After a short period of refurbishment (to which Sweet Saturdays moved to City Hotel as the Kin.ki event), Civic Hotel upper level reopens with a new event. Let’s check it out!

Midnight crowd. DJ corner in the far right.

Yolo (You Only Live Once) Saturdays @ Civic Hotel (Rooftop)
Assessment Time: Midnight – 3:15AM
Opening Hours: Unknown (probably 10:30PM) – 4:00AM
Lockout: Around 2:30AM
Address: 388 Pitt St (oppposite World Square)
Venue Website: http://www.civichotel.com.au
Event Website: http://www.facebook.com/YoloSaturdays
Promoter Website: Unknown, but it could possibly be self promoted???
Occurrence: Today is Grand Opening night and it is to run every Saturday.
Outside Line: Didn’t appear to be a line. We got in right away without much trouble.
Dress Code / Door Policy: Nobody was wearing hats, except for the MC, so not sure on the hat policy. Guys are generally a mix of casual and collared shirts – you could get away with most clothing here. We were also a large contingent of mixed guys and girls and got in without issue tonight. Girls were dressed with their casual dresses and only a handful wore body tight dresses.
Entry Fee / Cover Charge: One of my friends knew someone, who knew someone else, who got us free entry. So lovely of them. Standard cover charge ? we had no idea, but based on past history of Asian clubbing events at Civic Hotel and the cross promoting before the event launched, I would make the educated guess that it was $25 standard entry, with $5 discount if you were on a guestlist, and entered the premises before perhaps 11:30 or midnight.
Guestlist: yolo@civichotel.com.au , or check the facebook website for mobile phone contact details

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A venue I’ve always wanted to visit. I made plans, cleared the night, and tonight was the night. Here we go!

Dance podium area

Saturdays @ “The Club” Nightclub, Kings Cross, Sydney
Assessment Time: 12:30AM – 2:00AM
Opening Hours: 21:00PM – 05:00AM
Lockout: Unknown
Address: 33 Bayswater Road, Potts Point, Sydney. 
Venue Website: http://theclubsydney.com  Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/theclubsydney
Event / Promoter Website: Self promoted
Occurrence: Every weekend. 
Outside Line: There’s two lines, one for re-entry and one for ‘first time’ entries. Our ‘first time’ line took about 5 minutes, while re-entry was only a few seconds. Security were pretty lenient on scanning. 
Dress Code / Door Policy: Being situated below Hugo’s, one would believe the dress code would be strict, but it suprisingly isn’t. T-shirts and hats were allowed for guys and so were singlets  allowed for the ladies. There is a simple explanation for this later on. 
Entry Fee / Cover Charge: Tonight was $25. 
Guestlist: you may enquire within at info@theclubsydney.com but we are not sure if you are guaranteed a response. 
Inside: Walk past the counter to enter the common pre-club hangout area where you can either move onto the main room, a side room, the bathroom or the outdoor smoking courtyard area. The side room is quite small and has a small DJ set on a table, with lounges and a small bar staffed by 1 person. Bathroom to the left and main room on the right. The first set of steps takes you to the main bar area, which is basically: big long bar on the left, with lounges around the whole floor. There is even a darker corner of lounges on the far left. Continue walking and approach the second flight of stairs, which leads you to the main dancefloor. The area can hold about 200-300 people easily and if you watched the video, our first reaction was “wow”, just seeing this big space snugly hidden underground from the outside view. Big giant disco ball overhangs while there is a large podium/stage area with not 1, not 2, but three dancing poles. That is pretty impressive. It is no surprise to learn that this place was a former strip club.

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The final stop, after visiting Northies and Sting Bar. This is where all the action is supposed to be in the Shire – so here we go!

