Does your favorite bar have a wonderful kitchen, airy layout, spectacular views, a wine cellar and a friendly, helpful waitstaff? Have fun there, we’re heading for the dive bar.
You know the type, a real hole-in-the-wall kind of place. There’s a guy smoking a Marlboro and drinking a Pabst Blue Ribbon at the bar, waiting for his turn at the pool table. The bartender laughs in your face when you slap your debit card on the bar and order a White Claw. A TV shows the ballgame, but they lost the remote years ago and it’s stuck on the same channel. Hungry? Grab some peanuts or, if you’re lucky, a pickled egg that’s been sitting in a jar for who knows how long.
Dive bars aren’t as easy to find in Florida as they are in the Rust Belt, but there are still shot-and-a-beer joints around if you look hard enough. Here, based on online reviews and staff recommendations, are some we’d love to hang out in. If you don’t find your favorite, that’s probably because there are a few too many ferns or because it’s so out of the way that you and your pals get to enjoy it all by yourselves. If you do find your favorite here, don’t be offended; we consider “dive bar” to be a supreme compliment.
Ginger’s Place
304 South 3rd St., Jacksonville Beach, (904) 249-8711, gingers-place.net…