Things to do, Places to stay in KC (Independence, Country Club: where to stay, hotels)

[5starson23]

I am 31 and single. I am "temporarily retired" and am travelling the country. You might say I am on a sabatical.

I have never been to KC so I decided I should spend a couple days exploring the city and eating BBQ while travelling between Denver and Chicago.

Despite searching for a good neighborhoods map, I really don't know where to go or where to stay in KC. I want to stick the urban core, but many times being right downtown in the CBD is not where the beating heart of the city is.

Suggestions for hotels, neighborhoods, BBQ joints, bars, all things essential to a visit to KC is greatly appreciated. I don't really care about museums or zoos or things like that; I want to discover the real KC and tend to stick to where the nightlife is.

Thanks for your insight.

[northbound74]

Actually, downtown is where a lot of the action is these days. Power & Light district is there, the Crossroads Arts district is just to the south of that, and the City Market is on the north side of downtown, closest to the Missouri River.
Westport, one of the original entertainment districts from way back, is a few blocks south of downtown along Westport Road. Then there's the Country Club Plaza which is a few blocks south of Westport. All of this stuff is pretty close together, and there's a good bus line that links all of them.
My favorite BBQ is LC's, which is off the beaten path a little ways from what I just described. It's on Blue Parkway. I've heard good things about Oklahoma Joe's on 47th in Kansas, along the county line between Johnson and Wyandotte counties. There's lots of BBQ places in all the places mentioned, as well as most anything else there is to eat. City Market has a lot of smaller, more casual places, while the Plaza has more upscale stuff. Power & Light is very new, and Westport has several bars as well as a wide variety of places to eat.
I don't do bars, maybe someone else can probably help out with that.....
There's lots of hotels throughout that corridor. A lot of them are around the Plaza, and there's several downtown, as well as around Crown Center.

[fireman mike]

Originally Posted by northbound74

Actually, downtown is where a lot of the action is these days. Power & Light district is there, the Crossroads Arts district is just to the south of that, and the City Market is on the north side of downtown, closest to the Missouri River.
Westport, one of the original entertainment districts from way back, is a few blocks south of downtown along Westport Road. Then there's the Country Club Plaza which is a few blocks south of Westport. All of this stuff is pretty close together, and there's a good bus line that links all of them
My favorite BBQ is LC's, which is off the beaten path a little ways from what I just described. It's on Blue Parkway. I've heard good things about Oklahoma Joe's on 47th in Kansas, along the county line between Johnson and Wyandotte counties.

Good advice, LC's is great, it is a hole in the wall but the sandwiches are awesome. If you go to Oklahoma Joes get the Z man.

[northbound74]

Funny thing about LC's is, I first heard about it on the Travel Channel before I even moved here. Now that I'm here, it seems a lot of locals don't even know about the place. At least not the people I'm in contact with. Must be the neighborhood.
I've found that the smaller the hole in the wall, the better the food. Lucia's in Independence has to be one of the smallest restaurants I've ever seen, but it's food (especially the tacos) is fantastic.

[TabulaRasa]

LC's is much more off the beaten path than the better-known BBQ joints in KC, so it gets less word of mouth, unless you know an "insider." Arthur Bryant's is a stone's throw from downtown, off the 18th and Vine historic jazz district. Gates has multiple, easy-to-locate sites throughout the city. Danny Edwards and Rosedale are about a mile apart on Southwest Boulevard, a street which leads (shockingly) southwest outta downtown . Oklahoma Joe's (where the Z-Man is indeed awesome) is barely off the Plaza, just over the state line in KCK. All of those are places more or less main drags regularly traveled by outta towners, or at least not uncommon to navigate. LC's is, by contrast, not in a part of KC most folks would have a reason to go to unless they live in KC.