#Local Ice Cream Shops Fort Collins CO | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

gallusrostromegalus · 5 years ago

Note

Hi! I've lived in Colorado for most of my life, but I've just recently moved to Fort Collins for school. Are there any cool spots that you'd recommend? Love your whole blog btw!!! ❤

Aw, thank you! Also congrats on school, I’m gonna guess you’re at CSU so sticking to the downtown area which is going to be the easiest to get to:

The Alley Cat is a coffee place that’s got coffe, milkshakes, wifi, really cool art and is typically open until 4 AM. Tends to get a bit crowded and it’s right over a hookah place but it’s a fun scene to go hang out. Not quiet, don’t attempt to study there, but great for meeting new people in a place that’s not a bar.

Pizza Casbah nearby is the best pizza in fort collins but it’s run entirely by stoners so if you order delivery from there it’s going to take like. 3 hours. best to go in and get it by the slice.

There is ALWAYS something going on at the stage in Old Town Square- bands playing, free public yoga, political protests, beer festival etc. it’s all free to observe and half of it’s free to participate in.

Walrus Ice Cream is hella good and they also have free (non-chocolate) ice cream for dogs so if you ever want to go pets dogs there’s always dogs

Fort Collins Public Library just off old town is a chill FREE place to hang out, study or do one of the nintey zillion activities they have on offer

Northside Aztlan Community Center is a long walk or a short bike ride north of old town and it’s the best/cheapest gym in fort collins, also a great place to take hobby classes or join a sports team

Martinez Park is also just north of old town and is a really nice natural park along the river. also lots of dogs.

Horsetooth Resivoir/Lory State Park are great local hiking areas and they have frequent free days. esp reccomend going in late april/early may becuase the wildflowers are amazing, but really it’s a beautiful, calm place any time of year. You will need a car ride to get up there though.

also great hikes if you have a car: Poudre Canyon has a ton of hiking trails coming off it, and you can take highway 14 clean out to steamboat springs if you want. Ranger Lakes State Park is just after comanche pass and small but really charming. Eagle’s Nest out by Livermore is also lovely for wildlife/wildflower veiwing, and just up the road from there is Red Feather Lakes, which is a nice place to hit in summer becuase it’s usually about 20 degrees colder up there.

Gryphon’s Games and Comics is a great Nerd Store- owner hosts tabletop and family-friendly card game nights, midnight premiers of movies are always a blast to go to, and there’s a nice coffee shop to meet other geeky people in.

the best grocery store close to CSU campus is the king soopers at timberline and elizabeth- no close-to-campus markup and it’s decently well-stocked.

If you have a place where you can cook, The Food Co-Op on Mountain by old town square is a great place for bulk local foods and organic pretty much everything. Also a great palce to get introduced to the local farming/solarpunk scene.

Pretty much every restaurant I’ve eaten at has had delicious food, just of varying bang-for-your-buck.

Concerts aren’t really my thing but the Mishiwaka Ampitheater up the canyon on 14 has a ton of concerts right on the river so that’s cool?

If you want to chill in a nice garden and/or also get in on the locavore food scene Spring Creek Gardens is really close to campus and just a super-nice quiet place to spend an afternoon.

There’s a TON of stuff to do and it’s a really safe city so I really encourage you to wander around and sign up for anything free, it’ll be a good time.

#rebel-in-ink

329 notes · View notes

tauers-go-dutch · 7 years ago

Text

Why Bristol?

I can’t really describe why I wanted to go to Bristol. Being a beer geek, I quickly realized that the UK has really good craft beer- most everyone’s probably heard of BrewDog, but there is also Siren, Burning Sky, Magic Rock, Buxton, and Wild Beer, to just name a few. As I kept trying new beers, I started paying attention to where they were brewed. I noticed that Wild Beer, Arbor, Moor, Tiny Rebel, and others were from Bristol, or at least nearby. Doing a bit of research, I saw there was also a Bristol Beer Week in October, where several of the neighboring breweries and bars team up to bring rare beers to the public. That, plus I had actually found that Bristol is a bit of a foodie town, I was sold- even if literally everyone asked me why I’d want to go to Bristol.

