An Easter Keg Hunt in El Segundo A Different Kind of Fun Pub Crawl
This is what happens when a creative person – or persons – sits down to have a few beers.
They come up with crazy ideas and turn them into even crazier events.
I was at one recently. An Easter Keg Hunt.
That’s not a typo. Yes keg, not egg.
The premise, of course, is to gather a bunch of people and go to a bunch of bars. But hmm, they needed an excuse. Somewhere between beers, the creative creators came up with the idea of hiding kegs around their small Los Angeles-area town, decorate them up like Easter eggs, and using their favorite local watering hole as the host bar.
They even added an additional element to it – clues to finding the kegs, which can only be obtained by playing silly games at the various bars. There are teams of four people, who pay just $40, and Bud Light puts beer on special at the bars for just $3.
It started slowly, just a few teams, but in 2012 had 400 people. Somehow, the normally attentive El Segundo police let it happen without incident. In fact, in seven hours, I did not see one cop or cop car. Oh, there were there, trust me, but they stayed out of the way and let the event happen. And because of that, there were no confrontations and therefore, not even a hint of trouble.
They know – and the organizers of the Keg Hunt know – that people in this event are professionals when it comes to putting on costumes and drinking beer.
I showed up not to participate, but to cover it for PubClub.com (see the story here). And when I did, I started laughing.
What I did not realize was that all the teams were in costume! It was 1 in the afternoon and they already had beers in their hand.
My first thought is that this was a series of themed pub crawls all rolled into one event. Then it hit me: This is the Surfest of El Segundo!
Now don’t panic, folks in Gundo. It is NOT Surfest, and with 400 people instead of 20,000, is hardly on the same level as Manhattan Beach’s one-time marquee event. But it has that same element of fun, quirkiness and. of course, costumes. How about a Jamaican bobsled team walking around downtown El Segundo inside a cardboard bobsled!?
The event also provided me the opportunity to check out a lot of bars in El Segundo that are not exactly on the regular party radar. Oh, I’ve been to the Purple Orchid tiki bar, had a couple of beers over lunch at Richmond Bar & Grill and just wrote a review of the new Rock ‘n Brews, which is part owned by Gene Simmons of KISS.
But The Office, one of the all-time dive bars I’ve ever been in my life? (It seemed appropriate that here, a guy was laid out shirtless on the bar, the recipient of a body shot by a girl.) The Patio, which has a pretty big patio in the back but is a true dive on the inside? Even the host bar, Tavern on Main, which looks like a great place to watch sports?
Never.
But now.
Keg hunt? Sure. People found all seven of them around town.
Fun, creative event?
Most definitely!
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