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When a bar plays lilting ukulele tunes on its website and sets up speakers underneath its sidewalk sandwich board, I expect a full-on luau. I want a flower lei around my neck, the heat cranked up and a pig roasting on a spit—or at least some hula-dancer bobble dolls on the bar. I want a vacation, damn it. In some ways, Island Mana Wines (526 SW Yamhill St., 971-229-1040) does make you feel like a tourist—on my visit, there were patrons from Washington, D.C., and San Diego. "Oooh!" the Californians squealed, upon learning my friend and I were locals. "Have you heard of Voodoo Doughnuts?" Maybe it's best to approach the wines—most made from tropical fruit, along with chardonnay and cabernet—as delicacies just too complicated for a dumb foreigner to appreciate. Or, like my friend, you could compare the mango wine to runny sweet-and-sour sauce. Island Mana starts to go there—it has a bar made from a repurposed surfboard and two flat-screen TVs showing waterfalls and waves—but it's just too tentative to transport you to paradise.
WWeek 2015
