@Haali: no pollution, you'll just be wandering around with your own drinking habits on your own, unless you want to conform reasonably to local drinking customs. You may not want to, but anyway you have the choice.

Chapter one is on wen lin jie near the entrance to yun da. from morning til 7pm they have 40% off all beers, and cocktails.

Uh, wasn't latest incarnation of Shelter remodeled, opened, and owned by four foreigners? GoK says it's failed again, so is it open under Chinese owners now?

Muyu is located way in the back of a parking lot complex off Wenlin jie. It's like the first right into a parking lot coming up the hill from bottom entrance of Yunnan uni. www.gokunming.com/en/listings/item/32956/mu_yu_studio

There are plenty of nice local bars around Moondog and the corner heading to Kundu. We just tend to forget about them cuz we are going there for Moondog. Also, the beer is more expensive.

Another bar area is the YMCA club. Pretty local, city center, several bars.
www.gokunming.com/en/listings/item/33002/ymca_club_1933

Finally, if you want a true young and local bar scene, then east side of Panlongjiang just north of Remin.

Thanks everyone, seems like I have plenty of places to try. Nobody has mentioned The Mask..

I agree with Shelter, excellent setting, but almost empty most nights..

Also like the Hump Hostel terrace and the new O'Reilly's on Beimen Jie..
How about Laowo? It was a famous bar back in the day and has been reopened.. named D2? It is still foreign owned.

If you don't mind travelling, try Bluestone in Guandu Old Town.

I tried to find Laowo / D2 the other night but failed...

Laowo is pretty hard to find, on the street look for a place called lao wo xiao chi de, then you go into there and youll see the bar entrance

I checked out Alei. It was too loud/busy for our requirements (somewhere to have a chat) so we went up on Vervo's balcony, not a bad place. Only problem was they would only let us buy a minimum of 9 beers (for 2 people who wanted 1 drink each!), so we had to have cocktails. Its cool how they have a separate dance floor, but it was almost deserted, even at midnight. If you went with a few people or on a busier night (than saturday!?) it could be fun

I had the same experience with Vervo. Empty at 1am on a Saturday night. Very strange!

Do many foreigners go to Chinese bars, or only foreign-owned or foreign-clientele bars? This is a simple, honest question. I am not a huge bar guy, so I just honestly wonder.