Triple XXX Root Beer Drive-in (Gone)
Issaquah, WA
Photo courtesy Dan Brown

Cruising through Issaquah, here's one roadside stop that was just about impossible to miss. Sitting alongside Gilman Boulevard was the Triple XXX Root Beer Drive-In, complete with a giant orange root beer barrel glowing above the building. If the burgers and root beer didn't get your attention, that barrel certainly did.

Triple XXX goes way back to the early days of roadside dining in the Pacific Northwest. Archie Rutherford opened the first Triple XXX Root Beer location in Renton in 1930, and before long the name began appearing at drive-ins around Washington and beyond. Issaquah had its own Triple XXX by the 1930s, originally located along East Mill Street, today's Sunset Way.

A look at the front counter
Issaquah, WA
Photo courtesy Dan Brown

When that property was needed for a car dealership parking lot, Triple XXX packed up and moved to 98 NE Gilman Boulevard in 1968. That's the location most road travelers came to know, with the restaurant, parking lot and those wonderful barrel signs making quite a sight from the street.

And what a sign. The huge orange barrel mounted along the front of the restaurant was the kind of roadside advertising that didn't need much explanation. XXX ROOT BEER was spelled right across the middle, with another barrel perched up on the roof for good measure. About the only thing missing was a giant straw sticking out of the top.

A closer look at the food
Issaquah, WA
Photo courtesy Dan Brown

Pull into the parking lot and things didn't exactly calm down. Triple XXX was filled with old license plates, hubcaps, radios, soda bottles, photographs and assorted pieces of 1950s and '60s memorabilia. There was something hanging just about everywhere you looked. Owner Jose Enciso, who took over the restaurant with his family in 1999, helped turn the place into an even bigger celebration of cars and roadside culture.

That spilled outside into the parking lot too. Triple XXX became a regular gathering place for classic cars, hot rods and weekend car shows. On the right day, you could pull in for a hamburger and root beer float and find the parking lot looking like somebody had turned the clock back about 50 years.

Memorabilia
Issaquah, WA
Photo courtesy Dan Brown

Then there was the food. This wasn't exactly the place to stop if you were looking for a tiny lunch. Triple XXX became known for big burgers, milkshakes, root beer floats and portions that sometimes seemed to match the size of the sign outside. Even the menu had a little fun with the roadside location, including an entree called "Why Did the Chicken Cross I-90?"

For many years, Issaquah was one of only two surviving Triple XXX Root Beer restaurants in the country. The other could be found way over in West Lafayette, Indiana. But if you're keeping score on roadside architecture, Issaquah had the giant root beer barrel. That alone made this one worth pulling over for.

Taking Orders
Issaquah, WA
Photo courtesy Dan Brown

The old drive-in managed to hang around while much of the roadside landscape surrounding it changed. Maybe that was part of the fun. You could still pull off the road, grab a burger and float, wander around looking at all the memorabilia and then head back outside beneath that enormous orange barrel.

UPDATE: Triple XXX Root Beer Drive-In permanently closed on November 29, 2023, after Jose Enciso and his family retired. The restaurant's familiar barrel signs were later removed, and the old drive-in property was taken over for a new Burgermaster location. 08-26

For more root beer locations, check out Roadside Peek's Root Beer East.

Triple XXX Root Beer Drive-in
Image courtesy Dan Brown

Check out the last of the Triple X Root Beer locations in the country. Located in Issaquah, WA, this root beer business with its huge root beer facade continues to be an eye-catcher as well as a stop for good food.

Below are more photos of the XXX Root Beer Drive-in in Issaquah, WA courtesy of Dan Brown.

Google Street View Image

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