Florida Keys: Best tiki bars are required stops

Featured Articles, Florida Keys, Unique Eats — By Bonnie Gross on 09/28/2010 2:27 pm

I had a friend who was disappointed in the Florida Keys. He thought the drive down the Overseas Highway passed too many tacky commercial establishments spoiling the natural beauty.

I understand.

The Keys are an acquired taste, like beer.

Fortunately (or not), I’ve acquired a taste for both, and one of the things I love about the Keys is where authentic tackiness meets postcard views. And that is at the tiki bar.

Elsewhere, tiki bars hearken back to the 1950s romanticized view of Polynesian culture — carved wooden masks, hula-girl lamps, that sort of thing.

In the Keys, it’s more of a chickee-bar or cabana-bar culture and it’s all about being outdoors and overlooking the water, particularly at sunset.

Keys tiki bars are some of the best places to eat fresh fish and fried anything. They are usually family friendly, because kids at an outdoor table can wiggle and make noise. And they are the epitome of the Keys attitude — sit back, relax, be entertained by fish snapping up breadcrumbs or the passing clouds.

If a Keys vacation were a college major, Tiki Bar 101 would be a required course.

Here are three classic Keys tiki bars that will help fulfill your requirements:

• Lorelei Restaurant and Cabana Bar, Mile Marker 82, bayside.

For years, the big mermaid sign on US 1 at Mile Marker 82 in Islamorada, has said: Relax, you’re finally in the Keys. Beyond the parking lots, Lorelei’s decks, chickee huts, palm trees and sandy waterfront create an expansive and outstanding place to watch the sunset. Lorelei’s is situated on a lovely mangrove-rimmed bay that is pretty to gaze upon any time of day.

On a hot but breezy summer day, it was easy to get a table at water’s edge and watch the fish battling over bread crusts kids threw in the water as skinny needle fish darted by. An excellent fish dip and a $2.50 draft of Key West Sunset Ale completed the experience.

Lorelei’s is located in a marina that contains an item that belongs in the Florida Funky Hall of Fame — a pink limousine converted into a boat, the famous Nautilimo. It’s parked next door to a mock pirate ship.

Lorelei’s is jammed at sunset in season, but off season, I felt like I had discovered the place.

Lorelei’s has lots of fans on TripAdvisor and on Yelp.

• Chiki Tiki Bar and Grille at Burdines Waterfront, 1200 Oceanview Ave, End of 15th Street.

Unlike Lorelei’s, you have to know about Burdines to go there. To find it, you turn east on 15th Street in Marathon, wind past an old trailer park and stacks of lobster traps, and arrive in a large working marina in a protected harbor. The Chiki Tiki is up a flight of stairs, giving you an excellent vantage point and a superior breeze. Around you are fishing boats, yachts and beat-up live-aboards. In the distance is the broken drawbridge to Boot Key. Across the water, Boot Key is all undeveloped mangroves, populated by the occasional wading bird.

On our visit, just before the start of lobster season, we watched as boat after boat stacked high with lobster traps headed out to sea — a happy sign that this paradise isn’t only about tourism.

Keys restaurants can be expensive, but Burdines is popular for its moderate prices and casual atmosphere — the view and wall to wall license plates comprise the decor. Our fresh dolphin sandwich ($7.95) and Tower of Fries were excellent. Other visitors recommend the burgers ($6.25).

See what folks on TripAdvisor and on Yelp say about Burdines.

• Alabama Jacks, on Card Sound Road, a toll-road through the mangrove swamps where Miami-Dade County meets Monroe County, is a great place to start or end your Keys trip. It’s an historic outpost in the middle of crocodile habitat, 15 minutes north of Key Largo. I’ve written a separate post all about Alabama Jacks, here.

Of course, I haven’t visited every tiki bar in the Keys: Thanks goodness, there are places still to be discovered. (Next time, I’ll stop at Sunset Grille and Raw Bar, which is near Burdines and has a view of my favorite bridge, the Seven Mile Bridge.)

Did I miss your favorite spot? If so, please leave a comment below.

Other nearby things to do in the Florida Keys:

• Print out this mile marker guide to enhance your next road trip to the Florida Keys.
• Biking or walking the Old Seven Mile Bridge
• No Name Pub worth finding on Big Pine Key
• Indian Key: Kayak into history
• Long Key: Beach camping in the Keys
• Seeing Keys deer
• Cabins, off-the-beaten-track, make a good kayaking base

Tags: Florida Keys, Islamorada, Marathon, seafood