Postcard Inn Beach Resort & Marina

The Hotel

The resort at Mile Marker 84 has had four names. It opened in 1951 as the Holiday Isle Beach Resort, became famous in the 1970s as the home of the original frozen Rumrunner cocktail (the Tiki Bar still claims invention), trundled on through the 1990s as one of the loudest spring-break resorts in the Keys, was reimagined in 2007 as the Postcard Inn Beach Resort & Marina under the Innkeepers Hospitality group, and reopened in 2026 as the Three Waters Resort & Marina, a Tribute Portfolio Hotel under Marriott. The physical property — 151 rooms across two oceanfront wings, a 60-slip marina, a full PADI dive shop, two pools, a private Atlantic beach, and the legendary Tiki Bar with its waterside stage — has remained the central Islamorada party address across every rebrand.

Rooms run from Guest Rooms (one king or two queens, 300 sq ft) through Oceanfront categories with private balconies, up to the two-bedroom Beachfront Cottages — five standalone cottages on the sand that are the only true beachfront accommodation between Key Largo and Marathon. The 2026 Tribute Portfolio refresh focused on the rooms: white-oak plank floors throughout, a softer coastal palette than the previous Postcard Inn era's vintage-postcard kitsch, new bedding and bathrooms, and Marriott's standard upgrades to WiFi and door locks. The Beachfront Cottages and the Oceanfront Suites are the bookings worth chasing; the back-building rooms looking at parking are the categories to avoid.

The property's defining asset is its physical footprint — fifteen acres directly on the Atlantic at the geographic centre of Islamorada, with the longest unbroken sweep of resort beach in the Upper Keys and a marina that operates as the spring-loaded base for fishing charters, dive boats, and sandbar trips. Hooked on Books — the open-air poolside restaurant — serves Keys-American food through the day; the Reel Bar inside handles the dinner shift; the Tiki Bar at the beach is the late-night room. The Rum Bar holds one of the deepest rum-by-the-glass lists in South Florida. A Starbucks in the lobby, a small spa, two pools (one quiet, one with a swim-up bar), and a fitness centre complete the resort apparatus. Conde Nast Traveler and others have repeatedly named the resort to their Keys lists for the marina-and-beach combination, not for the rooms.

The honest read on the Postcard Inn / Three Waters is that it is not a quiet resort and does not pretend to be — it is the Islamorada beach-party institution, with a Tiki Bar that runs live music seven nights a week and a clientele weighted to fishing groups, bachelor parties, and multi-generation Keys-family Christmases. The 2026 Tribute Portfolio reflag has tightened up the rooms but has not (and was not intended to) change the underlying social proposition. For couples who want the largest beach in Islamorada and a marina at their door and don't mind the Tiki Bar at 11pm, this is the booking. For honeymooners, look fifteen minutes north to Bungalows Key Largo or fifteen minutes south to Cheeca Lodge.

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