A friend of mine from L.A. drove down to San Diego to hang out for part of the Memorial Day weekend. We hit up a local restaurant/brewery called Gordon Biersch before heading to downtown S.D. We took a 5 minute cab ride from my place to the Gaslamp Quarter in beautiful downtown San Diego. Once we reached our destination, I noticed more traffic than I'd seen anywhere since I've been here...and hardly any parking. Good call on the taxi.

Although we arrived just after 8:30pm, many places were already pretty crowded because of the holiday weekend and some sort of jazz concert that had just ended. We spent a while walking around since neither of us had been down there before.

Our first stop was Gaslamp Tavern. My first impression was a trendy sports bar where professionals in their mid 20's to 30's hang out. The fact that the wrap-around bar opened to the outside, definitely made it feel bigger than it was. So far, I'm a big fan of all the outdoor bars and restaurants here. I've always liked being outside, but in Dallas, it was just too hot most of the time.

We stuck around the Tavern for a couple drinks and then took off to find some other popular hang out spots. I can definitely see myself hanging out at the Gaslamp Tavern a lot in the future.

After chatting with some of the local people, we figured we would try another place called The Local. At first glance, it seemed pretty dead inside, but after a round of drinks many more people started showing up. The bar had plenty of seating and tables, as well as some space that eventually turned into a dance floor near the D.J. booth. After a few drinks here, we were ready to check out more of the Gaslamp.

We walked around a while longer and made note of some other places, one of which was called Confidential and is supposed to be a very popular place. But at this point, we both felt a little too intoxicated to be roaming around an unfamiliar city, so we grabbed a taxi and headed home.

Overall, I really enjoyed the Gaslamp Quarter. Other than the traffic and parking, which is easily solved with a short taxi ride, I was left with a great impression of downtown. I'm sure there will be many stories to come...