So we got into Bristol Friday evening after a bit a flight delay. We had an easy bus ride from the airport to our hotel, which was right by the main Temple Meads Station. After checking in, we had enough time for one drink. We were only a fifteen minute walk from downtown, so we wandered down to Kongs of King Street. This student bar brought me back to my college days- with a ping pong table, arcade video games, blaring rock music, and a killer beer list. Yes, even the killer beer list reminded me of college (I did go to school in Fort Collins). Despite the throwback, we definitely aren’t college kids anymore, so we called it early and got some sleep.

On Saturday, we had a food tour scheduled with the Bristol Food Tour, but it didn’t start until noon. So we strolled around and found some coffee at the Full Court Press. This small café really knew their coffee. There were several beans with different origins- Guatemala, Indonesia, Ethiopia. I went with a flat white with the Guatemalan origin bean that gave a raspberry chocolate flavor with earthy undertones- one of the best coffees I’ve ever had! Mariah had the cold brew, which was also delicious. Even though we were going a food tour, I also had a cinnamon scone and stopped at another café for a quick mushroom and halloumi brekkie sandwich (again delicious). I underestimated the amount of food that would be on this food tour- skip breakfast if you go, the quality and quantity of food is truly epic. You will not leave famished.

It was a bit of a hike to get to the starting point in Stokes Croft, the hipster neighborhood of Bristol, but we met our guide, Anika, who was a Canadian who relocated to Bristol to work in the restaurant industry. Like I said, Bristol is a bit of a foodie city- I was excited. Also, remember how literally everyone asked why we were going to Bristol? That included the people who were also on the tour- they were all local Bristolians who wanted to see what the next best thing is to eat in their town. After the initial jabs at my American accent, they all were very welcoming and very pleasant to converse with over the next three hours.

Our tour started at The Parlour, a local ice cream shop that used to be a hair parlor (yes, I am American and will leave out the ‘u’ when it isn’t in the name) in the 70s. Three generations later, the same family that owned it in the 70s runs the show today. We got to sample as much as we want, but I truly recommend the cappuccino- it was divine. Next was Flour & Ash, a pizza parlor (see what I did there J) that was started by an ex-corporate banker who wanted to do something different- don’t we all. The pizza cannot be understated; we tried three of the ever-changing selection. I loved the mushroom, but the chorizo was top notch as was the vegan featuring smoked eggplant (no aubergines here). Our guide stopped to show us a Polish Church (read Catholic Church- not common in Protestant England) and shared with us baklava from Bristanbul (I love a good pun). It was good, if almost forgettable, among the other treats on the tour. Next was a café in a laundromat (really a good idea), that featured a drink that could not be named (it was butter beer- come at me JK). Honestly, it wasn’t for me- kinda tasted like eggnog without the alcohol. Meh. Mariah was even less thrilled.

You should always start the tour with ice cream

Mariah was disappointed to find that the Butterbeer from her beloved Harry Potter books tasted more like melted butter than the cream soda she’d imagined.

Always time for some baklava

We crossed the street to a local pub called The Pipe and Slippers. We received a selection of four burgers, including the fried halloumi veggie burger. Sidenote- I’d never heard of halloumi before moving to Europe, but the English love it. It is a stiff Turkish cheese that is delicious when grilled, but it can be excessive (such as when using it to replace meat in a burger). The fried chicken and chorizo (the English love chorizo, too) burgers were good, but I actually loved the seasonal Blood and Guts burger, which featured a slab of blood sausage. If you Google blood sausage, it’s easy to get turned off, but I promise it is good. The fries (not chips) are solid too. Oh, and don’t forget to grab a local brew from the bar.

