Sac Brew Bike takes riders on a beer field trip

OK, so we all know that after hitting the bars downtown, driving home isn’t a very good option. Pedaling that little beach cruiser home doesn’t seem like a good idea, either.

But taking a pub crawl downtown on a trolley-esque bicycle that rides in the middle of traffic, decked out with disco lights and club music alongside 14 of your closest friends? It's a total go—one made possible thanks to Sac Brew Bike.

When my friends and I saw the party bike cruising down J Street one night, we knew we had to try it. For $25 each, we could join a pub crawl that would take us to three local breweries (the bike makes several trips daily). For a group of college students living on an instant ramen diet, the price seemed a bit steep, but we also figured it was too much fun to miss.

A few days later, as we waited for the bike to show, we felt excited and antsy. This was probably the closest most of us have had to a field trip since the sixth grade.

The bike arrived and it was huge. How were we expected to pedal that thing in traffic for the next two hours, fueled only by beer and foot power? The driver assured us we would be fine, and everyone hopped on. Before we could leave, however, she told us she needed to lay down a few rules:

“Always wear your seat belt!

“Don't wave your arms outside the bike!

“No high fives to other cars!”

Suddenly, our boozy field trip started to feel like more my fourth-grade visit to the train museum. Then the really sad news came.

“No booze on the bike.”

How could a brew bike exist without endless taps of beer en route? We sulked for a moment. One man whispered to me that he was going to have to put away the Fireball he'd brought for “pre-gaming.” Our driver explained it was state law, but insisted we'd still have fun.

Luckily, she was right. As soon as we left, it felt like a party started. Music blared, the wind blew in our hair and people walking by cheered as they took our photos. Bar owners jumped outside along our route, begging for us to pull over. As one rider put it, we became the unofficial cool crowd of Midtown.

The first stop was Der Biergarten on K Street, where it felt like we were part of a human petting zoo. When we disembarked, people cheered, handed us beers, asked questions and stroked the “Brew Bike” stickers on our chests. The stickers were supposed to give us a discount on beers, but that turned out to be unnecessary, thanks to all the free pints we scored.

Then everything started to blur. The free beer got us drunk pretty fast, and even all the pedaling wasn't enough to sober me up.

But that's OK, because riding that thing drunk was even more fun.

We almost ran a red light, and chewed out the driver of a car that tried to cut us off. Some man called me Fran Drescher and we fought for half the ride, but made up by singing “Don't Stop Believin'” together. We were like a drunken choir, preaching karaoke classics to the people of Midtown.

The last thing I remember was being dragged back from Tank House BBQ & Bar by a Justin Bieber look-alike, because I kept begging the cook for barbecue ribs.

So, yeah, a good night and a great ride.