Trails Media Group, Inc
P.O. Box 5650
Madison, WI 53705
(800) 236-8088
e-mail: info@wistrails.com
www.wistrails.com
Following is the text as it appears in the book:
Nighthawks Tap Room
401 South 3rd Street
(608) 785-7427
Home | About Us | Schedule | Contact Us | Past Acts | Photo's | Inventory | Notable Mention
Seven taps with rotating selections pull in the beer drinkers. Wheat beers were hot on my last summer stop at this popular nightspot. And oddly enough, here in Heileman town, bottled and draft Point beers have a following among the regulars. It has a growing selection of regional brews.
Nighthawks is the type of place that picks up more energy the later it gets. The crowd often grows after midnight. The live music mix includes blues, rock, funk, and more blues. A Wednesday blues jam provides local and national surprises. The band posters bedeck the walls like campaign ribbons.
Those who favor elbow-bending over toe-tapping needn't worry about being blasted out the door on band nights. Nighthawks has one of the best midsize club setups in terms of coexistence of the bar crowd and the music crowd. The bar area is separated from the rear room by a low arched passageway that acts as an acoustic block. If you venture through the portal on a busy night you'll want your dancing shoes.
There is a bit of an age and cultural divide between the front of the bar and the back dance floor. The bar patrons look to be in their 30's and 40's. The dancers are a bit younger. At the bar a jukebox collection of blues, salsa, jazz, zydeco and fusion suggests a mellow broad-mindedness.
A bit of candor compels the admission that more than one observer among my mostly male corps of tavern sleuths has remarked that the bartenders here include, year in and year out, some of the most attractive young women in La Crosse. This demonstrates that some tavern owners will make extra efforts to differentiate themselves from the competition. It works here because the bartenders, both men and women, generally know what they're doing. How about the lava lamp collection behind the bar? yes that ONE blue lava lamp, what a collection!