Since there is no FIRST organized team social in Pittsburgh, I was wondering if anyone would like to help organize an informal one. I am willing to do some work on it, but I have not been to Pittsburgh and have no idea on what fun activities we could do with the students.
The team socials (or the lack of) are getting real sad.
It would be great if some local teams could suggest
some Friday Fun for all of us out of towners.
Or better yet y’all can come back to our Hotel and have a pool party (just kidding!)
It’s just the wrong time of year to be in Pittsburgh. No real outside activities to speak of due to weather. The Penguins (NHL) are out of town. The Steelers and Pirates are out of season. You are a week too late to see Rod Stewart at the Mellon Arena and a month too early to see Prince. The Carnegie Science Center closes at 5 on Thursday and at 7 on Friday and Saturday. There was a huge indoor paintball arena in the Strip District (no not strip clubs, but a warehouse district), but it closed.
There are however 3 places I would recommend. First, there is a great, relatively new development called The Waterfront (http://www.waterfronttowncenter.com/), located in the Homestead area of Pittsburgh. Tons of great shops, restaurants and a huge theater. One place there that would be great for FIRST teams is Dave & Busters, a combination high-end arcade & restaurant. The only problem there is a house rule that says there must be one adult for every 4 or 5 students under 21.
The second place that is kind of cool is Station Square (www.stationsquare.com) , just across the river from downtown Pittsburgh. A number of cool restaurants (the Hard Rock mentioned earlier in this thread is just across the street) and high end “boutiques”. Within a short walk of Station Square is one of Pittsburgh’s most notable landmarks, the Mount Washington Incline. Even though it’s cold outside, taking the incline to the top gives you an absolutely excellent view of downtown Pittsburgh.
And finally, the Strip District that I mentioned before. It is basically a concentration of restaurants (Primanti Bros, where you get fries and cole slaw not with your sandwich, but on your sandwich (it is a Pittsburgh specialty and it actually tastes great), Spaghetti Warehouse and others) and clubs.
There is of course the usual complement of malls (Ross Park, Century III, Monroeville) and movie theaters, if those trip your trigger. I will check around and see what else I can find.
If that place is also called “Rock Bottom”, then that place would be sweet! It’s kinda small though for ~60 teams to be in though; I think. They did have a great arcade & restruant there though. Team 5 & 35 went there one night; and we had a blast. Billards, sweet arcade (I think they had/have DDR), and bunch of stuff to just do. I dunno if it was just me or not, but they didn’t really say much to us; and we didn’t have that. We weren’t bad or anything though; so that might’ve given us a star so to speak
Ok, enough promoting the fon-doozle (yes, I said that); That place would be sweet if we could set something up.