Update: Sunday June 29, 2003 7:56pm

Hey, gang-stas! Greetings from the Auto-Train. Yes, it’s true -- our sejour Where The Boys Are has now come to a close and we are steaming back north… but more on that later. First up, let me tell you about the second night of the Hukilau, at Fort Lauderdale’s own Mai Kai… It was utterly incredible.

With the destruction of the Kahiki in Columbus, OH, to make way for yet another Walgreen’s drugstore, the Mai Kai is pretty much THE last remaining full-scale vintage Tiki restaurant left in existence. Established in 1956, it’s coming up on its 50th year anniversary, and Tikiphiles the world over should hope it lasts another 50. The place is amazing. The décor is all vintage from Back In The Day, and, let me tell you, kids – Disney wasn’t even this over the top. We’re talking carved Tikis, thatch, bamboo, all sorts of hanging flotsam, heavy wooden furniture held together by rope… all under dark mood lighting in a restaurant that seats 670 people. In the bar, water runs down the window panes as if a tropical storm is occurring outside. The majority of the dining rooms (each of which is named after a different Polynesian isle) surround a good-sized stage, which is used for twice-nightly dinner shows featuring Polynesian dancing (a portion of which is with flame). There is a separate hut where the food is cooked, and walking back towards it, another labyrinth of dining areas emerge, one of which is on a porch overlooking some misty waterfalls. A small bridge stretches from the porch to a path on the other side of the pond into which the waterfall empties. If one follows the path, it leads through a garden of dense tropical foliage, with Tiki torches and Tikis at every turn. And there are even a few more waterfalls. Following the path back into the building, one walks through an atrium area that is directly below the glass A-frame roof. There are more waterfalls and Tikis in this area, and the path eventually leads back behind the stage and into the main dining area. Instinctively, the place kind of reminds me of the big touristy shore seafood restaurants from when I was a kid, but it’s about a thousand times bigger and more extreme. Please do yourself a favor and check out the pics of the Mai Kai in Photo Set 10. My descriptions just can’t do the place justice. It literally has to be seen to be believed.

ROADTRIP NOTE: Dan is so cool that even in the screaming pain of his foot injury, he made it a point to find a drugstore other than Walgreen’s at which to fill his prescription for pain medication.

As everyone gaped in sheer awe at the amazing atmosphere that surrounded us, the dinner of Hukilau 2003 got underway. Dan and I were seated with his parents, and we made our dinner selections. Shortly thereafter, a gong sounded behind us, and we knew that our Mystery Drink had arrived. A wahine came up behind Dan and danced a hula for him after planting the Mystery Drink bowl on the table. Towards the end of the dance, she took the lei off of her neck, kissed it, and put it around his neck. Everyone cheered. Later, Dan’s mother asked if I was jealous, but, honestly, I really wasn’t. I think it was cool that he got some quality time with the Mystery Drink Wahine, and I’d like to think that he’d be similarly understanding should Damon Albarn ever wish to give me a lei. Proper Mystery Drink etiquette dictates that it must be ordered in advance, as there can only be a certain number of ceremonies performed in one night. I heard maybe one or two more Mystery Drink ceremonies happening in different parts of the dining room throughout the night, and this really kind of surprised me. I would have thought that with the Tiki enthusiasts in attendance, there would have been at least a few more going on. (Or maybe we just had to much mystery drinks to notice -DN).

The floor show was really cool, and it featured a series of dances from different Polynesian isles, culminating in the flame dancers. While the show was not nearly as long as the one at the Luau at Disney’s Polynesian Resort had been, I kind of got the idea that it had maybe been truncated to allow time for the Hukilau auctions that followed. Several items were auctioned off to raise funds to put towards Hukilau 2004, but then we all had to exit the dining room as they had to prepare for the second dinner show seating. Everyone headed to the back porch area, where I Belli Di Waikiki were performing another set. This time, the boys from Italy’s best Hawaiian Rockabilly band were decked out in 1940s sailor uniforms. They are such a great band on so many different levels -- some of you will probably be getting some mixes from me in the future which will inevitably contain at least one of their songs.

