What is the Most Tiki Place . . .

. . . you have ever been to?

For me it would be Tiki's in Waikiki. Having a MaiTai at next to lifesize tikis or gazing at tiki torches illuminating the coconut trees against the Pacific, while being in Hawaii was my tiki nirvana.

I've never been to Pu`uhonua o Honaunau National Historical Park

http://www.nps.gov/puho/

The garden at the MaiKai, after seeing the hula show, would be the next best because of the abundance of tiki and the polynesian pop perseverance.

Tiki Gardens when I was a kid.

Everyday that I walk into our TIKI room.
Then into the backyard.
So TIKI, so tropical.
Why do I ever leave my house?

OH, to pay for it

Anywhere in Moorea, Tahiti.

Actually... It has to be Hala Kahiki. I'm goin' all OG on this, but Hawaii and Tahiti don't cut it. Even the Mai Kai, as awesome as it is can't make the cut. Why? They are in tropical climates and we're really talking about Tiki which is an American Pop culture phenomenon.

So, Hala Kahiki wins because there is nothing like walking out of two feet of snow into that place. The Kahiki would win if it existed...

The original Trader Dick's in Sparks, Nevada.

Reno is so close to Hell, you can see Sparks! (Old joke.)

It was a stand alone building then, with a black ceiling with teeny little lites they kept on a dimmer.

From the walls came faux thatched roofs to cover the tables near the wall, and around the central bar was another thatched roof.

The bar was a room of its own, with bamboo/fabric walls and a classic bar with all the cool bottles on the back wall. It had a big old Hammond organ in the back corner. I've heard Somewhere My Love done Polynesian style played by Earl Grant there.

They had a big ol' functioning clay oven, and faux Gauguins hanging throughout the restaurant.

They had cool mugs and great Polynesian flavored dishes.

They also had streams that flowed through the restaurant and paths with bamboo bridges that crossed the stream to get from one area to the other.

It also satisfied the "oasis in winter" criteria for freezing temps and snow outside.

If I could only travel back in time!

La Mariana on Oahu

On 2005-02-10 10:34, Geeky Tiki wrote:
I've heard Somewhere My Love done Polynesian style played by Earl Grant there.

Can it get any more Swinging 60's than that? :D

Hukilau, with the friendliest, greatest bunch of people EVER!

I felt so warm and cozy inside, and that wasn't just the booze talking.

It's an odd choice, but one based on the FEELING of Tiki rather than the usual decor, location, etc. My choice is the Bamboo Hut in North Beach, SF.

The reason for it was that I'd been getting into Tiki through copies of Tiki News that somehow made their way to the UK, and I'd not been to an American Tiki bar (well, restaurant in actual fact) since I left there at age 16. My wife and I decided to go to San Francisco in 1999 and I was desperate to check out the Tiki bars there, even e-mailing Otto to ask for tips. (No 'Locating Tiki' in those days)

Anyway, after a looooong flight, I realised that we could make it for happy hour at the Bamboo Hut, so we dumped our bags, put on an Aloha shirt and raced over to the Bamboo Hut.
A flawed experiece in many ways - the mixer didn't work, it was full of suits having a quick drink before they went home, and to be honest, it's really not the greatest Tiki bar in the world. In fact, I went to better Tiki bars the next day. But, it was what I'd been waiting for and I loved it.

Later that evening, in another bar, we saw a woman performing just like Janis Joplin and so my wife got her wish too. Ah, good times.

Trader Woody

Bamboo Ben's!

OCEANIC ARTS !

Classic Vintage: Mai Kai

Witco Vintage: Hala Kahiki

Cocktail: Tiki Ti

New: Lucky Tiki

Foreign: Tabou Tiki Room, Berlin

Vanished: The Tahitian Lanai, at the Waikikian Hotel, when the Oldtimers brought out their instruments to play Hapa Haole classics

On 2005-02-10 08:41, Swanky wrote:

... because there is nothing like walking out of two feet of snow into that place. The Kahiki would win if it existed...

well, a good runner up might be the tiki room in stockholm (did anybody find out if it's still operational?):

http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=3061&forum=1&9

This is, right here at Tiki Central.

