 

Articles: hauntedhouses.com - ktvb.com - idahoparanormal.com - hauntedjourneys.com - yelp - tripadvisor