Which brings us to the present. We caught the 4pm Auto-Train this afternoon, but we actually almost missed being able to get on it. You see, it loads in a little town outside of Orlando, and the location is so poorly signed that you practically have to click your heels together three times to find the place. (And it doesn’t help matters that both sides of the tracks are The Other Side Of The Tracks). Needless to say, we got a little lost. But, in the end, we made it under the wire. We took the Auto-Train, we worked from 9 to 5 and then… (ARGH! Sorry, I couldn’t resist). And we got ourselves a cool little sleeper compartment with our own private toilet and shower. Of course, the really weird part of this is that both are in the same room – a little thing literally the size of a broom closet, which , obviously, presents a few hazards. You don’t want to be in the bathroom and push the wrong button to flush the toilet… Ooops.

So far, the Auto-Train is pretty cool, though. We’re just lounging here, updating the website, and watching the country-side zoom by. At 9pm, we go to dinner in the dining car. It’s all so Agatha Christie… it’s all so James Bond. -MA

Update: Sunday June 29, 2003 7:00pm

Ok, it might sound a bit lame for folks on a road-trip, but we took the Amtrak AutoTrain back. (Really, we needed to be back at our respective day gigs!) It was a twelve-hour trip and it got us from Stanford, FL to Lorton, VA over the course of the night.

I have to say that our cabin on the train was kinda neat. If I may use a book title as an adjective, I was expecting something very ‘Murder On The Orient Express-like’, but instead it was more like one of those Japanese micro-efficiency apartments that you read about in Dwell Magazine. In fact, it reminded me of Bruce Wills’ apartment in ‘The Fifth Element’. Every thing folded away, or served multiple functions. The seats flipped over to become beds, and the toilet was located in the stall shower. The tables swung down out of the walls, which were made of molded plastic. There were little compartments hidden everywhere, not an ounce of space was wasted. Very impressive.

It's a double decker train, and our cabin is on the top floor so it sways back and forth quite a bit, which will make it a bit of a challenge to fall asleep, although my guess is that we'll be out right away. - DN





Update: Saturday, June 28, 2003 11:00am

Hey-a, kids! Greetings from Fort Lauderdale! It’s been a busy few days with lots of fun-filled activities. On Thursday, we went to the Sunrise Swap Shop in hopes of finding some cool thrift items, but, alas, it was not to be. Of course, had I wanted an imitation Rolex, a pair of cheap shoes, or a sluttly J. Lo outfit, I would have been psyched! While that was a total bummer, it was cool to see that the drive-in that shares the space is still open on, like, 10 screens, and has some great fontage on the neon sign.

That night, we headed down to South Beach in Miami where we stole cars and torched hookers and gang members with flame-throwers. Oooops, no, wait -- that’s Dan’s Grand Theft Auto Vice City game. We actually just ate and checked out the cool deco neon. I’m told that the area was a total pit a mere 10 years ago, but they’ve totally revitalized it and played upon the architecture of the buildings to create a real atmosphere. I only wish Wildwood could mobilize to do that effectively. They have all this completely amazing architecture, and what do they do with it? Tear it down to build condos that look like everywhere else. What an utter brain trust.

Yesterday, Dan and I drove around Hallendale and Fort Lauderdale beaches. Supposedly, Porky’s happened around Hallendale, and, in Fort Lauderdale, we saw the bar called The Elbo Room from Where The Boys Are. Cool. He also tried to drive me past the club where Luke from 2 Live Crew was arrested for singing “Me So Horny,” but the club had been torn down. He also drove me past some strip club that is mentioned in Motley Crue’s song “Girls, Girls, Girls”, but that also appeared to be closed. In addition to the vintage architecture disappearing, it also seems like ‘80s pop culture landmarks are also in danger. But, given the choice, I’d rather save the vintage architecture – after all, both of those bands suck.