Every place listed so far, and many more, exist here in images, mugs & stories. The people, the drinks, the art and carvings, they're all here.

Come on in, it's Tiki in here.

I would agree with the Mai Kai, but as far as the real deal go to Tahiti!! Tiki abounds all through the islands and I met some incredible carvers down there. The whole experience is tikirific!!!!

I would have to say that my most "tiki" experience was at the Tonga Room in San Francisco, followed closely by Trader Vic's in London. These places both made me feel as if I had walked off the street into a Polynesian paradise for a mini vacation - to me that's what tiki is all about. Hopefully I'll be able to visit the Mai Kai, the Hala Kahiki, Tiki Ti, Bali Ha'i, various other Trader Vic's, etc. - so I can add to my list of tiki escapes - till then, I'll just have to take the 12 steps downstairs and soak up the atmosphere in my Grotto.

While not the best, the most unexpected for me was The Luau Polynesian Lounge, just a few blocks from my house when I used to live in Seattle.
http://www.nwsource.com/ae/scr/edb_vd.cfm?c=c&ven=4685&s=nws

A little slice of heaven in the Jet City.

HB baby!

Tiki's galore.

My wedding reception.

It was the PERFECT Tiki experience.

My grandfather's back yard in Rancho Palos Verdes.

He has a 1960's beachcomber bar in his house. He has a bamboo hut in his lush tropical back yard. He has a lava-rock waterfall and koi pond, on a ship's deck patio.

We had tikis from Oceanic Arts. Torches.

Wedding cake shaped like a volcano, with the bride and groom being sacraficed at the top.

Music by the live band, the Blue Hawaiians, on a stage trimmed with thatching and ringed with torches.

We had a do-it-yourself photo booth with a backdrop and a polaroid, coconut bras, grass skirts and pith helmets.

We had a "decorate your own drink" swizzle-stick bar, with dozens of the wackyiest drink ornaments ever seen.

The cake table was rigged with a subwoofer so that the volcano rumbled.

We had pinapple flambe' with the cake, a dessert we dubbed "Pinapple Eruption."

Along the jungle paths of my grandfather's yard, we put food tables from different reigons around the Ring of Fire, asian food, polynesian food, etc.

In a deep place of the jungle, we had a small shrine to Yma Sumac, decorated with pictures, insense, votives and her music, to be discovered by wanderers.

It was perfect.

Barkerbird,that sounds phenomenal!Post some pics,if you can.

Its funny to note that many answers to the question had a time as well as a place, I too will date my best TiKi place, 1960, Bali Hai 5 years old, having a virgin Mai Tai watching the Dancers and listening to exotica for the first time, I was hooked, and then last summer at the Rincon room at Bongo Fury's place, that was very TiKi meeting all the TCers

I've had the chance to go to Tahiti and Easter Island in the same trip.

coconut pete

the marquesian island was the ultimate tiki place for me of course. I really felt the mana of the tiki, of the people, of the islands. Undescriptable.

Next is my first tiki experience : the polynesian room in the Waldorf Hotel in Vancouver in 1999 : I couldn't believe it was real.

Bishop Museum in Honolulu, Oahu.

Being in the prescence of the actual tiki from early Hawaiian history was possibly the most tiki experience.

Here are the photos of the Ku show:

http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=8693&forum=1

(photos courtesy of Alnshely)

I also appreciated the smaller display of polynesian pop with tiki mugs, Hawaiian Host chocolates, etc. Bringing tiki to the present, in a manner.

[ Edited by: christiki295 on 2005-02-14 22:37 ]

Sam's Seafood, in Huntington Beach.

also on my favorites...
Hanakiki Apartments, Orange
Islander Apartments, Orange
House of Tiki, Costa Mesa
Enchanted Tiki Room, Disneyland

[i]On 2005-02-09 20:13, christiki295 wrote:

The garden at the MaiKai, after seeing the hula show, would be the next best because of the abundance of tiki and the polynesian pop perseverance.

