I went to my old bar regularly after meetings for a couple of months after I stopped drinking. It was part of my old life. I wanted to see my "friends". I only stayed ten minutes or so, just had a coke. Then one night the truth of the place hit me. I thought it was the centre of the universe, where life happened. It wasn't, sad to say, it was a dive full of smelly drunks and smokers. I wondered what I ever saw in the place. I left and never went back.
Fast forward a couple of years, having joined the AA program and recovered, I still wouldn't be bothered going to a bar like that one, but I would go with friends if I had a good reason. Part of the freedom from alcohol in AA is that alcohol does not control where I can go anymore.