Party in the fuselage! This one's on the Contras...

A friend of mine just returned from Costa Rica, where stray dogs act as sherpas & if you want to get your drink on in a Fairchild C-123 cargo plane--a vestige from the Iran-Contra affair--you can do so at a place called El Avion. It's a bar, it's a coffee shop, it's a store, and it is, my friend reports back, amazing! The Hotel Costa Verde acquired the plane for $3k in 2000, and details the journey here:

We then disassembled and shipped the pieces of the Iran-Contra relic to Quepos. From San Jose, the fuselage was shipped via ocean ferry (from Caldera to Quepos) because it was 10 inches too wide for the antiquated Chiquita Banana railroad bridges! After hauling all seven aircraft sections up the Manuel Antonio hill, the C-123 finally found its current cliff-side resting-place.

Bars in places that used to be totally-not-bars are always fun. Barmacy, the NYC staple of yesteryear's bar culture, was named after the equally beloved 14th Street pharmacy that once occupied its space. LA's Bordello used to be, yep, just that. Has anyone ever been to El Avion, or otherwise patronized a place that was formerly a very different kind of establishment?