I've got to add the Kon Tiki after visiting it - tiki inside and out which dates from the original era. An incredibly high Tipsy score - tikis abound! Here are the pics! (beware... there be lurkers afoot!)
http://photo.humuhumu.com/v/kontikitucson/

I also love the heavy use of thatch, tapa cloth and their menus are to die for and, yes, I did leave them there.

(TikiBars: you should give it another try, I think it is deserving of atleast 4 tikis, if not five.)

[ Edited by: christiki295 on 2005-02-26 18:03 ]

[ Edited by: Humuhumu - changed pic url to new location - 2005-09-23 15:16 ]

Sam's Anchor Inn and its second location, Sam's by the Sea, on Okinawa, were Tiki with a strong nautical emphasis. It looks like they did some remodeling since the last time I was there, when Carter was president.

http://www.sams-okinawa.jp/ancaor.html

It's with grief I yesterday learned that the awesome Tiki Room of Stockholm will be closed, so you fanatics, you have less than a month, after that it's gone.

I'd say Bamboo Ben's, based primarily on the roots culture and core nature of the beast. No veneer, no posing - pure aloha, rasta

For me: Don the Beachcomber's International MarketPlace, circa 1969.

The Kahiki.
(sob, sob...)

Gotta go with Tikifish on this one- the Kahiki. But from an earlier time, not it's later incarnation. It defintely meets the northerly snow and paradise cognitive dissonace defition, too.

The Kahiki was a fantasy- a poly-pop interpretation. I'm sure there are much more 'real' Tiki experiences, but the Kahiki most perfectly embodied the mainland fantasyland of Tiki for me.

(I'll illustrate with a few images I've culled from the net)

From the moment you drove in through the landscaping to the valets who made your car (and the outside world) melt away- you were somewhere else!

(Service was a key to the Kahiki's success as well- you were waited on hand and foot and made to feel like and island queen or tribal cheiftan for the evening. The Kahiki was a luxurous evening- filled with scents, sounds, images, and the Aloha of the people who worked there.)

You crossed the bridge, passing between the twin Moai with flames atop their heads.

Then pulled open the heavy oddly shaped doors- and entered a quiet grotto.

For just a moment, before the full sights and sounds and LAYERING of the Kahiki really hit you, you were in the most quiet dark beautiful cave of dripping glowing water, and you had passed from the outside world into SOMEWHERE ELSE! The outter doors had closed behind you, the inner doors were still closed. Both were heavy and kept alot of the sounds out of the grotto. Here you were confronted by lava walls, the sight of the purplish (blacklit) glowing water, and the sounds of the water dripping in the cave. It was a perfect moment of stillness between the outside world and entering the unimaginable.

Then you opened the second set of door and were confronted by "George",

with water burbling and fire atop his head, in his own hut- welcoming you through the wormhole, to a Tiki paradise! George was a riot of color and flame in his own grande foyer entry hut. He epitomised the shift from the quiet grotto to the overload of color and smells and sounds of the Kahiki.

From there, you checked your coat and stopped by the Outrigger bar. Here, mixologists created amazing drinks- perfectly balanced between sweet and sour, each served with care in their own shaped mug or glass with garnish and Kahiki's signatire picks and stir paddles. One could even order a huge brandy snifter of their "smoking eruption" which drifted dry ice fog across your table or seat at the bar.

Eventually, you asked the hostess to seat you and she would ask whether you prefered the Kauai Garden Booths (which faced the rain forest (with live parrots and a "rainstorm" from time to time, with thunder and lightning and 'rain' running down your windows), the Reef, (the booths alongside the saltwater aquariums), or Village dinning in or outside one of the huts. (Any choice was fine- they each had their own personality and sense of wonder!)

