The Tiki Revolution: Here’s our definitive guide to the best tiki bars in California
To drive the Pacific Coast Highway is the stuff of bucket lists and dreams. On my 500-mile trip from San Francisco to San Diego, I seized the chance to not only to admire the Golden State’s majestic coastlines but also to indulge in an epic bar crawl.
My itinerary included stopovers in towns that are home to some of California’s most renowned tiki bars. For the uninitiated, tiki is a Polynesian-inspired American pop culture theme (not to be confused with authentic Polynesian culture) that swept bars and restaurants across the United States from the end of the Second World War through the 1970s. For a variety of reasons (proximity to Hawaii, the surfer lifestyle, weather, burgeoning post-war economy and population) tiki most flourished in California.
While considered a 20th century relic by many, new bars have been opening in recent years, a testament to what some have dubbed the Third Wave of Tiki (there was a brief rekindling of the torch in the late 90s). My pilgrimage bore out this revival, beginning at the oldest tiki bar in the US and ending with one that had launched only two days before my visit. Here are the highlights – tiki and otherwise – from my trip.
San Francisco
Appropriately – for the drive and for the bars – my journey commenced in San Francisco. Driving the Pacific Coast Highway from north to south kept the car on the side of road next to the sea, for unobstructed views and easy access to the shoulder. Starting a tiki bar road trip in San Francisco meant a chance to begin at America’s oldest tiki bar: the Tonga Room & Hurricane Bar at The Fairmont San Francisco hotel.
Completed just before the 1906 earthquake and opened in 1907 following structural repairs, The Fairmont is a city icon. When Tony Bennett first crooned about where he had left his heart, he did so in 1961 at this cherished Beaux-Arts landmark atop the slopes of Nob Hill. 16 years before that, the hotel was the talk of the town for transforming its downstairs spa into the Tonga Room & Hurricane Bar.
During my visit, the nightly automated rainstorm started with a thunderclap over an Olympic-sized, indoor lagoon (once The Fairmont’s swimming pool) and ushered in a live band performing Top 40 covers on an island floating in the middle.
The Tonga Room is not only the oldest tiki bar in the US, but probably the nation’s most over the top as well. During my visit, the nightly automated rainstorm started with a thunderclap over an Olympic-sized, indoor lagoon (once The Fairmont’s swimming pool) and ushered in a live band performing Top 40 covers on an island floating in the middle.
A thatched roof above the band protected them and their gear from the manufactured weather. Looming ponderously over the lagoon and the dance floor was the SS Forester, a largely intact lumber schooner that once sailed between San Francisco and the South Pacific.
Of course what’s most important about any restaurant or bar is the food and drink. The Tonga Room’s menu offers a range of Hawaiian inspired Californian fare (spicy ahi poke with toasted macadamia nuts in a coconut shell) and old school Chinatown crowd pleasers (such as Mongolian beef). The Tonga Room’s 1944 Mai Tai is a smart choice of drink, as it adheres to the original recipe created by Victor “Trader Vic” Bergeron, who first served it at the now defunct Trader Vic’s restaurant in Oakland.
Downhill from The Fairmont and near City Hall is Smuggler’s Cove. Since its 2009 launch, founder and owner Martin Cate has been stockpiling awards, accolades, and rum for his patrons. Spread over three storeys and adorned with tiki bric-a-brac, Polynesian décor and rum-related memorabilia, Smuggler’s Cove boasts the largest rum selection in America and a drinks menu incorporating it all into an intriguing cocktail list that draws inspiration from more than three centuries of rum history. One drink to consider for your visit is The Expedition, a rich and potent mix of coffee liqueur, dark rum, and Bourbon with honey, vanilla and cinnamon (it comes in a take-home signature mug too).
