We love an option

The highest-rated room on this list at 4.9. Chef CJ Jacobson's Mediterranean, on a terrace, and booked solid for exactly that reason.

NoteBooks out weeks ahead. If you want this, call the moment you read it. Parties of 12+ go through AbaNashvilleParties@lettuce.com.

The "Rosé All Day" neon sign is here, which makes it the most photographed brunch wall in Nashville and, frankly, the correct backdrop for a 40th. Coastal food, cherry blossom tree in the dining room, rooftop upstairs.

NoteSix minutes from the hotel door. The neon sign is the group photo — get there before the room fills.

Chicago chef Lee Wolen's Italian room. The cacio e pepe ricotta dumplings are the thing — order them for the table before anyone opens a menu.

NoteOpens at 4:30pm. Same block as Middleman and Momotaro, so dinner and drinks are a thirty-second walk apart.

Boka Restaurant Group's Japanese room, opened next door to Middleman on the same night. New enough that the review count is low and the rating is high.

NoteLiterally two doors from Middleman. Dinner here, drinks there, no car.

A squat stone room the Gulch grew up around, and the best live music on this list. Everyone sits down, everyone listens, and the players are frequently famous. The answer for anyone who wants real music without standing in a crowd on Broadway.

NoteFirst-come seating and it fills early. Go at opening or not at all.

Coffee shop, restaurant, bar, six vintage bowling lanes and two outdoor dipping pools in one building. The pools make it the obvious backup if Saturday's pool plan falls through.

NoteBowling lanes book up on weekends — reserve a lane when you reserve the table.

Sixty wines on tap, sat on top of Assembly Food Hall at Fifth + Broadway. Wine-country food in a room with a roof that opens. Good for a long lunch that turns into an afternoon.

NoteSame building as Blanco and a two-minute walk from Pushing Daisies — this corner does a whole evening on its own.

Nashville's original craft cocktail room, downstairs from The Catbird Seat. Bartenders in period dress, no standing, no phones out, drinks built like a performance.

NoteHouse rules: everyone must be seated, so a big group waits. Go with four, not ten.

The safe, polished, everyone-leaves-happy option. Live jazz in the lounge most nights, big enough to seat a group without a month of notice, and walkable from the hotel.

NoteThe one on this list most likely to have a table on short notice.

The one Nashville musicians send you to. Real traditional country, played straight, in a former boot shop with the boots still on the wall. If you only do one honky tonk, this is the one that won't feel like a theme park.

NoteThe $6 Recession Special is a fried bologna sandwich, chips, a MoonPie and a PBR. Order it once for the picture.

The Nashville branch of the New York institution. There's no menu — you tell the bartender two spirits or a mood and they build to it. Unmarked green building, you knock.

NoteThe furthest thing on this list from the hotel, and a real detour. Worth it for a small group, not a crowd.

The Nashville outpost of the New York bistro. You don't have to commit to dinner — the patio works as a cocktail stop on the way to somewhere else on the block.

NoteDirectly across Houston Street from Flamingo. Patio first, disco after.

Tennessee whiskey, bourbon, rye, scotch and Japanese whisky, in a small room that opened in June. Comes recommended for the clientele as much as the pour.

NoteSixteen reviews, because it's brand new. Next door to Momotaro, two doors from Alla Vita.

Narrow, loud, bluegrass-leaning, and beloved by people who find the rest of Broadway exhausting. Been there since 1997, which on this street counts as ancient.

NoteSmall room. Good for a nightcap on the strip, bad for parking a group of ten.

French Truck coffee and house-made pastries in the lobby of the Thompson. The serious coffee stop, for whoever in the group wakes up first and wants to leave the hotel.

NoteCloses at 3pm and doesn't do a big breakfast. Coffee and a pastry, not a sit-down meal.

Six blocks of boutiques, coffee and murals. Draper James is Reese Witherspoon's shop and the anchor, the I Believe in Nashville mural is around the corner, and Five Daughters does the hundred-layer donut.

NoteThe best Saturday afternoon that is not a bar. Easy to peel off from and rejoin.

The closest real restaurant to the hotel and the easiest yes on the list. Oysters, steak, and a room that's been good long enough to stop trying to prove anything.