Central dance area (2:30AM)

Central dance area (2:30AM)

Easter Saturday @ Fusion Nite/Night Spot, Cronulla
Assessment Time: 12:15AM – 02:45AM
Opening Hours: Unknown – 03:00AM
Lockout: Unsure, but likely to be enforced due to the attentiveness of RSA staff here
Address: 84 Cronulla St, Cronulla
Venue Website: No official website that I could find (I am sure I found it). FB: http://www.facebook.com/pages/FUSION-NITE-SPOT-Cronulla/234586068300
Promoter Website: Self Promoted Event
Occurrence: Every Saturday. Fridays are also open under a different event name.
Outside Line: About 20 people in front of us with a waiting time of about 10 minutes.
Dress Code: No hats are allowed in side. Anything goes here, and most are locals dressed up in casual gear – shirts, jeans etc. I met a guy inside with long dreadlocks so there you go. Girls wear whatever makes them feel sexy. I particularly very overdressed just wearing collared shirts, let alone with ties, dress shoes and blazers to match, but better than underdressed, right? 🙂
Door Policy: “How many drinks have you had?” – The standard sobriety question. At this place, the guy asking is very particular – if you look even slightly drunk then you’re denied entry. Speaking to another patron of the club, she did say it was a 50/50 chance of getting in, whether you had been drinking or not. It’s a massive clamp down here, as there probably were some incidents in the past.
Entry Fee / Cover Charge: $10 for the entire night. Let it be noted that there are no stamps given on your way in – That’s fine, but guess this – there are no stamps on your way out either! Huh? Yes.. why would they do such a thing? I was wondering the same thing – it turns out that every time you exit and want to re-enter the club, you need to pay an additional $10. Shameful! Does it keep the patrons inside though? Sure does.
Guestlist: None can be submitted. These guys don’t have a contactable email address that I could find.
Inside: The Fusion Nite Spot is situated on the upper level of its residence. Walk up the stairs and enter via the Southern side to face the middle of the room. On the SW corner to your left is a small bar to service the small lounge area to hold a small party of 20-30 people. Smoking area to hold about a handful of people along here as well. During busy times, there is actually a queue to go to the outside smoking area – it’s that small – and since people are not encouraged to leave.. you have to wait it out. On the NW corner is a second bar, to line up for 5 or 6 people. On the North wall is the DJ area, which is defined by the platform the DJ set stands on. On either side are lounges. To the NE corner are two pool tables and more tables and stools. This general area is a standing / drinking area. The SE/E corners is where the main bar and bathrooms area. There are also lockers and lounges. Right smack in the middle of it all is the dance floor – In the middle of this is a very thick mirrored column about 2×2 metres in the middle. Around the column is a tier of elevated podium dance area about 1 person wide, surrounded by the main dance area about 6×6 metres. This area is bordered by tables and metal poles, so the areas are pretty well defined, but there is nothing stopping you from dancing in other places around this central dance area. No drinks are allowed on the dance floor here, similar to Sting Bar’s policy. Cronulla must be the only place that I have seen purposely created signs that disallow patron to bring beverages to the dance floor.
Cloak Room: None, but I did spot some women using the lockers. I didn’t ask staff about the lockers so I am not sure if they are open to the public, but I would be guessing so, but I have no idea how the mechanism works.
Bar Prices / Line: The bar on the Eastern side is most busy, wich people constantly there placing orders. You would wait about 5 minutes for your order, which isn’t bad. If even that is too long, just hop on to the other side where the two other bars are usually less crowded and you will hopefully get an order faster here. Throughout the night there are also time-outs of 5-10 minutes, where alcohol is not allowed to be served to patrons.
Eviction Count: I saw someone nearly got kicked out, but after lots of negotiation managed to stay inside I believe.
DJs: Anthony K / Louise Love (sax)
Music Style: In the main proceedings of the night mostly a mix of Contemporary Commercial RnB and known commercial House track mash ups was being played here. Later nearing the end of the night it was more of a Hip Hop style of music, typical of a closing night of an RnB club – they even played Sexual Healing! It’s been a while since I’ve heard the clubs play that near the end of the night. This was definitely a club that fostered romance.
Crowd & Ratio: Like the other places around here, the entire crowd is pretty much local. Local Caucasian Australians are dominant here but there are also a tiny handful of islanders and Asians. Most of the guys are beefcakes though. Women are generally pretty well dressed, and looking pretty fine. Everyone here is pretty young  – ages range from teenagers to 20s… with a few late 20s early 30s too. Also some of the crowd that we saw at Sting Bar also made the trip down here later in the night. The ratio was quite okay here. It was probably on par or just slightly more guys for most of the night. Also there were plenty of people here so your options weren’t that limited.
Entertainment: No MCs or extra entertainment
Atmosphere: Pretty much all the crowded dancing action was here. Most of the people making out in the club were in the middle as well. Throughout the night it was constantly packed, so it was a bitch trying to dance well here – one can only manage to secure their own little spot and bob up and down. You actually had better luck going up on the central podium area as at least you only had two people next to you on either side, instead of being surrounded by people. Outside the immediate dance floor there was generally space for which daring people could dance here at the observation of the drinking crowd. The eastern side was quite busy with an extreme abundance of men particularly in the pool table corners. The other side was more balanced, but there were fewer people than that of the side with the main bar.

