Get Your Santa Hats Ready!

4th Annual SANTA Monica Pub Crawl

By Ashley Ricci Drinking while helping others? Oh, is such a thing possible? On December 15^th @ 5PM, the 4th Annual SANTA Monica Pub Crawl returns to the city. “This event has quickly become one of the busiest nights of the year for our local businesses and proceeds benefit a great cause for families during the holidays.” said Laurel Rosen, President and CEO of the Santa Monica Chamber of Commerce. Getting into the festive spirit, 25 bars and restaurants all over the city will come together to raise money for those in need during the holidays. Last year, over 5,000 Southern Californians celebrated the season at the popular Santa Monica holiday event by filling the streets with joyous Santas, reindeer and elves to raise enough money for over 70,000 meals through the Westside Food Bank.   In order to participate, crawlers are asked to purchase a special pub crawl wristband which allows them access to the drink and food specials at each official location and entrance to the Official After Party and automatically enters them into a  raffle to win dozens of fun prizes from local businesses. They are also encouraged to drop off canned food items throughout the month of December at the Westside Food Bank (1710 22nd St. Santa Monica, CA 90404) where they can collect their wristbands in advance and avoid delays the night of the event. Crawlers must Sign Up Online, Pay a $10 donation/entrance fee, Choose a Route and Collect their Wristband and Map at their official starting location. SANTA Monica Pub Crawl participants are encouraged to dress in Santa/holiday attire so the streets of Santa Monica will be filled with merry cheer. The pub crawl includes bars on Wilshire, 4th Street, Broadway, Main Street, The Pier and the Third Street Promenade. Crawlers can download the official SANTA Monica Pub Crawl Mobile App to get a complete list of bars, routes, specials, pub crawl updates and more.   The SANTA Monica Pub Crawl is a community event and encourages responsible drinking by participants. When taking part in any events that involve drinking, always keep safety first. Don’t DRINK and DRIVE, and assign a designated driver at the beginning of the night, call a taxi, or use public transportation.  The Big Blue Bus will be selling unlimited bus passes for $4.00 on the pub crawl web site. Yellow Cab will also be donating a portion of all of their proceeds from the night to the Westside Food Bank.   2012 Bars: 31Ten Lounge, Barcopa, Big Dean’s Ocean Front Café, Brittania Pub, Cabo Cantina, Circle Bar, Finn McCool’s, Harvelle’s, Joe’s Pizza, JP’s Pub, Lula Cocina Mexicana, Main on Main, O’Brien’s Irish Pub on Main, O’Brien’s on Wilshire, Renee’s Courtyard Café, Rick’s Tavern, Rusty’s Surf Ranch, Sonny McLean’s Pub, South, The Charleston, V Lounge, West 4th and Jane, Wokcano, Yankee Doodles, Ye Old King’s Head For an updated complete list of bars, pub crawl maps, routes, bus stops and updates, or for more information, please visit the official SMPC Web site.               ABOUT WESTSIDE FOOD BANK Westside Food Bank’s mission is to distribute as much food as possible to local agencies with food assistance programs and to reduce food waste on the Westside of Los Angeles County. As the food bank warehouse for the Westside since 1981, it annually distributes nearly four million pounds of food to the food assistance programs of 65 Westside social service agencies. It does not distribute food directly to individuals, only to agencies. www.westsidefoodbankca.org