1. The Palms Retro
City: Atlantic Beach, FL
Category: Accommodations
Telephone: (904) 241-7776
Address: 28 Sherry Dr.
Description: Palms Retro is a revamped kitschy beach motel featuring retro-themed rooms. Formerly The Palms a Courtyard Inn Atlantic Beach, this 1940s gem has 10 re-imagined rooms as well as a new owner, vision, and name. Stay in the “Diva Room” with a giant photo of Marilyn Monroe, “The Bad Boy’s Room,” papered with pictures of James Dean and Steve McQueen, or choose from one of the many quirky others.
2. Ragtime Tavern And Seafood Grille
City: Atlantic Beach, FL
Category: Nightlife
Telephone: (904) 241-7877
Address: 207 Atlantic Blvd.
Description: Ragtime is a supremely good brewpub, bar, and tapas bar (and that means three full bars here) that sits just one block from the ocean. It’s also a popular restaurant (see the Restaurants chapter). The crowd here is more mature, late 20s and up, and boasts a cadre of regulars who live within walking distance and let hardly a night go by without a visit. Be sure to try a glass of Dolphin’s Breath, a popular beer brewed on the premises and named by a local contest winner. Ragtime is a good place to meet a teacher, musician, or a naval officer. Expect large crowds here on the weekends and live music in the brewpub that reverberates throughout the restaurant and tavern.
3. Kathryn Abby Hanna Park
City: Atlantic Beach, FL
Category: Parks & Recreation
Telephone: (904) 249-4700
Address: 500 Wonderwood Dr.
Description: Hanna Park is a great place to get away from it all without having to get away from the city. Located at the beach, Hanna Park is 450 acres of natural Florida: thick forests, open beachfront, and plenty of saltwater and freshwater fishing. With 293 campsites, this is often the park parents pick to introduce their young children to camping. If the campout turns into a disaster in the middle of the night, it’s easy enough to pack up and go home without a long drive. The campsites have water and sewer hookups and electricity, and there’s also a small store, bathhouse, and public laundry facility in the park. Hanna Park offers a playground and summer water park for children, as well as biking and hiking trails. Dogs are allowed here as long as they’re kept on a leash. Besides surf-casting in the ocean, there are several freshwater lakes and ponds to fish in. You need a valid Florida fishing license to drop a line here, but the freshwater areas are well stocked with largemouth bass, bluegill, sunshine bass, and catfish, which makes the licensing process worthwhile. If tent or RV camping isn’t your thing, reserve one of the four new rustic cabins. They rent for $34 a night and sleep four. (Bathrooms are still a walk away in the bathhouse.) Best of all, each cabin features a charming screened porch, so you can eat outside without fear of bugs. There is also a new oceanfront building here called Dolphin Plaza that’s a perfect place for a wedding, Eagle Scout ceremony, or small corporate meeting. Dolphin Plaza is air-conditioned, has a refrigerator and outdoor grill, and has ocean views to die for. It seats 125 people banquet-style, or 96 people classroom-style, and rents for about $640 a day. Just be sure to book early—Dolphin Plaza is very popular.
4. Davinci’S Pizza
City: Atlantic Beach, FL
Category: Restaurants
Telephone: (904) 241-2001
Address: 469 Atlantic Blvd.
Description: Go here for a blissfully limited menu of New York–style pizza made in traditional brick ovens with fresh, high-quality ingredients. Independently owned and operated, DaVinci’s chooses to make their dough and sauce from scratch. As serious about having a good time as they are about making good food, DaVinci’s fully embraces the beach lifestyle and has even been rumored by locals to trade “items of interest” for pizza—although the details on that are fuzzy and no one’s going on the record. When the DaVinci’s folks aren’t stoking the ovens, they’re “dreaming up new recipes…hittin’ the beach, enjoying live music, playing sports, or spending a lazy Sunday-Funday with our friends and family.” If there exists a more fitting tribute to the beach lifestyle, I don’t know what it is. Open Tuesday through Saturday for lunch and dinner. Closed Sunday.
5. Ocean 60 Restaurant Wine & Martini Bar
City: Atlantic Beach, FL
Category: Restaurants
Telephone: (904) 247-0060
Address: 60 Ocean Blvd.