Friday night, we headed over to the Holiday Inn on the beach in Fort Lauderdale for the first night of the Hukilau. People were there from all over, dressed in floral print and ready to worship the pagan gods. Vendors were set up in one larger banquet room, and the items up for sale ranged from limited edition Shag Hukilau 2003 mugs to carved Tiki lightswitch covers to giant carved Tikis, all of which looked GREAT. I picked up a great Tiki head and named him Denny (after Martin, of course). Additionally, Crazy Al was selling his carved items, and James Teitelbaum was there with signed copies of his book Tiki Roadtrip. There were also some vendors down on the floor below (a room floor), selling items from their rooms. It was sort of like a dorm floor party, where you just walked from room to room and everybody was hanging out. In one room, they had a whole bunch of coconuts on the floor and the guy’s Polynesian father was there cutting them open with a big knife. All night, people were walking around sipping coconut milk from real coconuts.

In another, larger banquet room upstairs (decorated with Tikis from Mai Tiki), live entertainment came in the form of The Delusionaires from Orlando. They did rockabilly surf guitar with a tinge of Vegas sleeze to it, and they were awesome. Next up was King Kukelele performing with Crazy Al, and the last band of the night was I Belli Di Waikiki. I Belli Di Waikiki was AMAZING. Picture a bunch of guys from Italy wearing nothing but yellow terry-cloth skirts and grass arm-bands performing Hawaiian-tinged rockabilly. They were so much fun – the ultimate party-band -- and everyone was totally loving them and dancing up a storm. It was way fun. When the entertainment ended at midnight, everyone headed over to Bikini Bob’s (rechristened Tiki Bob’s for the night) to continue the festivities, and we had some more great conversation with the DC Tiki gang that we met at the Honolulu at the start of our trip. They are all really, really cool, and I look forward to more Tiki escapades with them in the future. It was really funny, though, because the bar was ordinarily a kind of frat/biker bar with a bunch of Harleys parked outside… and the guys from I Belli Di Waikiki are walking around in their yellow skirts and coconut bras.

Of course, the funniest part of the night was the fact that the two events happening simultaneously on the conference floor of the Holiday Inn were the Hukilau and the Campus Crusade For Christ which was down the hall. Pagan hedonists here, scary conservative Christians there. Irony here, no irony there. Better yet, the Hukilau organizers had a big painting of a grass-skirted, coconut-bra-ed wahine holding a drink in a Tiki mug and rockabilly flames shooting up beneath her set up in front of the vendor room, which also just happened to be the very first thing the Christian kids saw when the elevator doors opened. HA! We were sitting on a bench by the elevators at one point, and these totally conservative people were getting out of it with these really confused and almost scared looks on their faces while a member of their party stood there screaming and pointing “Down the hall!” Later, that same guy came up to Dan and asked him about our event. He seemed really intrigued – he wanted to know how he got into Tiki and Dan told him it was through mid-century design and architecture. The guy then asked if he could maybe look at the items in the vendor room. Wouldn’t it be a hoot if we actually ended up converting one of them? Either that, or they’ll now start protesting in front of Tiki restaurants… Hmmm… let’s see. A sea of floral print shirts, leis, and sliced-open coconuts with great Tiki tunes vs. suits, dockers, polo shirts, and hymns. Can you guess whose party was more fun? -MA

Update: Friday June 27, 2003 3:23pm

We donned our urban archeologist caps and went in search of the I-95 ‘Santa Giantess’ in Hollywood, FL today. It’s a 20 foot tall Amazon woman in a skimpy red miniskirt, torn halter top, and a Santa cap. It used to be in front of Jolly’s, an antique store, where she waved to passer-bys on I-95 South.