NoteFour minutes on foot. This is the one to hold for the night nobody wants to make a decision.

The answer to "where can we actually dance without being on Broadway." Free line dancing lessons Friday and Saturday nights, under a glass atrium, a block off Printers Alley.

NoteDJ brunch runs Friday through Sunday, 10am–3pm. It's the same room, twice as loud.

Bright, loud, modern Mexican at Fifth + Broadway. The margarita-and-guacamole answer when the group can't agree on anything more ambitious.

NoteOpen until 11pm Thursday through Saturday, so it works as a late dinner after Broadway rather than before.

A subterranean, flower-covered tequila and margarita bar under Fifth + Broadway. Book ahead — that's the one instruction that comes with it.

NoteOpen till 2am Thursday through Saturday. Reservations strongly recommended for weekend nights and groups — call (615) 988-5055.

Open since 1948 in the basement of the Southern Turf building. Live jazz nightly, a proper steak dinner, and a late-night burlesque show Thursday through Sunday. This is the grown-up alternative to Broadway that still counts as a night out.

NoteDinner and the burlesque show are the move together. Book it — the room is small and it sells out.

The zero-effort option, downstairs. Barista coffee and to-go breakfast daily from 6am to 11am, for the morning when leaving the building is not happening.

NotePut this one in your back pocket for Sunday.

The Nashville food thing you are supposed to do, and the downtown branch means no pilgrimage. Heat runs from Southern all the way up — order down, you can always add.

NoteCounter service and a queue, but it moves. Good for a group that cannot agree on a restaurant.

The famous one. Bonuts — fried biscuit dough with lemon mascarpone and blueberry — are why people queue down the block, and they are worth it once.

NoteThere will be a line and they do not take reservations. Send one person ahead.

Prime steaks, fine Italian, and a live Sinatra impersonator who is, by all accounts, the reason to go. A completely different genre of night from Broadway, four blocks away.

NoteCall ahead to ask which nights the singer performs. The endorsement is really about him.

The purple one. Willie Nelson and Patsy Cline drank here when it was still a back door to the Ryman. Three floors, three bands, no cover, open until 3am.

NoteBusiest room on Broadway on a Friday. Go up — the top floor has air and a view of the street.

Named for Nudie Cohn, the tailor who put rhinestones on every country star worth the name. His actual suits are on the walls, which makes this the single most on-theme room on Broadway for a big-cat-and-honky-tonk party.

NoteThree floors and a 100-foot bar, so it absorbs a big group better than most.

A hot-pink rooftop named after a Dolly album, with a chicken-wire Dolly sculpture, glitter chandeliers and a pool. The most photogenic room in Nashville for a 40th, and it knows it.

NoteRooftop, so it lives and dies by the weather. Worth going early for the light.

Indoor-outdoor rooftop on top of the Thompson with the skyline in front of you. The grown-up drink with a view — a short ride rather than a whole night out.

NoteKillebrew is downstairs in the same building, so it doubles as a coffee stop earlier in the day.

Thirty-odd counters under one roof, which makes it the only sane answer when ten people want ten different things. Sixty Vines sits on top of it.

NoteNobody has to compromise and nobody waits for a table. Keep this one for the wobbly afternoon.

A genuine hidden room under the Noelle. The entrance is the point: take the elevator to the lower level, walk through the door marked "storage," and keep going.

NoteNext door to Sinatra and two blocks from Printers Alley. Easy to string all three together on foot.

Garth and Trisha's own honky tonk, and the reason this whole theme exists. Four floors, twelve spaces, live music daily. The third floor is curated by Garth and Trisha with menus by Trisha Yearwood — quieter, and the place to put a group that wants to hear each other.

NoteStart here for the photo, then decide whether to stay. The main honky tonk holds 1,075 people and feels like it. Tables can be booked ahead.

Pink, mirrored, and unapologetically a disco. Sits in the middle of the Houston Street block with Aba, Pastis and Middleman, which makes it the natural last stop of that whole night.

NoteLowest rating on this list at 4.0, and it doesn't matter — nobody reviews a dance floor kindly. Go late.