Yucatan Beach Stand operating without power on Fort Myers Beach

Businesses on Fort Myers Beach have let creativity take control in the wake of Hurricane Ian.

Some restaurants have set up food trucks, while others have brought shipping containers.

And then there is the Yucatan Beach Stand, which has been operating without any power at all.

“We just were, kind of, assuming it was gonna go north. And that, you know, worst case scenario, we’re gonna lose power for a couple of days,” said Yucatan Beach Stand General Manager Robert Reilly.

But four months later, “We still don’t have power,” Reilly said. “It’s made operating a restaurant pretty tough without power, you know.”

Reilly revels in the reality that his restaurant still has the power to serve customers.

“Thanks to technology these days, we figured out ways to make it work,” he said. “Well, our very large smoker survived the storm. So we feature that a lot.”

The seating area and their kitchen are essentially outdoors.

The smoker didn’t move an inch during the storm, Reilly said.

“It stayed exactly where it was. We had to dig it out and get it back out of the parking lot,” he said.

Yucatan is open seven days a week. They open at 11 a.m.