Ideas for Midwest Travel and Tattoo Fun

[AverageJer]

Hi all, my wife and I decided to reward ourselves for continuing to exist in our, and your, favorite way: getting tattoos. We've decided to target this fall because of time, money, and summer being a bad time to get tattoos considering that someone (usually our six year old daughter) always wants us to go swimming.

Anyway, the question we have to ask ourselves is if we should take a long weekend and travel for tattoos or get one in our home town of Minneapolis, MN. If we decide to stay home we will go to our usual shop, Leviticus, where there are several artists we enjoy, or would enjoy, getting tattoos from. This option saves money on travel which could potentially lead to more , um... aggressive tattoos.

The alternative is to travel but then we have to decide where to go. Long childless weekends are probably the only thing we like better than tattoos so this option is attractive for obvious reasons- although money concerns could compromise the tattoo. This doesn't actually bother me because it just saves more skin for future tattoos but it is at least worth mentioning.

My question for LST is where should we go if we do decide to leave town? Mostly likely we would be driving so both coasts are out. Chicago is always fun and we would love to head back to Great Lakes Tattoo where we went while on a similar misadventure a few summer back. The criteria for other destinations would be that it would be a fun place to spend a few nights, that we could get good quality tattoos (traditional or Neo-traditional would work best), and that it is within striking distance of Minneapolis.

I look forward to your suggestions.

[iowagirl]

The only place I'm familiar w/is Omaha. My husband and I get ours at Big Brain in the Old Market part of Omaha. There's a ton of shops down there to browse thru, art and books and music, lots of places to eat and hang out outside. Henry Doorly Zoo is in Omaha and there are plenty of other things to do as well. I guess it depends on how far you want to travel? Chicago is probably closer to you.

[AverageJer]

Actually, Omaha and Chicago are pretty similar drives, hour wise. Thanks for the suggestion.

Edited May 28, 2015 by AverageJer
add a comma

[iowagirl]

Oh really? Ha, shows what I know about geography. Well, maybe it's a better option than I thought then. I can't copy/paste for whatever reason right now, but we the website for the shop we go to is bigbrainomaha.com

There's a Spaghetti Works around the corner from the shop...maybe not a big deal to city folk but to us country meeces that have 4 places to choose from to eat in town, we feel like we're living high on the hog!

[exume]

I love Chicago, but if you wanna go a bit further Ann Arbor is one of my favorite cities in the greater Midwest region. Tons of great food, cool stuff to see, and of course a bunch of great tattoo shops. Right in AA you've got Name Brand and Leo Zululeta's Spiral Tattoo, just down the road in Ypsilanti is Depot Town, and a bunch of the depot town guys just opened a shop in Hamtrack whose name escapes me right now.

[AverageJer]

Hmm, interesting suggestion. MI could be a nice place to drive to in the fall. Thanks.

[9Years]

Josh Arment | The Aloha Monkey Tattoo & Piercing

That'd be my choice

[AverageJer]

Aloha Monkey is about 20 minutes from home. My wife has gotten tattooed there. It's a fine shop with a great reputation. Maybe I go there someday. There are a lot of local shops I have interest in and I always have a great time at Levitcus.

[UglyButProud]

I love Chicago, but if you wanna go a bit further Ann Arbor is one of my favorite cities in the greater Midwest region. Tons of great food, cool stuff to see, and of course a bunch of great tattoo shops. Right in AA you've got Name Brand and Leo Zululeta's Spiral Tattoo, just down the road in Ypsilanti is Depot Town, and a bunch of the depot town guys just opened a shop in Hamtrack whose name escapes me right now.

Dawn and Bill from Depot Town opened Harlequin Tattoo:

Harlequin Tattoo

I haven't been down there yet but they're cool people. Also to add to the Ann Arbor list is Tony Caporusso @ Lucky Monkey Tattoo down the street from Name Brand:

Lucky Monkey Tattoo

Ann Arbor and near by Ypsilanti have a shit ton of stuff to do, as they are both college towns (U of Michigan and Eastern Michigan)

[Nick W]

Hey, my recommendation would be taking the Great River Road (Highway 35) along the Mississippi to La Crosse, WI (About 3 hours or so from the cities) and go to Blue Line Tattoo. I've gotten most of my left sleeve done from Nick Schreck at Blue Line, and have nothing but great things to say about him and the shop. Facebook page here and his IG is @NickBlueLine. Also, the drive is absolutely gorgeous.

If you want to make it a 5 hour trip, going to Tailor Made Tattoos in Madison would be cool. @jonbass1 is someone I wish I got stuff done by.

[AverageJer]

Hey, my recommendation would be taking the Great River Road (Highway 35) along the Mississippi to La Crosse, WI (About 3 hours or so from the cities) and go to Blue Line Tattoo. I've gotten most of my left sleeve done from Nick Schreck at Blue Line, and have nothing but great things to say about him and the shop. Facebook page here and his IG is @NickBlueLine. Also, the drive is absolutely gorgeous.

If you want to make it a 5 hour trip, going to Tailor Made Tattoos in Madison would be cool. @jonbass1 is someone I wish I got stuff done by.

Thanks, these could both be good ideas. Lacrosse might be a way to save a little money on travel expenses but still get out of town. It would be hard not to just go to Chicago once we got to Madison but I have been meaning to do more than drive through one of these years.