About Downtown
From our boat in the marina we can walk to over 40 restaurants, cafés and bars in five minutes. What other small city has several elegant rooftop bars like the Perspective Bar, pictured below, which even has a swimming pool!
Perspective Rooftop Pool Bar
Facebook photos, 06/19/18
Facebook photos, 06/19/18
For years we left clothing and stayed on our boat in Marina Jack. After landing we could walk off the plane, skip the luggage carousel and grab an Uber and be on our boat in 15 minutes. From the boat it was just a few minutes walk to the center of town is where the weekly farmers’ market is held. There is a wide plaza with two famous restaurants, Salute and Mattison’s City Grille (shown below right). Both have outdoor
seating on a huge plaza. Plazas and cafés abound and give the city a European feel. Winter rains are rare, and only a sweater needed in the evening, so everyone dines outdoors as nearly all restaurants have outdoor seating service.
From Mattison’s City Grille website
Here are more pictures of Salute and Mattison’s showing their covered seating on the plaza.
Salute Restaurant by Irene Eng, 2024
From VisitFlorida.com state marketing
Eventually we wanted more room, and occasionally the weather turned bad, so we started looking for a base on land. Of course, like everyone else who has ever visited Sarasota, I tried to find an affordable place within walking distance to the center of town, where Mattison’s City Grill, Bevardi’s Salute and other restaurants are located on a plaza at the junction of Main St. and Lemon Ave. (point “B” on the map below).
It took almost four years until we found a condo in the Mentone Court complex, on the edge of the Rosemary District next to Gillespie Park, marked by the blue house icon on the map below. From the condo, it’s a four-minute drive (the light blue line) to the marina at point “A”, or it’s an 11-minute walk (dark blue line) to the center of town at point “B.” The restaurants and shops are all clustered in the yellowed areas pointed out by the green arrow.
It took almost four years until we found a condo in the Mentone Court complex, on the edge of the Rosemary District next to Gillespie Park, marked by the blue house icon on the map below. From the condo, it’s a four-minute drive (the light blue line) to the marina at point “A”, or it’s an 11-minute walk (dark blue line) to the center of town at point “B.” The restaurants and shops are all clustered in the yellowed areas pointed out by the green arrow.
Mentone Court Condo Complex
Mentone Ct’s Front Gate on N Orange Ave
Just steps out our gate is the beautiful Citrus Square, a mixed
use condo complex (shown left) with four restaurants in it and an internal plaza with outdoor seating. Using her rollator, Gail can get down the sidewalk to there in just a couple minutes on foot.
Within a few hundred feet are many more bars and restaurants, one-after-another, lining Main Street and the side streets. In 01/25 Yelp listed over 240 restaurants just in the downtown!
The Street Scene
C’est La Vie!, Photo by Sarasota Magazine