At this point I’m getting full, but we walked a little further while admiring the street art. Bristol has a vibrant street art community, probably most famously known as the home of Banksy. Stokes Croft has ton on display, and I was loving it. Our next place was a brunch spot called Ceres that was started by a Melbourne chef, and it was amazing. Serious, each time I think I’ve found the best brunch, someone just raises the bar. The food in England gets a bad rap, but the brunch game is on point. We had a dish with maize pancakes with a perfectly poached egg, but the black rice porridge with coconut milk, mango, and lemon balm sealed the deal. That dish was epic, and worth the price of admission.

The amazing black rice pudding

Afterwards, our guide brought us to the Bear pit, which is an outdoor art venue where aspiring street artists and practice and display their work. We had a bit of chocolate from Zara’s Chocolates- I really enjoyed the mint chili crisp. Then we walked back to the downtown area, saw more stunning street art, and eventually made our way to St. Nicolas Market. There we found a gyoza restaurant called eatchu (not capitalized). It was started by some locals after living in Australia and studying under a Japanese chef, and the handcraft love and care that goes into the more than 500 gyozas sold each day really shows. Meanwhile, our guide went and brought us some delicious cakes from Ahh Toots- the Orange Chai was my favorite.

In the Bear pit

Selfies are hard

So ended our tour, but we had plenty of other sites to see… but they’d have to wait until tomorrow because the sky opened up and the rain came down. Well, we just holed up in local brewery- Zerodegrees. These guys specialize in lagers, and they make some good ones. I enjoyed the slightly meltier Vienna lager, while Mariah enjoyed a black currant Berliner Weiss. Once the rain died down, we made our way to Wild Beer Co. I definitely recommend these guys if you’re looking for something different. They specialize in beer fermented with wild yeast, creating unique flavors, which can range from bone dry funk to juicy sour fruit. Maybe not always great, but definitely unique. We closed the night going to two fantastic beer bars, Small Bar and The Beer Emporium. Small Bar might have had a better tap list, but The Beer Emporium had a unique ambiance in an old underground cellar.

The next day we finally saw more of the city, but not after heading to another great brunch spot, Brew (not going to lie, I seriously debated going back to Ceres). Brew held its own with solid poached eggs, bacon, and toast. So we made our way to the Clifton Bridge (the park to the right has a great view), and back to Cabot Tower. It is free to climb Cabot Tower, and there is a great view of the city. Afterwards, we had a ‘treat yourself’ moment at the Bluebird Tea Co. The people there were extremely friendly, and explained how the quaint little tea shop is rapidly expanding all over England- including just opening a store in London. Their teas are still house blended by the founder, who also creates cute puns to name the blends (serious, I think puns are a source of English pride). We bought the founder’s book, an Advent calendar, several bags of loose leaf tea, and a gift set or two for the holidays (can’t spoil who they’re for). We then saw a vintage Banksy (unfortunately splattered with blue paint). We fought the wind walking the Wapping Wharf, and got a burger at the local joint, Squeezed. The burger was good, but the fries were really tasty since they had a light dusting of both salt and sugar. We went back to the Wild Beer Co. (also at Wapping Wharf), and enjoyed a beer before getting on our afternoon flight home.

The famous Clifton Bridge

Mariah was in heaven

Cabot Tower and the view from the top

A Banksy original, ‘Well Hung Lover”

Overall, Bristol was the least touristy place we’ve been so far, which was refreshing. Admittedly, it is a little sleepy, but there is enough culture, from the street art, to the food, to the beer, to justify a weekend trip. While we didn’t have enough time to do this, you can spend more time in the area by taking a quick train to Cardiff, the capital of Wales, Bath, home of the famous Roman ruins, and Stonehenge. Definitely keep this small city on your radar if touring through England!

Tot ziens for now.

#Bristol #Bristol Beer Week #Tauersgodutch #tauers go dutch

2 notes · View notes