Features

Ease on down to the lanes

Each Monday before their bowling league’s lane time, Joe Partash and Thaddeus Prekel head to the lounge at Modern Lanes in Exeter for a weekly meeting of their own.

click image to enlarge

Looking for something to do on a Tuesday night? People like Tim Newell of Pittston head to Chacko’s Family Bowling Center for a few games.

PETE G. WILCOX photos/THE TIMES LEADER

click image to enlarge

T.J. Newell, 10, of Pittston, spent time tossing basketballs at the arcade inside Chacko’s Family Bowling Center on Tuesday night while his parents bowled. The arcade is filled with games such as Arctic Thunder, Last Action Hero and House of the Dead.

PETE G. WILCOX/THE TIMES LEADER

Additional Photos Below

Select images available for purchase in the
Times Leader Photo Store

If you go

Bowlers (and non-bowlers alike) have plenty of local options:

 

What: Back Mountain Bowl

Where: 120 Memorial Highway, Dallas

Phone: 675-5026

What: Chacko’s Family Bowling Center

Where: 195 N. Wilkes-Barre Blvd.

Phone: 208-2695

What: Modern Lanes

Where: 1948 Wyoming Ave., Exeter

Phone: 693-0584

What: Stanton Lanes

Where: 470 Stanton St., Wilkes-Barre

Phone: 284-4661

“We’re the Sam Adams crew,” Partash said, explaining the meeting is more about winter lager than bowling strategies and indicating the weekends are more about entertainment.

“Where were you Saturday?” Partash asked his friend, who couldn’t make it out last weekend to see Partash’s group, The Jeanne Zano Band, perform.

“It was packed in here,” Partash said, which didn’t surprise Prekel, who runs the junior bowling league on weekends.

“I always get calls to see if there’s a band playing,” Prekel, 53, said.

In other words, today’s bowling alleys are no longer just about balls and pins and spares and strikes. They’re also about live music and socializing and modern, more appealing menus.

“I know everybody here,” Partash, a drummer, said with pride.

Sure, the lanes are still crowded with typical, bag-toting, hard-shoe-wearing bowlers, but the music, the beer and the fare are pretty big draws even for those most likely to get to know the gutters should they agree to a game.

“If I’m getting pizza, I’d rather get it here,” Guy Sviatko of Bear Creek said.

His friend Leo Kaslavage agreed, though he more often opts for the hot wings.

“They call them wild here,” he said.

Modern Lanes, Sviatko joked, serves up “all the stuff that’s good for you, because we’re on strict diets here.”

Translation: breaded mushrooms dipped into multiple sauces, mini tacos loaded with salsa or sour cream or double cheeseburgers that concessions employee Heidi Vanleuven said best Burger King’s.

Sviatko has been bowling in a weekly league at Modern Lanes for about a decade. He joined when a couple of guys who used to come into a nearby garage he ran needed an extra bowler.

“Even though I gave up the garage two years ago, I still come in and bowl with them,” he said. “We go on bowling trips together; we have clambakes.”

Chacko’s Family Bowling Center in Wilkes-Barre, Back Mountain Bowl in Dallas and Stanton Lanes in Wilkes-Barre are other local hotspots with similar, diverse appeal.

“I was here a couple of times on a Thursday when they have college night, and it’s pretty packed,” 27-year-old Nick Marrapodi said while hanging out at Memory Lane Lounge, the bar area at Chacko’s, last weekend after bowling a few games.

Beer pints are $1 from 9:30-11:30 p.m. but not the only big draw for Thursday nights, bartender Justin Knesis said. Hazleton band Kartune plays Thursdays and draws “a fantastic crowd,” he said.

In fact, it’s just like “100 of your closest friends.”

Kristen Chapasko, 24, of Wilkes-Barre often accompanies a group of friends to see Kartune.

“Most of the people I run into are friends of Zack’s,” she said, referring to Kartune’s twentysomething drummer, Zack Baldassari, also her friend.

The bar area also transforms into a sort of dance club on Thursdays.

“A lot of people there are bowlers at the beginning of the night. They’ll come in when they’re done bowling at 9 or 10, and they may stay until 11,” Tommy Bruno, Kartune lead singer, said. “Then you have your crowd left that comes in to see you all the time.”

“It’s a nice change for some of those people that don’t get out to bars,” Bruno, 45, said, noting the crowd represents ages from 21 to 60. “Now they get to see bands.”

“There are times we’ll do Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays and do well every night, which is amazing,” he said.

Ron Maloney, 50, is a bowler but often heads to Chacko’s even when he’s not hitting the lanes, he said. He has a thing for the buffalo bites.

“I’ll stop in – even when I’m not coming in to drink – to get takeout.”

He has plenty of options, considering how bowling-alley menus have evolved since the days of standard-issue hot dogs from a roller machine. Chacko’s also serves chicken sandwiches, Italian wraps, brick-oven pizza, steak quesadillas, shrimp and even French toast, which is on the breakfast menu.

Pat Layden, 54, of Wilkes-Barre, however, comes in for the Molson Canadian beer on draft.

“You can have a couple of beers, watch TV, and nobody bothers you,” the former bowler said last weekend as his buddy Allen enjoyed “a monster” garden salad and a Stegmaier.

“Pat’s a permanent fixture in here,” joked bartender Anne Chacko Libby, for whom “The Anne” is named. That’s a burger topped with sweet sauce, cheese, lettuce, and tomato.

Arcade games are another draw, especially for those not old enough to hang out in a bar and not interested enough to learn the signature game.

“I actually hate bowling,” 18-year-old Amanda Brennan of Luzerne said while watching her friend Zech Keener play The House of the Dead in Chacko’s arcade.

Bowling doesn’t do much for Stacy Cook, 26, either, but that doesn’t keep her away from the Back Mountain Bowl, where she swears by the Sicilian pizza.

“I couldn’t tell you why; it just tastes really good,” she said, also praising the hot wings as “just hot enough but not overpowering.”

“I come to hang out and have a few beers,” she said over a Coors Light. Plus, her friends Nick and Amanda DiPaola are weekly bowlers.

The story’s pretty much the same at Stanton Lanes, where mozzarella sticks, cheesesteaks, popcorn and pizza are big sellers and breakfast items, such as bagels and English muffins, are offered as well.

Bartender Lyndsey Hadvance usually works Sundays and says “people who used to bowl here frequently stop in just to say hello.”

Birthday parties also bring people, hordes of little people, to bowling alleys.

“This is the first time I was in a bowling alley since high school,” 34-year-old Rich Alaimo said after throwing a party for his 4-year-old at Back Mountain Bowl. He found the idea more appealing than a house party.

“This kept them a lot more occupied,” he said.

Were you interviewed for this story? If so, please fill out our accuracy form

Send Question/Comment to the Publisher