As we approached her locale, we were shocked to see that she was gone. Dismayed, we entered Jolly’s to find out what happened to her. It ends up the city made the store take her down for some unknown reason. Luckily, she’s still at the store, just inside, but sans her legs. She now towers over the checkout counter in the front of the shop. -DN






Update: Thursday June 26, 2003 11:23pm

Hey there, kids! Welcome to another fun-filled day of total Roadtrip-core. We’re presently in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, after a marathon few days of fun, quirky sight-seeing.

Upon leaving Savannah on Monday, we headed down Route A1A in Florida to Marineland, the vintage sealife aquarium. They had sea lions and penguins and dolphins – oh my! It was pretty cool, because the place was founded in the ‘30s, but it had all this great ‘50s/’60s architecture. Then, we headed down the coast to Daytona… where, along the way, we stumbled across a few Tiki suprises in the town just north of Daytona. First was Julian’s Restaurant and Lounge – a restaurant and lounge with THE most amazing décor. Apparently, the place opened in 1967, and they haven’t changed it since. It was sort of a supper-club with three descending tiers of table seating, culminating in a sunken bar with huge Polynesian mural over top of it on the back wall. There were Tiki masks on the walls, and the outside was this huge A-frame structure. While the food was not Polynesian in style, it was still completely amazing. I just wish I could take the whole place home with me – I’d be there every night. A few blocks down the road was the Makai Motel, with a great swoopy roof and an amazing sign featuring Tikis.

ROADTRIP FACT: There is a Hooters across the street from the Daytona Speedway. Are you surprised?

Next stop was Orlando. We spent Tuesday at the Magic Kingdom, where we checked out the Enchanted Tiki Room. It’s sad to say that the show has been redone, but check out Presley’s update for the horrific details. In summary, it was a world of suck. The rest of Disney was pretty cool, though – “It’s A Small World” was literally like walking into a Rankin/Bass TV special, and it was incredible. And I got my picture taken with Mickey… Yay! That night, we went to a luau at the Disney Polynesian Resort, which was a really cool place. In retrospect, there were some things about Disney that reminded me a lot of Hershey Park (theme park near where I grew up), but the thing about Disney is that everything is totally over the top. Disney actually has the money to create an entire hotel designed like Polynesian longhuts. With a volcano by the swimming pool. And that’s sooooo cool.

Yesterday we headed down Route 192 from Orlando, and stumbled across some cool roadside attractions that are now, sadly, all closed. There was a huge alligator with a car in it’s mouth which was probably a Gator World kind of thing, and we also came across the Xanadu House Of The Future looking run-down, forlorn, and up for sale. Both Dan and I think we remember reading about it back in the ‘70s in one of those Dynamite magazines you could from during elementary school book clubs. Our destination was Jupiter Beach, where we hung out and dined with Dan’s friend Jackie, her daughter, and her boyfriend. It was great to get to meet them all at last, and it was a really cool night. After we left, we headed to Fort Lauderdale to Dan’s parents’ house, and we pulled it, utterly exhausted, at 12:00am. Stay tuned for more cool roadtrip exploits! -MA

Update:Tuesday June 24, 2003 10:16pm

Yesterday, we left Savannah and hightailed it to Florida. It was there that we encountered much Tiki.

After a quick stop at Marine-World, (thanks for the tip, TB!) we decided to forgo route I-95 for something more scenic, and ended up driving A1A from St. Augustine to Daytona Beach. Right before we hopped on to route 4 we made a wondrous find. A vintage 1967 tiki-themed lounge and supper club called Julian’s. (It was listed in the Tiki Road Trip book, but we somehow overlooked it.) The outside was a HUGE A-frame roof and the front of the structure was covered in banners with native Polynesian designs. Inside was amazing. The entire back wall was a good 30 foot long mural of a luau on an island beach. The dinning room was multi-tiered (as any good supper club should be) and culminated in a half moon two-story bar that had a piano station on the top. I only wish it was closer to Philly. I’d be eating there every night.

