Madison Nightlife

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The largest beer festival in the Midwest, 2nd biggest in the country is held the 2nd saturday in August.

This year Jenn(CoAir13), Ethan(CoAir19), Kevin(Itsfunhavingfun) & his wife all happened to be passing thru.

Dunk tanks, games, music... and plenty of beer. Over 100 breweries with 4-6 samples each.

It runs from 1pm to 6pm. Tickets go on sale the first sunday in May, also by mail order. It sells out in 1 hour.

Martini Night on Saturday? This is a quiet a bargain!! been there for a friend's birthday last week, and we had a great time! The Bar is small, but the place had a sleek-decor. After the dinner is over, the place turns into bar/wine lounge. We sat on tables next to a huge mosaic representing the God of wine: Dionysos. We were hoping he wouldn't get mad at us for drinking martinis!! There was latin music in the background.

Dress Code: Elegant, neat probably prefer no jeans

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Not your typical happy hour. The price of each beer changes according to how many are sold, or some calculation. How do you know what the price is?? They have a stock ticker thing that runs constantly alerting you to the price of the beer. You want a Leinies Honey Weis, check the ticker and see the price just jumped from $2 a pint to $3.75. But wait, Capitol Island Wheat just went form $4 to $1.55 a pint. So buy one of those. Kinda fun, and you can always find a good one for $2 or less. Prices seem to change every 15 minutes. I think it runs from 4-8 or 9.

They also have a nice seating area outside, and they show games on the somewhat big screens. So you can sit outside, watch a baseball game, World Cup game, whatever. Nice.

Plenty of food inside too, it is a Brat Haus afterall. Fries are real good & spicy.

Dress Code: Umm, no.

Memorial Union Rathskellar or outdoor terrace

Best place to see live music, perfect setting assuming it doesn't rain. A small stage is set up near the lakefront, with the people sitting mostly in front of the band on the terrace of the Memorial Union. Beer, soda, pretzels available right there.

Friday and Saturday at 5pm & 9pm, Thursday nights too, schedule varies, and usually only when school is in session including summer. Free.

In winter, inside. In summer, out on the lakefront Terrace...weather permitting. Also has an art gallery, travel agency, and many meetings/talks/movies/game room/2 cafeterias and other things going on inside.

Dress Code: Whatever you want

Madison has some great bars, ranging from high class spots to hole-in-the-wall dives. You can find them on pretty much any street on campus (state street, university street, etc...). It really depends what you're looking for. If you're looking for a higher class place (or want a place with a bit of older patronage) stick closer to the capitol building.

Dress Code: Generally, you can get away with wearing anything from jeans and a t-shirt to a dressier get-up, but dress varies on the place you're going and the night you're going out (i.e. during the week, more casual).

This is a nice bar with reasonably priced drinks and a very nice patio. The patio is on a fairly busy street with plenty of late night foot traffic. There are heat lamps too for when it gets a bit chilly. Inside there are plenty of booths and a couple of couches.
A feature of this bar is the "Redneck Buffet" where for $15 dollars you can get a tee shirt for eating a pickled egg, pickled pork hock and a pickled turkey gizzard and drinking a can of Hamms. Not my cup of tea, but...
They also have pretty good regular food.

I don't go to this bar too often, but I am a fan of their Tuesday night specials. It's not that it's a bad bar, I just go to other places. On Tuesdays they have free bacon and $1.00 cans of Pabst, Blatz and Hamms. I didn't even realize they still made Hamms.

Neighborhood bar that brings people to town. Sometimes charging a cover of 5 dollars, this bar is infamous for great varity of good music. From string emsombles, honk tonk, rock, you name it! Give them a call!

Dress Code: None!