Dallas; Beers, Buddies, Buildings and 2 Airports

I went on a recent trip with friends to Dallas, TX. This is the second time I traveled with 2 buddies, and we will continue to do it annually and we do it in a pretty awesome way. The purpose of our trip is one person plans the trip and the other two do not know where they are headed until they get to the airport. Well this year was my turn to plan and I decided to go to Dallas, not really knowing what an awesome city it truly is. One of the best things about traveling to Dallas if you are a fellow Wisconsinite, it is extremely cheap to travel there via Southwest Airlines. I have looked continuously at their site, and see an average price of $74-$100 dollars one way, which for an American airline is cheap. Dallas offered amazing views, I can’t say enough about the friendly people, and a surprisingly great party atmosphere. Here is a list of my DO’s and Don’ts of Dallas.

DO’S:

1. Although we did not get enough time to do it, I can say right now that the museums in Dallas look pretty awesome. We visited Dealey Plaza and the Grassy Knoll where JFK was assassinated. There is the Six Floor Museum tour that you can take, that talks about that horrible day in history and view where they believe the gunman was. I also would suggest going to the Perot Museum, I think this is one place the 3 of us wanted to do the whole weekend, but did not get the chance to go to it. (I don’t know how many times my buddy mentioned how bad he wanted to go up the cool escalator). Just about everyone we spoke to said we needed to do it, but for some reason we ignored them and just kept drinking. I would also suggest Dallas Holocaust Museum.

2. Visit the Breweries: If you are a beer person and love to visit unique breweries with a lot of character and a good atmosphere, Dallas has exactly what you are looking for. We sampled a lot of Dallas beers at various bars and visited Brain Dead Brewing and Four Corners Brewing. First Brain Dead in Deep Ellum, not only was their beer wonderful, the food was phenomenal. They also have an outdoor patio that is amazing with a lot of space to sip down one of their Foreign Export Stout. Four Corners’ Brewery is in the quickly growing Trinity Groves neighborhood. Man was this place awesome. We could have spent all night there, but had other places to go. Everyone except the bartender was friendly there. You could play bags, sit outside, and play a ring toss game that had us entertained for hours (One buddy just couldn’t quite manage to figure the game out). But playing ring toss and sipping on a El Chingon IPA made for a great time. Other beers we drank but did not visit their breweries were Deep Ellum Brewery, Peticolas and Community Beet Company. Also, although it is not a Brewery, Cold Beer Company was amazing, and offered many different local brews and had an amazing atmosphere, especially their outdoor seating.

3. Check out the neighborhoods in Dallas: I’ll admit when you are the only one planning a trip it can get hard to find a lot of different things that are unique to Dallas, so it was good to ask people we talked to on the street, in the parks or our Uber drivers, what they enjoy doing in Dallas. Many people told us to visit Deep Ellum, Uptown and check out Main street downtown. If I were to give the best advice for someone going to Dallas would be to visit these 3 neighborhoods;

-Main Street-Downtown was cool, but it was not my scene, there were plenty of places to go and country music galore, but walking around having some brews amongst tall buildings toppling over you is awesome. I would highly suggest going to Press Box Sports Bar. The staff was super friendly, the food was good, and you can’t really go wrong with a sports bar.

-Uptown- Uptown is awesome, there are many different bars for you to chill and have a drink, places for you to party, and then clubs to just get your dance on and be surrounded by a bunch of bro’s. For obvious reasons we did not go clubbing. We first stopped at Katy Trail’s Icehouse. If you want to go somewhere to eat mouthwatering burgers and sit outside in one of the coolest backyard looking patios, I highly suggest Katy Trail’s. Their burgers were so amazing and the place is just so cool. A short walk from Katy Trail’s is Kung Fu Saloon, where you can play all the classic arcade games or challenge your friends to some Skee-Ball for shots. All for Free!