Sideways Detour along the Central Coast
After a few days in San Francisco, it was time to drive south. This first leg of my journey was the least tiki but most scenic. Hugging the curved and craggy road from Monterrey Bay to Big Sur yielded a particularly wondrous eyeful of coastline. But such twisting and turning can make a driver hungry. So it was fortuitous I found a gem of a restaurant for my supper, nestled within the wooded seaside splendour of tiny Carmel-by-the-Sea.
In downtown Carmel is La Balena, a casual eatery where Italian chef-patron Emanuele Bartolini prepares Cali-Itali style dishes from scratch using local ingredients. Considering the bounty of produce grown within even a 50-mile radius of Carmel, this seems more like a no-brainer than a noble cause. Whatever the case, chef Bartolini should be applauded for his menu. Dishes change daily, but handmade pasta is always guaranteed as well as all sorts of fresh seafood dishes accompanied by a wine list demonstrative of a similar commitment to featuring what’s best from nearby. A short drive inland from town, the Quail Lodge & Golf Clubserved as a low-profile rural retreat for the night.
My next stop was the town of Solvang. Danish immigrants from the Midwest moved to this area north of Santa Barbara in 1911 in search of milder winters. Soon after came the fake windmills, Danish bakeries, a replica of Copenhagen’s Little Mermaid statue and more kitsch Nordic fixtures juxtaposed against the arid backdrop of California wine country.
Solvang’s claim to fame is that it was the location for hit film Sideways. Surrounded by vineyards and with more than 20 wine tasting rooms in town, it was the obvious choice for an off-kilter comedy about an obsessive wine connoisseur.
A not so off-kilter experience but a wine lover’s dream nonetheless was my Stagecoach Company Wine Tours visit to nearby vineyards and wineries. My guide was a walking wine encyclopedia, able to explain things in layman’s terms without dumbing down or patronising. All the sites we visited were beautiful and the wines delicious. I especially loved what I saw and tasted from Pence Ranch, a lilting tract of land in the Santa Rita Hill about half an hour west of Solvang, producing noteworthy pinot noirs.
In Solvang, I stayed at Hotel Corque. An easy stroll from just about everything in town, my room at this boutique hotel came with balcony yielding a commanding view of the countryside.
Los Angeles
125 miles south of Solvang is Los Angeles, where it was time to get back on my tiki trail with a visit to Hollywood bar, Tiki-Ti.
Hardly bigger than the actual bar from which its cocktails are served, teeny Tiki-Ti on Sunset Boulevard has made an immeasurable impact on cocktail culture across the globe. Open since 1961, and still in the hands of the son and grandson of the original owner, Tiki-Ti ranks as top contender for the ultimate California tiki bar. The tropical décor is chock-a-block, the atmosphere is welcoming and chatty. And the drinks are out of this world. A must-drink is Ray’s Mistake (named for the original owner Ray Buhen with the bar’s “own super secret flavor, botanic liqueurs, passion fruit and floated with dark Corub rum”). And if you want to see the place go wild, order the tequila-based Blood and Sand!
The DusitD2 Hotel Constance in Pasadena was my base in Los Angeles. A grand old hotel with a new lease of life, the Constance offers a balanced mix of historic elegance and 21st century convenience. It proved an ideal location for sightseeing and an especially convenient departure point for exiting Los Angeles without traffic hassles.
Orange County
Tiki is not only about bars. One of California’s seminal shrines to the phenomenon is the Enchanted Tiki Room at Disneyland in Anaheim. Originally built in 1963, the Enchanted Tiki Room is a zany and kid-friendly musical attraction featuring animatronic parrots and tiki statues interacting and performing for small audiences. The rickety, claptrap sounds of the robotic birds and statues gives the Tiki Room an antiquated, retro vibe. Undoubtedly, Disneyland has snazzier and more thrilling rides. But this old theatre holds its own with charm.
For the grownups, there’s Trader Sam’s Enchanted Tiki Bar. Opened in 2011, this bar is on the grounds of the Disneyland Hotel outside the park entrance. Drinks are as amazing as the bar is visually stunning. Consider the Hippopoto Mai-Tai, for a playful version of the classic cocktail.