No matter which you chose, upon entering the dinning room you saw the entire quiet village was watched over by a multiple story tall benevolant idol with a fireplace for his mouth

Here, in this strange thatch covered paradise you could order puupuu platers with hibachis, psedo-island foods with fruits and seafoods aplenty, or perhaps even a mystery drink, brought forth by a "mystery girl". Not long after ordering a gong would sound and a Wahine would arrive bearing a flaming bowl of goodness (and staws longer than any you had EVER seen before- this must be a SPECIAL drink!) and a Lei.

Simply put, in my experience, the Kahiki was the most all encompassing, windowless, immersive Tiki palace ever (although the Mai Kai ALMOST ties it. The Mai Kai is in Tropical Ft. Lauderdale, though, and it's layout somehow lacks the windowless coherence of the Kahiki. To the Mai, Kai's credit, though, does have exterior gardens beyond belief, and that's something the Kahiki never really acomplished, even before it lost some of it's external gardens. You just can't grow plants like that in Ohio- period.)

Once you entered the Kahiki, external signs, like daylight no longer guided you. The Kahiki had the same lighting at 4pm as 11pm. It felt like a timeless place.

The Kahiki's dinning room design- built around the massive idol, created a certain coherence- a feeling of the 'God' watching over the entire village that was unique. In all my travels, I've never seen anything quite like it. The roof's peak was just above him, so all focal lines came back to him.

Here, you were undeniably entwined with the Tikis, and in their space, their village- not the other way around. They were not decoration- they 'owned' the space.

Best of all, the people of the Kahiki, the hostesses, the staff, the shopkeepers at the Beachcomber shop, the musicians, and perhaps most of all, the bartenders all exuded Aloha, and welcomed you in every way to their islands. The 'villagers' made all the difference, without them, the Kahiki would have been merely an architectural marvel.

There is simply nothing else on earth like the Kahiki.

And I miss it more than words can say.

Here in my little pond it's Shelter Island. Spendin' a long weekend at the Half Moon, poppin' across the street every now and then for drinks and grinds at the Bali Hai and the occasional trip down to Trader Mort's for provisions is tiki to me.

On 2005-05-27 19:20, Shipwreckjoey wrote:
Here in my little pond it's Shelter Island. Spendin' a long weekend at the Half Moon, poppin' across the street every now and then for drinks and grinds at the Bali Hai and the occasional trip down to Trader Mort's for provisions is tiki to me.

Yes. Even the garbage cans on Shelter Island Drive are enclosed in lava rock.

On 2005-02-13 09:29 virani wrote:
Next is my first tiki experience : the polynesian room in the Waldorf Hotel in Vancouver in 1999 : I couldn't believe it was real.

Mine too! Blue Lizard Lounge at the Waldorf...those were the days! All three rooms...an absolute treasure!
Also, having cocktails at Vancouver's Trader Vics before it sailed away on a barge. :cry:
http://www.nickelbros.com/tradervics.html

[ Edited by: Pepe le Tiki on 2005-06-02 21:00 ]

I kinda gotta go with GeekiTiki about Trad'r Sam's in Reno. It's not actually as historically important or as museum like as many places, but the first time I walked in, It was so bitchin' that I couldn't beleive it had'nt been torn down yet.

Lots of odd touches like wooden models of Scottish Ships and other quirky bits not exactly Tiki, but add to the idea of who went where and brought stuff back.

It's not snobby or chic, nor is it low-brow...it's tucked in a corner, and most people just pass it bye.

Good fun that

Since it is very close to my place, Bahooka has become a frequented spot and it really does it for me...it too is "windowless" and its atmosphere is very stable. Wonderfully relaxing place for a drink or meal.

Mai Kai !

the only answer is the dark recesses of my mind....

On 2005-06-04 11:43, crazy al wrote:
the only answer is the dark recesses of my mind....

Hopefully to be revealed in the not too distant future at (another) new tiki bar.

Well, I live in Ft Lauderdale, so a part of me wants to say The Mai Kai. I mean, how could I not? But if I couldnt say The Mai Kai, I would have to say Chip and Andy's pad. :wink:

JeeeeeeeZAM!!!! Now THAT'S a tiki house to be proud of! :D Holy mother of Tiki!

MAI KAI!!!