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Rockford peeps. Looking for some advice on where to stay and eat for a weekend.

Posted by ibdoc <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=ibdoc' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on June 23, 2025, 10:49:52

Planning a trip in a few weeks to look around the area.
Any places I should definitely eat at? One night would be a nice dinner out with future mrsdoc. Just looking at places, Abreo and Franchesco's came up.

anything we should try to do or see?

Restaurant ideas

Posted by Draino <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=Draino' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on June 25, 2025, 7:29:37, in reply to "Rockford peeps. Looking for some advice on where to stay and eat for a weekend."

Lucha Cantina : family friend owned. very good.
Olympic Tavern: can get very busy / noisy but food is very good.
JMK Nippon: Hibachi.

obliviously recommend the Roo for fast food

thanks for the suggestion. lucha was good. kind of a fusion of southwest and mexican. tasty!*

Posted by Nobster <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=Nobster' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on July 2, 2025, 7:07:14, in reply to "Restaurant ideas"

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Lucha Cantina : family friend owned. very good.
Olympic Tavern: can get very busy / noisy but food is very good.
JMK Nippon: Hibachi.

obliviously recommend the Roo for fast food

beef-a-roo! ibdoc, the strip mall where lucha is has some other good places

Posted by Nobster <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=Nobster' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on June 25, 2025, 8:39:20, in reply to "Restaurant ideas"

and the mall has live music frequently in the courtyard. plus a beef-a-roo is across the street.

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Lucha Cantina : family friend owned. very good.
Olympic Tavern: can get very busy / noisy but food is very good.
JMK Nippon: Hibachi.

obliviously recommend the Roo for fast food

pig minds brewery is a good option for vegan. urban forest is OK and the burger

Posted by Nobster <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=Nobster' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on June 24, 2025, 15:18:27, in reply to "Rockford peeps. Looking for some advice on where to stay and eat for a weekend."

place next door is pretty good. And a decent vietnamese/fusion place called "RockPho'd" is in the same strip. You can take to-go to the brewery.

https://www.pigmindsbrewing.com/
https://www.urbanforestcraftbrewing.com/
https://www.yelp.com/biz/buddys-burgers-rockford-2
https://www.yelp.com/biz/rock-phod-rockford?osq=Rock-Pho%E2%80%99d

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brunch at the japanese gardens

Posted by Nobster <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=Nobster' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on June 23, 2025, 16:15:00, in reply to "Rockford peeps. Looking for some advice on where to stay and eat for a weekend."

https://andersongardens.org/home/fresco/

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That looks good. *

Posted by ibdoc <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=ibdoc' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on June 23, 2025, 16:30:34, in reply to "brunch at the japanese gardens"

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https://andersongardens.org/home/fresco/

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it is...if the future mrs. doc likes gardens, plan for an hour or two after to walk the grounds.*

Posted by Nobster <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=Nobster' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on June 24, 2025, 15:19:40, in reply to "That looks good. *"

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https://andersongardens.org/home/fresco/

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Literally just got back from Rockford. Wife did the Ironman 70.3 there this weekend.

Posted by tvillini <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=tvillini' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on June 23, 2025, 11:31:37, in reply to "Rockford peeps. Looking for some advice on where to stay and eat for a weekend."

I feel like the best location is the Embassy Suites downtown, but that might just have been jealousy that they got to roll out of bed and be at the start/finish line. But it was a really cool old building with huge windows, so it felt like it might be nice. We went to a decent pizza place called Woodfire the first night. It was as expected. We also went to Prairie Street Brewery. It was good, but not great. Part of it may have been them being totally unprepared for the onslaught of people this weekend. But the venue was really nice. I took my boys to a Philippino place on Main street called 27 ALUNA that was pretty authentic I think. Otherwise we cooked in the rest of the time. We got a 6br house about 10-15 from downtown. For an Ironman weekend it was perfect, but I'm not sure I'd do it for a couples weekend.

In general Rockford did better than I thought they would for their innaugural run at putting this kind of event on, especially given the challenging heat conditions. I had a fairly low expectation for the city before we got there, but it definitely appears it's trying to re-invent itself.

What did she think of the course?

Posted by Illiniphil <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=Illiniphil' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on July 2, 2025, 9:38:40, in reply to "Literally just got back from Rockford. Wife did the Ironman 70.3 there this weekend."

I've heard mixed reviews....probably colored by the fact that it was hotter than blue blazes.

Couple of people said that the roads for the bike course were really rough...but one of them is kind of a primadonna, so I take that with a grain of salt.

Downstream swim is never bad, and I'm sure the run sucked just because of the temps. DESM in 2021 was like that....it was 92 and humid when I started the "run".

I decided to skip the first year to let them get the bugs out.....thinking about putting it on the calendar for next year. Wanted to do DESM and RKFD, but I'm not sure DESM is getting a race next year. Rumor is that they're done after this year, which sucks, because it's a nice race.

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i'm planning to try 27 Aluna this weekend. thanks for mentioning it.*

Posted by Nobster <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=Nobster' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on June 25, 2025, 8:41:10, in reply to "Literally just got back from Rockford. Wife did the Ironman 70.3 there this weekend."

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we stayed at the embassy suites for a baseball tournament a couple of years ago

Posted by Gene Parmesan <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=Gene+Parmesan' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on June 23, 2025, 11:40:12, in reply to "Literally just got back from Rockford. Wife did the Ironman 70.3 there this weekend."

it is a nice property, and the rooms are unique in a way you don't normally see from a hotel like that. Would recommend. And it's in a really good location relative to downtown.

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I was there too. Two college friends of my finacee's son ran.

Posted by ibdoc <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=ibdoc' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on June 23, 2025, 11:36:23, in reply to "Literally just got back from Rockford. Wife did the Ironman 70.3 there this weekend."

I was there at the bike and run finishes from about noon to 3. It was unbearably hot, but couldn't complain as I wasn't a competitor.
I saw many very wobbly people I actually helped direct to the medical tent.

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We had a tent just under the railroad bridge, next to transition on the run route.

Posted by tvillini <iframe src='https://mb.boardhost.com/TheDeuce/info/user=tvillini' width='330' height='300' border=0 style='border:none;'> on June 23, 2025, 12:33:11, in reply to "I was there too. Two college friends of my finacee's son ran."

Wife did great considering. When she was done she was still totally fine. Others I agree not so much. 25% DNF rate which is crazy high.

I had to figure out what to do with my 8 and 10 year old boys, so we saw her get out of the swim, then once she was on her bike we did the coffee place that's in the Embassy Suites, then I took them to the kids discovery center that was like a 20 minute walk. So we chilled out for like an hour and a half there which was great because we were indoors. Then we saw her get off the bike, and we went for lunch, again indoors which was nice, then we got back to the tent in time for us to see her come by on the 2nd loop. All in all, we didn't spend a TON of time in the heat, and we were almost always in shade. So we did the best we could.

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