Next up in the Dart Bars of Itaewon series is Friends Bar.

Friends is located about halfway up Hooker Hill on the right hand side above Old Town.

What can I say about this place besides it being just about my least favorite bar in Itaewon?  Well, the owner JJ and manager Jonas are both good guys.  And the walk up the hill can be shall we say interesting at times, in a Paul Simon kinds of way “just a come on from the whores on 7th Ave”.   Other than that, there’s nothing good I can think of.

The bar is dark and dingy.  Overwhelmed the flash on my camera dark.  I actually lightened each of these photos, otherwise there would be nothing to see.  I’m not kidding, when I had a couple of bounceouts I could not see my frickin’ dart on the floor right in front of me.

Anyway, the bar sports 4 dart boards.  These two are in the back alongside the bar and we play our “A” division games here.  The boards were in decent shape on Monday, but that has not always been the case.  The boards themselves have adequate lighting, but otherwise it’s like being in a cave.

These are the two front boards which also looked to be in good playing condition.  The problem here is the traffic as folks make the way to the toilet (unisex) and pool tables.  As you might be able to see, Friends has one of the few soft tip darts machines left in Itaewon.  Koreans are big on the soft tip, but it just never took off in Itaewon for some reason.  Fine with me as I really don’t like the game.

Here’s the backside of the bar.  Yeah, the bargirls were pretty cute so there’s that.  Then again, they don’t serve draft beer which I prefer.  You can get your favorite Korean brew in a large sized bottle for Won 5000 however.

Friends does have two pool tables which is pretty unusual.  Of course, that means nothing to me but I suppose the pool players of the world appreciate it.

I understand this bar caters to a younger crowd and gets very busy on weekends.  They generally play rap at loud volume and have music videos on the big screen, although the mix on Monday night wasn’t bad (after some friendly hints to the bar staff). 

As a darts venue, I just don’t like this place.  I think the general consensus of SIDL members is similar to mine. They do support two “A” teams and at least one lower division team as well.  Frankly, this bar is just stuck in the past and has been far surpassed by the Dolce and Sam Ryan’s venues, which are newer, cleaner, and well-lit.  Hemingway would hate this place and I grade it a “D” for darts.

Still to come: Scrooge Pub, 3 Alley Pub, and Manila Bar.

Well, we faced off with the league leading gents from XOX at Friends Bar last night.  It was a bit of a grudge match for us as they had destroyed us 28-9 earlier this season.  We came out with a 20-17 victory which satisfied our thirst for revenge. 

I contributed a 6-6 effort, which although middling, I feel pretty good about.  I drew YK, their top ranked player, in both of my singles matches and came out 2-4.  For the most part I threw strong darts, but YK is tough to beat when he is on his game, and he was pretty much on his game last night.

The highlight of my night was in the final mixed doubles (501/cricket) match.  Dan and I took on HK and Mr. Lee and we beat them at their own game.  That is to say we pointed mercilessly in both cricket legs.   XOX is a Korean team and their style of play is more aggressive than most.  Generally speaking, most players will not continue pointing after they have a “comfortable” lead.  For me, that’s one bull (25+ points) for others it’s a two bull lead.  The XOX guys will continue pointing until you’ve closed the number.  I’m not sure it is a good strategy (although as mentioned, XOX is leading the league), but it can be damned disconcerting if you let it get into your head.   So, I think we surprised them a bit last night by giving them a taste of their own medicine. 

Anyway, it was a sweet victory indeed.

I said in my earlier post there was a lot of darts on tap this weekend.  There was, but not as much as I had anticipated since our Sunday make-up match against Kaibigan was once again postponed (this time at the request of Kaibigan).  The cancellation did not occur until game time, and we had been warming up at Gecko’s for over an hour so that kinda sucked.  Since the Rubbies were all dressed up and ready to play we played a little 301 game amongst ourselves.  DIDO, but with a little twist in that once you were under 100 points you had to double out on one throw.  Failure meant going back to 301 and adding another thousand won to the pot.  I really hated that game after a couple of hours of frustration.