Description: Ocean 60 has it all: great food and an impressive wine list in an intimate setting. This 50-seat restaurant benefits from an extensive, inventive menu cooked up by chef Daniel Groshell, a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park. His wife, Rachel, is the general manager and has made certain that the attentive servers can answer all of your menu questions. The Groshells like to say their food is “rustic,” as opposed to artful—meaning that it hasn’t been overworked or overtouched in the kitchen. This chef espouses fine dining with a Mediterranean or New World flair and a fondness for fresh seafood. The classic French onion soup with cheese rusks earns raves from most diners. And you just can’t go wrong ordering fresh shrimp this close to Mayport.Things really get interesting when it comes to choosing an entree. Try the porcini-seared salmon, or the Brazilian-style churrasco and bacon-wrapped shrimp. More adventurous fish lovers may want to try the two-pound snapper, imported from Costa Rica, which Groshell fries whole, complete with head, tail, and eyes. It arrives stretched across your plate and scored so that you can easily eat one side, then flip the fish and eat the other. Ocean 60 also offers wine tastings from 6 to 8 p.m. every Monday evening and is one of the only restaurants in town where you can order a two-ounce “taster” of wine from the extensive wine list to see if you like the selection enough to order a glass or even a bottle. It makes for some fun sampling. Ocean 60 is open for lunch and dinner Monday through Saturday and can also be booked for private parties.
6. Ragtime Tavern And Seafood Grille
City: Atlantic Beach, FL
Category: Restaurants
Telephone: (904) 241-7877
Address: 207 Atlantic Blvd.
Description: Long considered one of the Jacksonville area’s most popular restaurants, Ragtime specializes in fresh seafood, with several daily specials and pasta dishes to choose from. Ragtime doesn’t take reservations, but the food is worth any wait. Popular menu items include the grouper picatta, sesame tuna, and the grouper Oscar. Order a Dolphin’s Breath Lager from the taproom where the beer list is extensive enough to satisfy all comers. There is a full-service bar with happy hour Monday through Friday and live entertainment Thursday through Sunday. Open for lunch and dinner daily and for Sunday brunch.
7. Safe Harbor Seafood Market (At The Mayport Ferry)
City: Atlantic Beach, FL
Category: Restaurants
Telephone: (904) 246-4911
Address: 4378 Ocean St.
Description: The first time I went to Safe Harbor, we were invited there by friends who were out in Mayport on business and didn’t have time to come into town. GPS engaged, we drove out through the Beaches, turned north on Mayport Road, and drove until we reached a wide spot in the road near the ferry. Before we went inside, our friends prepped us, saying that while Safe Harbour wasn’t fancy, it was good, adding that, unlike some of the grocery stores in the area, it didn’t smell fishy. Boy, were they right. Safe Harbor is an immaculately kept, long-counter seafood market teeming with in-the-know locals who drive out from town with their coolers to pick up fresh-off-the-boat seafood. The market is equally popular with the weekend lunch crowd who order fish and shrimp baskets with fries and slaw and devour them on the deck overlooking the river and the surrounding marshes. The setting is pure Jacksonville—the one most of us remember from our youth—and the nostalgia, combined with the freshness of the morning’s catch, made for a near-perfect meal. Open Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.; closed Sunday
8. The Bookmark
City: Atlantic Beach, FL
Category: Shopping
Telephone: (904) 241-9026
Address: 299 Atlantic Blvd.
Description: Consistently voted one of the best independent bookstores in the city, The Bookmark is a great place to go if you want a good read but need some help finding it. Owner Rona Brinlee has many connections with agents and publishers and brings in popular authors several times a month for readings and book signings. If she doesn’t have the book you want, she’ll order it and have it to you in a matter of days. The Bookmark is just a block from the ocean, which makes it a great stop for beachgoers who need a beach read. The free gift-wrapping makes running from the store to a birthday party a breeze.
9. Calvin Cole Salon And Day Spa
City: Atlantic Beach, FL
Category: Shopping
Telephone: (904) 246-6622
Address: 675 Atlantic Blvd.
Description: Calvin Cole enjoys a great location in Atlantic Beach within walking distance of the shops and hotels of the Beaches Town Center. The salon offers haircuts, color, and mani-pedis as well as a variety of massages, salt glows, and body mud masks. Call first and they’ll usually squeeze you in. The salon stocks AVEDA hair, skin care, makeup, and body products, as well as the Dermalogica clinical skin care line.
10. Adele Grage Cultural Center
City: Atlantic Beach, FL
Category: Shopping
Telephone: (904) 247-5828
Address: 716 Ocean Blvd.
Description: Touted by local musicians as one of the most lovely venues in town, the Adele Grage Cultural Center serves as a performance center for the city of Atlantic Beach and the home of the Atlantic Beach Experimental Theatre company, which stages performances from September to May. For a special treat, show up for Songwriter Nights when the lovely local songbird Lauren Fincham has been known to take the stage.
11. Al’S Pizza
City: Atlantic Beach, FL
Category: Tours & Attractions
Telephone: (904) 249-0002
Address: 303 Atlantic Blvd.
Description: By the slice, or by the pie, Al’s White Pizza, made with ricotta and fresh tomato, is a hands-down kid favorite. Al’s creative pies, like the Spicy Caribbean Pizza, provide both the variety and the bedrock that keeps this Beaches establishment in hot demand with the stroller set. But don’t limit yourselves to the pies; the house calzones, salads, BLTs, subs, and pastas are worth trying, too.