Ah yes. We had stuffed ourselves full of wood-fired pizzas and walked off (hopefully) most of the calories winding our way through the painted walls of the Bushwick Collective.
With the morning behind us we set out on a bit of a different track and left Bushwick to head west towards Gowanus. There were rumors of a colossal bar hall attempting to stage itself as the come-back of modern shuffleboarding and I was on a mission to find out if it was worth the hype.
Who plays shuffleboard?
Grandmas. Grandmas and grandpas and old people with cigarettes dangling out of their mouths, donning pastel dresses and rolled-up-at-the-ankle trousers.
Where do they play shuffleboard?
In Florida. In Florida ensconced between even more pastel and/or striped cabana umbrellas all the while chattering away about their next mahjongg tournament and when little Billy and the family are coming down to escape the New York winter.
OK - just to prove my point - I just googled "shuffleboard" and this is the 5th image that popped up...
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| AM I RIGHT OR AM I RIGHT?! |
But, as a huge advocate of Brooklyn myself, I can very assuredly tell you that Brooklyn is pretty good at taking on the weird and making it normal. Cool. Hip. Vogue-ish. Fashionable. Trendy.
Which is how I found myself shuffleboarding in Gowanus.
The Royal Palms Shuffleboard Club, which opened in February of this year, brings the Palm Beach retirement community charm to a 15,000 sq. ft. space with ten very legit shuffleboard lanes, mounds of very legit Sunshine State decor, and a lovely menu of very legit, very colorful vacation-worthy drinks.
You walk in and are overcome instantly by how enormous the space really is. A standard shuffleboard lane is 39ft by 6ft so imagine that times ten with room for a full-service bar, a full wall lined with black and white cabanas, and what looked like a disco themed dance floor.
You can rent a lane for $40 an hour. We had Whitey and Shiva in tow from earlier but, unable to resist the fun, Giancarlos and Karri met us in Gowanus to join the festivities.
We put our names on the list and went off to explore. Aside from shuffleboard, the bar offers a ton of board games for you to enjoy when you feel like sitting one out. Finally, it was our turn and we were ready to (scoot) what our (grandmas) gave us!
Our lesson was given by none other than Royal Palms co-founder and #82 Shuffleboarder in the WORLD, Jonathan Schnapps! His partner in crime, co-founder Ashley Albert is ranked #68 in the world. They obviously know their stuff and it was so lovely to see his passion for shuffleboarding shine through as he tried to pass on the love of the game to each group.
We listened intently before embarking on a battle of epic proportions. We appropriately decided to face off with biscuits on one side and tangs on the other....
...and stared down our opponents from opposite ends of the lanes.
It was a bit hard to get the technique down at first. The struggle was certainly real for these two.
But after a few rounds, we were basically pros!
The boys took it a bit more seriously and were seen plotting their next game-strategy on numerous occasions...
...while the girls made it a point to try every mason jar tiki drink on the menu.
Did I mention they come with umbrellas? Where's the beach?!!?
TT had his eye on the prize the whole time.
While Giancarlos really embodied the phrase, "get low."
And Whitey opted for the gentle love-tap approach.
We tried our best puppy dog eyes to get them to extend our lane time once it ended but the place was crowded so the winners took a celebratory picture and we all retired to the bar.
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| winna winna chicken dinna |
Perhaps the coolest part of The Royal Palms is how they chose to approach the food situation. Obviously with people signing on for at least an hour of playtime, they needed to have appropriate food ready for the hungry shuffleboarders to gobble down between games. As the space is a converted warehouse, it comes with a built-in loading dock. Schnapps and Albert decided to create a rotating schedule of food trucks to drive right into the dock and serve fresh eats right into the bar.
You can find the rotating food truck schedule at the bottom of their website.
Papaya King was in line waiting for us to finish our game and we hurriedly lined up ready to order one of everything!
We waited like kids outside an ice cream truck as the guys inside prepared our deliciously stuffed to the brim gourmet hot dogs.
With hands full, we headed back to our cabana and tucked in. One of everything with every type of topping imaginable. New York is so well known for hot dogs but Papaya King takes it one step further. I fell completely in love with the corn dog. I could probably have eaten four but held on to my last shred of dignity and quietly dug into the curly fries.
We laid in the cabanas for a bit longer before lugging ourselves home and to bed.
If you're willing to make the journey to Brooklyn, do NOT miss out on The Royal Palms Shuffleboard Club. It is good, old-fashioned fun and the perfect Florida vacation for anyone stuck in NY. With the polar vortex coming up, what better way to get your fill of the Sunshine State without paying the cost of airfare?
If you don't believe me, just take the word of some other very serious, very trusted fun-graders of NYC activities. You'll find the Royal Palms written up by Thrillist, Time Out NY, New York Magazine, and Village Voice.
**Although you really should start just believing me because the faster you do the faster you'll learn I'm actually, like, super-duper fun**