Saturday’s league doubles tournament was a bit of a disappointment as we only had 8 participants.  So, the league leaders decreed that we would shift to a round robin format instead of double elimination.  That meant we got to play more darts which is a good thing.  Even better, all four teams would finish in the money (1st=120,000, 2nd=80,000, 3rd=60,000 and 4th=40,000).  The teams were David and Lonnie, Seung Youb and Chris H., Mike and Ron, and me and Lucky.  It turned out to be a very competitive match.  Seung Youb and Chris finished with 6 legs won and 1st place, while David and Lonnie and me and Lucky had 5 legs each and a playoff round for second place.  Which we won 2-1.  Yeah baby!

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention we picked up a new player on Rubbies to take the recently departed Dave’s spot on the roster.  While Dave was and is irreplaceable, we scored a major coup by picking up a former Rubbie–Billy.  He is a great darter and more importantly a good and comfortable fit for our team.  We are all feeling and playing with more confidence and have high expectations for success in the playoffs.

And that’s the way it is darts-wise.

Busy darts weekend in store.  We have the league doubles tournament today, a make-up game with Kalbigan at Friends Bar on Sunday, and our regular Monday night game against XOX, also at Friends.

Pretty nice night at the Friday Dolce Vita tourney yesterday.  A first and a second place showing and some very competitive matches.

I had a rather unusual request from a reader the other day.  Seems that in one of the pics in the Wolfhound review included he and a young woman in the background.  As he wanted to avoid any potential unpleasantness should this woman’s husband happen upon the photo, he asked that it be deleted.  You know, I accommodated his request, but really I couldn’t see anything identifiable in the photo.  Plus, although I have a cadre of loyal readers, it’s not like random jealous Korean husbands drop by with any regularity. 

And that was about the extent of my excitement this week.  Wish me luck today.  As always, you can check back here for an update on the outcome. 

Last night’s dart match was postponed until Sunday so I used the offnight to visit Wolfhound Pub.  This is a venue I do not regularly frequent, but it was the only place in town that was not hosting a league match headed over for some practice with Tom, the only other Rubbie who did not attend the Charlie Daniels concert on base  last night.  We played 15 legs and Tome took me 8-7.  What can I say?

Anyway, it gave me the opportunity to do my next “Dart Bars of Itaewon” review.

So Wolfhound is in the alley behind Seoul Pub.  Just walk past Gecko’s, turn right and about a block up the alley you wil see the Wolfhound signs. It’s the only Irish Pub I’m aware of in Itaewon.  Tom lived in Great Britain for a number of years and he said it had the same “feel” of Pubs he used to frequent.

 It has nice touches like this throughout the place.

There are two floors of goodness at Wolfhound.  This is the “first floor” bar (on the second floor of the building), it is also a pretty spacious dining area.  Wolfhound has a nice menu of Irish specialties and other offerings.  I had the fish and chips which was well prepared and plentiful at a fair, if moderately high, price. Talk around town is that the entire menu is quite delicious.  Eh, I don’t mean the actual menu, but you get my meaning.

The upstairs bar is where all the darts action takes place.

Plenty roomy with ample seating for players and spectators.  Same menu as downstairs.  Service was prompt and efficient, although it seemed a little impersonal.  A warm greeting and a smiling welcome to me is a good thing, but nothing I’ve experienced in my few visits at Wolfhound.  Not sure that is a fair criticism, because if I went there often enough to gain “regular” status I’m pretty sure I’d been treated like, well, a regular. 

Anyway, here is the dart board set up.  As you can see, the bar features two boards.  I’ve not played in competition here since my “B” division days.  That was pre-remodeling when there was a single board in the downstairs bar.  So, this is at least twice as good.  Tom reminiced that it was here where he hit the winning dart in a championship game.  I recalled that I had my first ever 9-mark at Wolfhound

On the plus side, the boards are well lit.  We played the left board last night, and there was plenty of room at the oche.  The boards were in good condition and they played well (not too many bounce outs).  On the down side, the board was not mounted tightly, which meant we had to frequently center the 20 between throws.  Another issue was that the oche was not centered on either board (it was lined up for a non-existent center board).  Also, there was no out chart.  Technically, this means the bar is not up to league standards and requirements.  I know that Wolfhound has a lower division team, so I guess no one has complained.

Those are all easy fixes though.  It is otherwise a nice venue and warrants a solid “B” rating as a darts venue.  So, if you got a hankering for some Irish cooking and ambiance, head on over.