Josh Noel - Destinations: The Chicago Tribune Guide to Vacations and Getaways

This is a great baseball town. Cardinals fans know to applaud for a sacrifice bunt, especially when laid down by their pitcher. They know not to applaud when the other team ties the score on a sacrifice fly, even though it means an out for the opponent. They dress in red as if it were the only color on the racks.

And this is a terrible baseball town. The food at Busch Stadium, which opened in 2006, is especially bad; ask 10 Cardinals fans about the best grub in the park, and eight will say the nachos, which are basically the same nachos you find at every other park. Fans do the wave when their team is down by eight runs in the eighth inning. And the streets surrounding the park are largely a charmless sprawl of chain hotels, predictable sports bars and parking garages.

Which is something Larry Recar, 33, learned on a warm Saturday night after watching his beloved Cardinals get thwacked by the lowly Colorado Rockies. After years of baseball pilgrimages to St. Louis from Bloomington, Ill., he was looking for more than the same old packed restaurants and bars.

When youve been doing this from 21 to 33, you want something where youre not neck to neck with someone you dont know, Recar said.

Well, Recar and anyone looking for a fresh take on St. Louis are in luck if they know where to look. This years Major League Baseball All-Star Game will be at Busch Stadium on July 14, and rather than visit the same old haunts, we headed to the All-Star city to scout out its most all-star experiences.

These tips arent just for All-Star weekend. Theyre good for any weekend of baseball in St. Louis.

It all starts where you wake up. Though downtown is full of hotels, you can find neighborhood flair at the Moonrise Hotel (moonrisehotel.com; 877-872-1122), which opened in The Delmar Loop, a neighborhood 6 miles west of Busch. Built by developer Joe Edwards, the Moonrise is a boutique hotel with excellent service, cool amenities and a popular rooftop bar with panoramic views of downtown.

This is the happening buzz of the city, said Derrick Martin, 42, at the Moonrise bar on a Friday night. You could go to downtown, which is decent on a Saturday night, but on Sunday a tumbleweed could blow down the street.

But back to breakfast. If you stay at Moonrise, start the day at Meshuggah Cafe (meshuggahcafe.com; 314-726-5662), an independent coffee shop where the java is made one espresso-based cup at a time, and the breakfast sandwiches scrambled eggs and some combination of veggies and meat are cheap, hearty and delicious.

The best thing about spending the first part of your day in The Delmar Loop before going to a Cardinals game is that the Metro Link connects the neighborhood to the stadium an advantage in a city thats difficult to negotiate without a car.

If you want breakfast closer to the stadium, try Rooster (roosterstl.com; 314-241-8118), which specializes in crepes but not the kind that leave you hungry 20 minutes later. These are closer to omelets, stuffed with fresh, surprising ingredients. A house favorite, for example, is the mushroom, basil and oven-dried tomato crepes with goat cheese. Delectable.

If youre up early enough that you have time between eating and the game or if its a night game check out one of the most mind-bending museums ever, where kids will smile non-stop: City Museum (citymuseum.org; 314-231-2489).

Housed in a 600,000-square-foot former shoe factory, this museum, founded in 1997 by sculptor Bob Cassilly, is a salute to imagination, packed with the surreal, the surprising and the incredibly fun. (The school bus hanging off the roof yes, you can go inside and a 10-story spiral slide are just the beginning.) Full of things to climb on, swing from, slide down and ride, the place feels like a circus crossed with Batmans Wayne Manor inside the eye of a tornado.

If you sleep past breakfast and are ready to dive into lunch and beer, a great bet near the stadium is Schlafly Tap Room (schlafly.com; 314-241-2337). The shaved roast beef, served on a perfectly soft roll, was succulent, as was the spicy and tangy beer-boiled brat, topped with grilled kraut and eye-opening mustard. And the beer didnt disappoint. Instead of Bud and Miller, youll be drinking porter and hefeweizen.

This is not your normal atmosphere before a baseball game, said Kyle Tracy, a Cardinals fan in for the game from Murray, Ky. His go-to beer is usually Coors Light, but this day he was drinking No. 15, an amber ale with a slightly sweet finish. You can do the sports bar thing wherever you go. If you make a special trip, you might as well do something special.

As baseball becomes more of a rich persons sport and thats just being a fan, not a $20 million draft pick the Cardinals offer a brilliant option: First Pitch Tickets. For every home game, at 9 a.m., near Gate 3, the Cardinals make available 275 vouchers, good for a pair of tickets to that days game. Ten minutes before first pitch, fans redeem their vouchers for $11 and get a random pair of tickets, anywhere from standing room to an all-inclusive area, where unlimited food and beer are part of the deal. For big games, it behooves fans to queue hours early, maybe even the previous night.

Its great, said Tony Phillips, 29, a youth director for a Catholic church, who has won both kinds of tickets. I do it all the time.

Truth is, no matter where you wind up in Busch, youre in for a good view. During the couple of games I attended, I sat in every part of the park, and except for the obvious high behind the foul poles there wasnt a bad spot. The best deals, other than First Pitch Tickets, are the standing-room areas along the third- and first-base lines, the lower bleachers, and the infield terrace reserved, which are near home plate.

Its a birds-eye view, but you can see everything, said John Linxwiler, 45, sitting in the last row above home plate with his family. And we are under the roof, whether it rains or is 105 degrees.