Second, about a mile down the road, we discovered a motel by the named the “Makai”. It was right on the water, had a swooping Googie style roof, and was covered in Tikis. The lobby hadn’t been redone since the 60’s and was rife with native masks and furniture that would have made Simon Templar feel right at home. We chated with the owner, and I bought a “Makai” beach bag, then we moved on…. -DN

Update:Tuesday June 24, 2003 9:16am

See above picture. Nuff' said.

Update:Monday June 23, 2003 9:16pm

I’d just like to state for the record that there ain’t no Tiki in Savannah. No way, no where, no how.

That’s not to say that Savannah isn’t a gorgeously maintained, wonderfully mellow southern city. Because it totally is. It has some amazing homes, and well-manicured parks around every turn. It’s rife with history and natural beauty.

It’s just lacking in the Tiki department. This is, after all a Tiki road-trip website, and I just figured I’d mention that. -DN

Update:Sunday June 22, 2003 11:47pm

Well, here we are in Georgia… and me without my Daisy Duke shorts. Our waitress at dinner tonight said her name was Sorrell, and my first thought was “Hey, that was also the name of the guy who played Boss Hogg.” It’s times like these when I realize how much, despite any wishes to the contrary, The Dukes Of Hazzard is scarred into my psyche. But I digress.

We started out the morning in South Of The Border, picking up some additional trinkets and bits of kitsch. Then, it was on the road for the drive to Savannah. And let me tell ya – between SOB and Savannah – there just isn’t much of anything there. We stopped off at a Stuckey’s and I was reminded of how the South is so The South. In the gift shop area, they had all these uber-non-PC Aunt Jemima-type figures for sale, and it was just so wincingly wrong. Guess it’s a good thing that I left the “Regime Change Starts At Home” T-shirt elsewhere… sheesh.

So we’re in Savannah at present, and the place is pretty cool. The architecture is really beautiful and the weird hanging things in the trees give it a kind of spooky New Orleans voodoo kind of thing. We found the house from Midnight In the Garden Of Good And Evil, but we haven’t been able to find the statue, despite being sent on two wild goose chases. Additionally, I was hoping that we could catch a drag show tonight, but, alas, there didn’t seem to be one on. So we decided to work on the website instead. Savannah is cool, but it’s kind of like one of those cities where it’s kind of a city, but there don’t seem to be many people around except for the tourists. And all of the shops are only open during weekday business hours. I am sleepy now. Must go to sleep. -MA

Update:Sunday June 22, 2003

Well. It’s with many tears and an “Adios” to Pedro that we leave the mecca of neon typography that is South Of The Border. As expected, the trunk is filled with tee-shirts, mugs, key chains, and back-scratchers all bearing the ubér-branded of the South of the Border logo. If fact, we have so added so much psudeo-mexican style knick-knacks to the trunk that I’m unsure where we will store all of the pink flamingo and Mickey Mouse shaped must-buy bits of commercialism that I’ll undoubtedly decide I need to own when we hit Orlando.

The only South Of The Border staple that we are *not* presently porting in our trunk is fireworks, for a whole variety of reasons. First, when we board the auto-train, I guess that the Amtrak conductors would frown upon us bring explosives on the train. Second, in the Florida heat, it would be a shame if the fireworks were to go off in the trunk and obliterate all of the wonderful kitschy junk that we spent so much time accumulating on our southbound journey. Lastly, it would suck to be pulled over by some Bush loving southern cop only to have him find “explosives” in our trunk and be jailed with out any civil rights under the Patriot Act as terrorists. Gack.

On the topic of fireworks, let me just state that the South of the Border firework stores scare me on some primal level. They are essentially just one large warehouse packed extremely volatile things go boom. It would only take one of worlds the extremely Neanderthal- foreheaded WWF fans to wonder in with a lit cigarette to turn the entire place into a Great White concert.

