Long, green trip

Erin Express makes the rounds

By Ainsley Maloney

Philly EDGE Correspondent

"(This is the) only day it's socially acceptable to be an alcoholic," says Mike Barker, 24, of Philadelphia while on the 2007 Northeast Erin Express last Saturday (March 10).

Indeed. The bar-to-bar bus shuttles that occur in and around Philadelphia each March can be a convenient solution to a beer-lover’s problem: getting around safely.

The Saturdays before and, this year, on St. Patrick's Day, bars on the Erin Express lines open their doors early, offer drink and food specials, set up Porta Potties and pay to have  school buses drive from bar to bar in constant loops, picking up drunken patrons and plopping them off safely at the next stop. 

An entire section of 39th Street in the city (from Chestnut to Walnut), is blocked off by police, making it even easier for crowds of 20-somethings to stumble from bar to bar. Any hassle that might stop even the most dedicated beer drinker from going on the Erin Express doesn't exist.

Tickets: There are none.

Reservations: Don't need them.

Sign-up cost: Nothing.

Bus fare: Free.

All riders have to do is show up at a bar on the loop and their Erin Express has begun.

Want to move on to another bar?

Just stand outside for the 15-or so minutes it takes a yellow school bus to pull up, hop on, and you're on your way to the next pub.

On the Northeast Erin Express, which stretched from Kelliann's on 44 th & Spruce to Westy's Tavern & Restaurant by 15th Street (stretches through University City – UPenn's campus – and Center City, from South Street to Ben Franklin Parkway), most bars didn't have covers; the one that did only charged $2.

All bar tours are different. Here's a peak of the 2007 Northeast Erin Express:

7 a.m. – Like most Erin Express-goers, we were already awake, getting decked out in green gear and anxious to start the day. A quick stop for breakfast and coffee, and the crack of a first Guinness, was the best way to go.

9 a.m. – We left our apartment on 18th and Catherine. After many failed attempts at finding an empty cab, we stumbled upon Callahan's on 26th and South. Though it wasn’t open yet, the staff was nice enough to let us inside. Another group of four came in after us. Together, we got a round of seven Irish Car Bombs and cheered to "Maybe we'll see you again, maybe we won't remember."

11:10 a.m. – We finally catch a taxi and take it to 39th and Sansom; the line at Cavanaugh’s is already 20 people deep so we make a left on Sansom. The Blarney Stone has their entire section of the street fenced in for its "Erin Express Block Party." Grills are cooking $3 cheeseburgers and $2 hot dogs; speakers are blasting Tom Petty's "American Girl," and a line is forming where the inside bar opens outside, forming a beer stand. Beer pong and flip cup games are already in effect.

We get a $22 six-pack of Miller Lite and start a game of flip cup while sun beats down on us. It's sunny, about 60 degrees, and feels a lot more like the Fourth of July than St. Patrick's Day.

Rich Roller, owner of The Blarney Stone, said he starts doing prep work for Erin Express in January organizing the beer, booze, fence, portable bathrooms, grills and a permit to block off the street. They also have a full staff of 30-plus employees, including 23 bouncers instead of the usual four.

"We want to make sure things don't get out of hand ," Roller said.

A lot of people at Blarney Stone are wearing "Erin Express 2007" or other "team" T-shirts ordered special for the event. 

Ryan Griggs, a 22-year-old from Manayunk, is with a crew of guys wearing green polo shirts, white rugby shorts and thick green soccer socks pulled up to their knees. He says most of his 15-person crew are Drexel rugby players. Everyone has their name on the back of their shirt, and if they're not Irish, they add a Mc or Mac in front.

Griggs – McGriggs today – said they know what bars to go to because they got a "scouting report" from friends who went on the ride last weekend.

"We're gonna try to spend a half hour at each bar, drinking whatever's on special," he said.

The rules in the bar are easy: No Glass Outside, No Rough Housing, No Popped Collars and No Cowboys fans.

Some of the bar tour groups have rules too. Greg Bagnoli, 23, from Philadelphia, said his group has two: They have to drink at least two Car Bombs at each bar, and each person has to get something new at every bar, whether it's beads, a hat, cups, etc.

He and his friends were up at 8:30 a.m. drinking Bloody Marys to "get the day going. The rest is history," he said.

Rick Kearney, who lives in Havertown  – "2,876 miles from Dublin" – and gives his age as "the 27th anniversary of my 39th birthday" –  said he comes to Erin Express to see all the lads and lasses – especially the lasses.

"I'm looking for a young lass, since my wife died," he said. "Just don't tell her I said that."

12 p.m. – The outside of The Blarney Stone is now a sea of green: People wearing green plastic hats are holding 16 oz. aluminum Bud Light bottles, switched from the usual blue to green for the holiday.

Katelyn Sheldon, 24, from Egg Harbor Township, a Drexel alum, is holding a tall green plastic flask of beer, with a straw that goes to the bottom, which she said she got at Party City.

"You gotta be well prepared," she said, adding that she didn't drink the night before, was in bed by midnight, and up by 6 a.m. to make the hour drive to Philly.

"Day drinking's awesome," Sheldon said. "We don't really have a plan; we're just playing it by ear. We usually hit four bars. It's almost impossible to hit them all.”

That seemed to be the consensus of most experienced Erin Express-goers; shooting for four or five bars instead of trying to hit all 16 on the loop.

