Ft Lauderdale - Elbo Room

We are 3 blocks from the iconic Elbo Room bar at the corner of Las Olas Blvd and the ocean. It was made famous in the 1960 movie “Where the Boys Are” which started the Spring Break Craze in Ft Lauderdale. It’s a total dive bar that only accepts cash, always has a live band, and is always crowded. It’s been on our Ft Lauderdale to–do list from day one.

We decided to slide in on a Saturday late in the afternoon for the maximum effect. It was full of folks our age already having a great afternoon. Somehow we managed, likely due to our sobriety, to find two open stools at the bar. The gin and tonics were excellent. The band was loud. There were the usual cast of barflies. We had the drunk fellow wandering behind the bar to hug the bartenders. There was the 50ish drunk chick flirting with everyone. She gathered people’s tips off the bar and put it in her cleavage for the bartenders to collect. Her time behind the bar was spent piggyback on one of the bartenders. The bartenders were completely unfazed by these shenanigans.

It was surprisingly fun. We stayed for the whole set of some local dudes singing and playing loudly. They started off with a variety of cover songs and quickly sized up the crowd. It didn’t take long to settle in to a string of Van Halen songs from the David Lee Roth era. It was a nostalgic trip back to high school for me. They sprinkled in a few AC/DC songs but they didn’t really know these. They sang and played over a recording. It seemed early in the night to cop out like that but it worked. The crowd loved the songs and didn’t care.