Anyway, as I’m typing this I’m in the passenger seat as we speed through South Carolina towards Savannah, and eagerly awaiting the next opportunity to pull into a Sonic. - DN

Update:Saturday June 21, 2003

Hey, everybody! Welcome to Day 1 of the Roadtrip. We started out at 8am this morning and headed down I-95 under an unyielding grey sky. The first stop-off was an almost 30-ish year old Tiki restaurant called The Honolulu in the southern ‘burbs of DC. We were greeted at the restaurant by a groovy gaggle of DC Tikiphiles from tikicentral.com, and the seven of us had a great lunch eating flaming pu-pu and discussing topics such as roadside attractions, the Kahiki, and Wildwood, NJ. It was great getting to meet them all, as they were really a cool bunch. Hopefully, we’ll all get a chance to hook up again down at the Hukilau, as they’re all heading down later this week. In addition to the great food and great conversation, we also imbibed some classic Tiki cocktails mixed up by the owner – who happens to be none other than the former bartender at the old Trader Vic’s in DC… and who also happened to be Richard Nixon’s favorite bartender. No wonder Richard loved him so much… after one Foggy concoction, I was more than a little bit loopy. Of course, at least I didn’t have to worry about tripping and hitting the big red button.

Fortunately, the sky cleared up as we reached North Carolina, and we glimpsed our first blue sky in what seemed to be an eternity. Finally! That really made my day, because a roadtrip without sun just doesn’t quite feel like a roadtrip. With the sun shining, we continued our southward direction alternating power pop tunes with an amazing Tiki/ukelele mix that Vern from DC made for us. The mix was really great – a collection of songs from long lost vinyl records that are probably only found in thrift shops anymore. Which, in my book, beats Tower any day. Thanks for the mix, Vern – you da man!

As we neared South Of The Border, we had another one of those giggly moments like during the Graceland expedition where we were getting close to the Wigwam Village Motel, and I looked at the directions, and I’m like “Ok… we’re looking for [insert street address here]… aw, geez… we’re just looking for a field of WIGWAMS!!” We didn’t know if we should figure out directions for South Of The Border, but with all the signs leading up to the place, it hardly seemed like it would an issue. Nearing it, I glimpsed a large neon sombrero tower… and soon a sea of the most gorgeously tacky neon one could ever imagine. It was sheer bliss. We pulled into the very first parking lot of the strip. Look! There are two huge pink flamingos! Look! There’s a huge sparkplug! Look! There’s a sombrero on top of that restaurant! The more we looked, the more giddy with glee we got. People have told me that there isn’t really much to South Of The Border, but these people must not have seen it at night. For, at night, it’s not only SOMETHING, but it’s the most exquisitely wonderful oasis of pure kitsch I’ve ever seen. Dan and I ran from shop to shop, amidst the neon, with big goofy grins on our faces that we couldn’t remove, looking at everything from sombreros to backscratchers to snow globes, all depicting Pedro, the South Of The Border mascot. Yeah, some may call the cheesy trinkets Junque. But, in a way, it kind of reminded me of being on an elementary school field trip. And I’ve got my Pedro pencil case. -MA

Update:Wednesday May 14, 2003

Yup. It's that time of the year again - time to jovially track Dan and Michelle as they gallivant along the kitschy roadways of North America. This time, we’ll be heading down to Ft. Lauderdale to rub elbows with various swank hipsters at the one of the year's largest Tiki and Polynesian pop-culture festivals, called The Hukilau.

Anyway, we’ve built this site so you can follow us, read our ramblings in the daily updates, and check out the lava flow of photos that we’ll be posting every 12 hours.

Or, if you like, you can use this site to plan your own Hukilau trip. All our driving maps, the places we’ll be staying, and all the cheesy roadside attractions we’ll be stopping at will be on-line in the road trip route section.

Our Tiki-style odyssey starts on June 21. Be sure to check back here then.

In the meantime, if you would like to get our email updates, so you can receive notification of updates to our site, simply email us by clicking here.

Update:Wednesday May 14, 2003

Hey there, Swankster! If you like this site, why not have me design a Tiki website for you! Click here for more info.