The general mood in the middle is party party with the darker lit atmosphere, lights and smoke machines helping out with the club feel tonight. The crowd seemingly are enjoying most of the songs being played tonight. Generally here the crowd is either quite friendly or tolerant, thought there were some aggravated blokes towards Marty at one time. I can’t blame them after he pretty much danced nearby near their little private space, right next to the dance floor. Besides that people were nice here. Some of the ladies were 50/50 friendly and cold.

Video: Walkthrough and Music Montage
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A night in Cronulla for a change. The plan was to just check Northies out for a bit before checking out the other places..

Saturdays @ Northies, Cronulla Hotel, Cronulla Sydney
Assessment Time: 10:50PM – 11:15PM
Address: 1 Kingsway, Cronulla (Opposite Cronulla beach)
Venue Website: http://www.northies.com.au
Promoter Website: Self promoted event tonight
Occurrence: Every weekend.
Outside Line: There was no line when we enetered at this time.
Dress Code / Door Policy: Hats were definitely allowed – trucker hats, fedora hats, whatever hat you have. It actually was kind of a bit scary when you see some really beefed up guys with trucker hats on. A large majority of the guys here wore t-shirts and jeans.. all the guys here are beefcakes so I would suppose every opportunity is needed to show off their guns. Very casual here. Girls were pretty casual as well – but there also were so many girls that there were a good number wearing one pieces as well.
Entry Fee / Cover Charge: Free all night.
Inside: Walk inside to a foyer area and walk into the corner bar area. From here you can go right to through to the main room for about 500-800 people – a sprawling area of tables and stool chairs for drinking. A bar to the left to supply for everyone here. Lounges dot the far north wall. There is a dancefloor in the north-east corner which occupies about 15-20% of the floor space here, but it is a bit small – to hold 40-50 people. Podium for 5-6 people and the DJ booth is here as well. On the other end of the venue to the South West corner is a separate room where classic/rock music is being played. The capacity of the floor is about the same as the main room, but there are considerably less surrounding tables and chairs. It’s not a large room by comparison.
Cloak Room: None
Bar Prices / Line: No drinking tonight, but there was only one order in front of us when we lined up to request some water.
Eviction Count: None that we saw during this brief time
Music Style: Hard to describe – a disco kind of feel type house music, where a saxophone player goes along with the beat. It’s not something you could really shuffle to. It’s a certain type of dance music but a bit laid back, so no party tunes were being belted out here. Almost reminds me of a Cargo Bar / Bungalow 8 style being replicated here.
Crowd & Ratio: Pretty much you can tell you’re in Cronulla, or somewhere outside of the city. Everyone is Caucasian Australian and the fair majority are locals to the area. Age wise varied but the majority in the main room are young from 18 to low 20’s. There are also a few people mid and late 20’s and some early 30’s represented. In the smaller south-west room the average age is probably a decade older than the main room. The ratio was pretty even – and may I say I have never seen so many hotties in one concentrated area in my bar/club life. That’s me though.
Entertainment: Main room has a saxophone player to play along with the tunes.
Atmosphere: Very busy and bustling in all areas. Dancefloor wise you could have your own little space to break out into dance, but I suppose due to the music you couldn’t really go as hard out as in a typical club. This venue is more focused on the drinking aspect rather than the dance aspect. On the dancefloor itself it was a bit weird, as the majority of the nearby people are watching you, and they are all seated pretty close. Kind of awkward when they sit and stare.
Video: Walkthrough
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Arrivederci
Wasn’t feeling the dance vibe here so we left. From here we moved onto Sting Bar

Recommendation
A popular place for the locals to have a drink by the beach, which is fair, but not many are fans of the dance.

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