Bryan Beddis, 25, of Skippack, said it's best to pick three of the best bars, get a good spot, and camp out the rest of the day.

"The first year I did this we tried to do a drink at each bar, but it sucked because we found ourselves always waiting in line," Beddis said. "When you try to hit every bar, everyone feels rushed. By the time you wait for the bus, get to the bar, wait in line and finally get a drink, you have to move onto the next one."

Before it even hits 1 p.m. one of our friends (who begged to remain nameless) gets kicked out for peeing behind a Porta Potty. The Blarney Stone is so packed at this point, it takes us a good 15 minutes to push our way through the crowd.

1:10 p.m. – The lines at bars are now about 50 people deep. We walk over to Smokey Joe's, where green, shamrock-decorated Porta Potties are stationed in front of the bar. Upon entering, we see a guy in a red-and-green checkered kilt leaning against the bar, who turns out to be 23-year-old Kevin Dougherty, from Wayne, NJ.

He tells us the kilt was his grandmother’s that his mother hemmed for him – which he turned over to show us. He admits he wears it so people like us will give him attention.

"You're that guy that stands out at the bar," he said. "You're that guy that people turn their heads for. People buy me drinks. Everyone wants to know what I'm wearing underneath – nothing but my manhood."

Dougherty said he was up at 8 a.m. fixing himself a Black & Tan (half Guinness, half Harp).

"I was told when I started this three years ago it would be the best day of my life," Dougherty said. "I look forward to this day months in advance. I had trouble sleeping last night."

2 p.m. – We're still at Smokey Joe's dancing to Journey's "Don't Stop Believin’," and Eric Prydz's, "Call on Me," when we find a rarity on St. Patrick's Day: someone who isn't hammered. Clint Mickel, a 24-year-old Manayunk resident, said he had one or two beers, but never drinks enough to get drunk.

"I have enough fun even when I don't drink," Mickel said. "I get annoyed when everyone says, 'Oh, you're probably not having any fun because you're sober.' I still enjoy being social and going out; (St. Patrick's Day) is pretty much any other day to me."

We spot a guy with green necklaces dangling from his neck with "Ryan's Beer" painted on his pitcher. We find out that in order to guarantee he always has a full pitcher of beer, he brought his own.

"The year before (a bar) ran out of pitchers," Ryan Robinson, 25, from Philadelphia, said. "I had to make sure that didn't happen again."

He drinks two pitchers at each bar until it gets too crowded then he gets on the bus and goes wherever it takes him, he said.

When a guy with a "Jager 18" shirt tries to pick up his girlfriend… and they face plant on the wet floor, we decide it's time to leave.

3:30 p.m. – The sun outside hits us hard- most of us having forgotten that it was day time. We run into a guy in line at the Porta Potty named Eric Mirra, a 30-year-old who told us he used to spend Erin Express on his porch and charge people $2 for using his bathroom. Hmm.

4 p.m. – We jump in a taxi, and, after passing rows of brown houses and stores, we see Bonner's, with its green Budweiser flags, shamrocks and a line of green-covered bar patrons, from two streets away. We get out and immediately a yellow bus pulls up packed with 20-somethings, who are smoking cigarettes and hanging out the windows, yelling to the people at the bar something like "whooooooo-hooooo."

Michelle Ambel, a 23-year-old from South Jersey, gets out wearing green, shamrock sunglasses and a T-shirt with "You can't drink all day if you don't start in the morning" on it.

"I love the early drinking - whole day events," she said. "I love the big-party atmosphere."

We get a couple bottles and notice, with confusion, that there is no green beer. In fact, we hadn't seen any all day. The bartender informs us that the green beer is saved for St. Patrick's Day. Ohhh.

5 p.m. – We go to the Irish Pub hoping to grab a bite to eat.

Five o'clock is about the time when people on the Erin Express are either at their highest point of drunkenness or can barely keep their eyes open. I pass by one drinker who is passed out on the table with his face in a puddle of beer. Meanwhile, another is on a circular table covered in beer and dumping it like an ice luge down his friend's throat.   We eat a meal of chili, cheese fries, cheeseburgers and chicken wings. Trying to get a straight answer from anyone at this point about their plans for the bar tour is useless.

As he spills his ice water all over the table, Kenny Robins, a 27-year-old from Belmar, NJ, says he was "trying to go to Boozetown, but made a left and went to Sexville."

I ask him where he's really going next; he looks at me confused.

"Sexville," he says.

7 p.m. – We walk to Tom Hagen's after being told they're not letting anyone else in the Green Room. We order Bailey's on the rocks, Miller Lites and shot glasses; spend $15 on the jukebox and decide to do a half-hour power hour.

We're having a great time until the bouncer storms in from the side porch and out through the front door onto the sidewalk. It takes us a second to realize he was dragging our friend with him.

Halfway through our power hour, we have to leave.

The situation is still unclear, but we manage to find out that he may, or may not, have been dancing by himself on top of a high, outside ledge.

9:45 p.m. – We end up in the upstairs room of Mace's Crossing, where our waitress, Tessa Renshaw, serves us "late-night" snacks of mozzarella sticks and onion rings. Tessa says she expects next week (Mar. 17) to be crazy and tells us a sad story of getting a $0.56 cent tip on a $70 bill.

My friend decides he loves her and leaves her $15.

We all decide we are beat, and that it's time to go home.