Just the 'Fax, man

A handful of regulars are lined up at the bar, heads hung low over the drinks that the bartender pours tall and stiff. Strains of '70s soft rock interlaced with Norah Jones emanate from the jukebox, and a Chuck Norris movie plays on the televisions, sans sound. Despite it's being just past happy hour, there is little joy in the place. The Red Room up the block is the place for hipster cool and tasty beverages. The Congress Lounge is where the rest of Colfax comes to get drunk -- good and fast. The bartenders ID everyone and are even known to check a ten before starting to pour.

Cigarettes are sold individually, for a quarter, and in the span of a half an hour, four bums come buying. The $3.50 cigarette machine is out of their range. Several other people pop their heads in but turn around and walk out, the scent of desperation and inevitability too strong for them. Even though Terezia Kesmarki, who bought the place last August, ripped up the spunky carpet and rearranged the decor, the Congress is still the bar on this strip of Colfax that you've always wondered about but enter at your own peril. -- Amy Haimerl

8 p.m.: Mezcal,
3230 East Colfax

Bienvenidos to the new Colfax Avenue -- the strip between St. Paul and Cook streets that's undergoing gentrification with gusto.

Following the upscale path paved by Tommy's Thai and the Goosetown Tavern -- along with longtime neighbors the Bluebird Theater and Goodfriends -- there's now Mezcal, a Mexican cantina that's been packing 'em in seven nights a week since its December opening.

"We realized pretty quickly that this is exactly what the neighborhood needed," says Mezcal general manager Pablo Torres, as his staff of twenty-something hipsters buzz around the joint restocking the cooler and handling the dinner rush. "People are just so psyched to have an option like this in the area."

As daylight and thoughts of work fade away, a wide range of customers bask in Mezcal's warm, prayer-candle light. Pierced and tattooed Colfax music scenesters. Socialites in snakeskin pants and black stilettos. Two frazzled parents with three tiny towheads in tow. An aging hippie in a fleece vest and scuffed clogs. A stylin' gay couple -- one in a midnight-blue velvet coat, the other sporting a silver concho belt and cowboy boots.

Outside the large glass windows, a scraggly homeless man staggers down the street and a punk teenager speeds by on his skateboard. Inside, Shakira belts out "Whenever, Wherever" in Spanish over the rising clatter, as the chatty bartender pours margarita after margarita under the watchful eye of the neon Virgin Mary, who holds court over dozens of bottles of tequila.

By summer, this stretch of Colfax will be home to two more nightlife destinations: the Atomic Cowboy, being brought to us by the couple behind B-52's and Brasserie Rouge; and Cafe Star, from the owners of Trattoria Stella in Highland. They'll be perfect hangouts for residents of the block's new Chamberlin Heights condo development, with its funky Wits Java and Jazz coffee shop.

"It'll be nice to have synergy with the other new places, really make this area a destination," says Torres.

The new LoDo? Maybe.

Call it EaCo. -- Julie Dunn

10:30 p.m.: Pleasures Adult Entertainment,
3490 West Colfax

Unlike walking up to a convenience-store counter with a handful of bills wrapped around a package of condoms, there's nothing discreet about going into Pleasures. Everyone knows why you're here. Nobody makes eye contact.

Aside from the clerk, nonplussed as he watches gay porn on the monitor next to the door, and a lone couple scanning the wall of porn, the place is empty. The only sound is the humming motor of the air conditioner that hangs just inside the darkened entrance to the video arcade. -- Dave Herrera

11:59 p.m.: Mon Chalet,
12033 East Colfax

The channel-surfing options in Room 11 at "Colorado's Finest Adult Motel" range from the award-winning Anal Ring Master (Channel 19, "Anal Features") to Leatherbound Dykes From Hell (Channel 22, "Bondage"), with gay porn, lesbian porn, interracial porn, new porn and vintage porn channels in between, on top and beneath, all piped in through Mon Chalet's dozen XXX television streams from a bank of VCRs in the manager's office.

In that office, the night manager, who is middle-aged, blond and weary but pleasant, wearing a cheap gold tuxedo vest and bow tie, is delivering a spiel over the phone: "In all our rooms, you get the water-column lights and the X-rated movies and the mirrors on the ceilings and on the walls. Our suites and semi-deluxe suites all have various features including ceiling swings and Love Machines, and some have steam showers and fireplaces and Jacuzzis." She pauses. "Thank you, sir. Have a good night."