Post #656263 by bigbrotiki on Sun, Oct 21, 2012 4:36 AM

Thanks for posting, Roger. I would be curious to find out WHEN the Bartons went on their "many trips" to Hawaii and New Zealand that they mention in their menu text as inspirations for the place.

It seems likely that they took the Matson line cruises, as they used one of Matson's McIntosh menu covers for their own place, and it also looks like they decorated some of the hotel rooms with the Matson Eugene Savage menu covers:

See above to the right:

The Matson Line ships went to Hawaii and from there to New Zealand (see Book of Tiki pages 30/31), where the Bartons saw these classic tourist destinations:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotorua

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waitomo_Glowworm_Cave

Misspellings aside, the menu clearly names the two places above as their source of inspiration:

I doubt there are any of the old brochures/tickets form their trips left, but sometimes people made scrap books of their vacations:
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=33163&forum=5