Deep Ellum- I am not sure what to say about Deep Ellum, besides that I would go back to Dallas again and again to enjoy the fruits of Deep Ellum and all it has to offer. First, Pecan Lodge, I am not going to say anything about it, but to just go there if you know what is good for you (I cannot stress this enough). Over on Elm Street there are bars as far as the eye can see. We went into several places there and had an incredible time. Every bar was unique in its own way and each place had a patio or rooftop to delve into to some cocktails and look at all the beautiful people around you (I Swear everyone in Dallas was good looking). At bar close, head over to Glazed Donut Works and enjoy a donut or try their grilled cheese donut, or if you aren’t feeling sweets go get a slice of pizza at Zini’s Pizza. Also in Deep Ellum as mentioned before is, Brain Dead Brewing, Deep Ellum Brewing, and Cold Beer Company. Seriously though, go to Deep Ellum it’s like a cooler Nashville type atmosphere (Sorry Nashville). Side note: be sure to not tip over anyone’s Harley, they tend to get mad and slam you to the ground and proceed to kick you in the face and if that isn’t enough you also get arrested. However, it was good entertainment while enjoying a nice slice of pizza. Also be sure to check out the amazing graffiti around the Deep Ellum neighborhood.

4. Lastly there is a lot of Green Space in the city. We especially liked Klyde Warren Park and all the food trucks, but in my opinion skip the food truck and go to Meso Maya nearby for some of the best Tacos you will ever put your taste buds on. Back to the parks, there are plenty of parks to see and toss the Frisbee around in, and after a night of drinking in Deep Ellum, some fresh air and some ping-pong in the park sure cures the hangover right up.

DON'TS

1. I say this in about every city I visit, but don’t rent a car unless you plan to travel a significant way outside of the city. Bigger cities are becoming more and more transportation friendly. In Dallas you can take the DART just about anywhere for $2.75, or hop on a bus. You can even get to Fort Worth on the Dart. We did a lot of Ubering which is always convenient, and now being able to split rides with the people you are cabbing it with makes it very affordable.

2. So, a quick story before my next “don’t”. As we are boarding the plan in Milwaukee, we quickly realize that Sid Moncrief is on the same plane. We all waved and said, “Hi, Big fan”. As we get off the plane we easily spot out Sid waiting for his ride, and we ask for a picture. Sid was one of the nicest famous people I have met. He gave us some pointers about Dallas, since he now lives there. When Sid Moncrief, one of the best Bucks players to put on a uniform tells you not to go somewhere, listen to him. We asked about a place called Sonny Bryan’s for BBQ, he said “No, don’t go there; they don’t have very good food”. Well we went there which leads to my next don’t. Sonny Bryan’s food was not good, although it’s well known, I am not sure if it just got to popular, but we were all very dissatisfied. The neighborhood Sonny Bryan’s is in is located near the JFK site, and geared towards tourist. I am not a fan of touristy spots so I would suggest to stay away from that neighborhood, and if someone yells at you to have a drink in their bar, it probably isn’t the best place, but we were on vacation and thought why not. So we had a beer amongst the very sparse group of people in the bar even though we were told it was packed inside full of people.

3. My last don’t is very crucial, but also very simple. It can apply to any vacation you are on. When you are in a large city, make sure you understand that there could be more than one major airport in the area, and to remember which one you came from, otherwise you spend an hour inside an Uber driving around from one airport that you are not supposed to be at to drive back to the one you most likely could have walked to and finally catch your plane after a $45 dollar cab ride.

Things to note: If you have more time in Dallas I would suggest going to Fort Worth, and to check out one of the pro-sports teams in the Dallas area. Although I can’t stand the majority of the teams near Dallas, the fans are passionate and the arenas and stadiums seem to be pretty awesome, and we greatly enjoyed the Dallas Stars game. We also stayed at an Airbnb hosted by Jude, which is right smack in the middle of downtown Dallas. She was an incredible host and the place is amazing and crazy cheap. I would suggest staying at her place over any hotel.

Pictures Below.

Enjoy Dallas!