After my Disney day, a 20-mile drive towards the ocean led me to Huntington Beach for a few restful surfside nights at Kimpton Shorebreak Hotel. Across the street from the beach and the famous Huntington Beach Pier, the Shorebreak is the sort of hotel that’s easy to love and hard to leave.
The reason we were at Huntington Beach at all was to see Don the Beachcomber. A cavernous venue bedecked with tropical trappings of mostly mid-century origin, this bar and restaurant is named in honour of barman and entrepreneur Donn Beach and his now defunct Don the Beachcomber chain of restaurants. Launched in the 1930s, they set the template for every tiki bar that followed. This same venue was once known as Sam’s Seafood, which for decades served as a Polynesian Pop destination for folks throughout Southern California. Current ownership has done a fine job maintaining the original look while adding a bit of Donn Beach memorabilia. There’s tasty food on the menu too (I can recommend the ribs, tuna tacos and calamari) and live music most nights of the week.
San Diego
At the end of the road was San Diego, where tiki old and tiki new combined for one last hurrah. In San Diego, I stayed at Humphrey’s Half Moon Inn, a low-rise boutique resort with a relaxed tropical feel, a jutting A-frame entrance, dozens of tiki carvings placed throughout the grounds and resident parrots to bid you welcome along hibiscus lined pathways. The resort is located on Shelter Island. Not an actual island but a sandbank connected to the mainland with a collection of hotels, restaurants, marinas and parkland. When Shelter Island was developed in the 1950s, local buildings had to adhere to a Polynesian theme as per special city zoning laws.
Hardly a saunter away from the Half Moon is the Bali Hai restaurant. Opened in 1954, this bayside “tiki temple” is a San Diego treasure, with floor-to-ceiling with carvings, artefacts (real and recreated) and South Seas accoutrements befitting their surroundings. Admired by locals as much for its seafood as for its looks, the Bali Hai is a fine place for dinner and drinks with views of downtown across San Diego Bay – especially at its top floor open-air bar just after dark, when the skyline across the bay starts to twinkle.
Across the bay on the southern edge of Little Italy is False Idol. The brainchild of Martin Cate, the same guy behind Smuggler’s Cove in San Francisco, False Idol was only two days into its launch when I visited but already the talk of the California tiki community. The place was foretold at every tiki establishment I visited en route, from the first day of my trip to the day I saw it with my own eyes.
To access False Idol, you pass through Craft & Commerce’s freezer door to emerge inside a torch-lit cave with an evocatively illuminated bar.
False Idol is (literally) hidden in the back of another bar, Craft & Commerce. A buzzing venue in its own right, you’d never suspect that there might be something tiki lurking in its shadows. To access False Idol, you pass through Craft & Commerce’s freezer door to emerge inside a torch-lit cave with an evocatively illuminated bar. As with most of the tiki bars visited on our tour, this one was decked out to the max with tiki-tat. But the torches and its speakeasy mystique upped the tiki ante to hitherto unseen levels.
Ending my tour on an al fresco high, I sipped a farewell drink at Fairweather. More contemporary cool than classic tiki, it proved a fitting setting for my journey’s end. In the city’s historic Gaslamp Quarter on the roof above Rare Form restaurant (owned by the same folks behind Craft & Commerce) and overlooking Petco Park baseball stadium, this outdoor bar’s cocktail menu and its focus on honouring the classics while veering playfully off course with signature updates as well.
Unlike my first night at the Tonga Room, however the weather here was real. Thankfully, this time the skies were clear.
Norwegian flies year-round direct from Gatwick to Los Angeles and Oakland International Airport, 35 minutes from downtown San Francisco. The flights are operated by a fleet of brand new Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft with premium and economy cabins. Fares start from £149 one way in economy and from £499 in premium. Visit norwegian.com or call 0330 828 0854 to book tickets and find out more.