Sunset over Kokomo

There may be some gourders in Kokomo, Indiana, but here we're talking about the island paradise by the same name. No, there really isn't a gourd society in Kokomo. Or at least if there is, I've never heard of it. This is just a "hidden" page on the Gourd Retreat website. As long as you found it, though, read on...

Kokomo is actually a fictitious island made popular by the Beach Boys in the 1960s (and later the King's Singers) in song:

"Off the Florida keys
There’s a place called Kokomo
That’s where you wanna go to get away from it all"

It was such a success that everyone wanted to go to Kokomo, but it was not to be found. Over the years, though, several people decided to cash in on the name, and you can find an island near Jamaica that now calls itself Kokomo, as well as a mini-villa (more like a large home) of the same name in the Virgin Islands, and another beachfront house by that name on a secluded island in the Florida Keys.

Actually, now that you are here, a few interesting tropical gourd factoids. The drink of choice in the Bahamas is the local beer, Kalik, named after the staccato music of gourd rhythm instruments. And gourds themselves are used extensively in Caribbean music, as drums, chekeres (we spell that shekeres), maracas (gourd rattles), and guiros (a notched hollow gourd struck with a stick).

And, here are found the tiny "jumbie pumpkin" gourds native to the tropics, named after the shape-changing ghostlike figure with origins in Africa.

There is a lot to know and see about the Kokomo Gourd Society (the very unofficial society of the Caribbean Islands, known only to readers of this website)!