ORANGE BEACH — There are at least a dozen restaurants on Pleasure Island scurrying to get open in time for the summer season and at one of those owners are hoping to be open in mid-May in the old Fish Camp location.

Jim Hutto and partners Roe Burton and Kendall Bozeman are reviving the location on Canal Road in east Orange Beach. Bozeman bought it last year, opened briefly, but decided he wasn’t ready to run a restaurant full time.

Hutto says the trio is reviving a name from the past to tag the new place.

“The Gulfgate used to be down the road,” he said. “It was a great place. I lived in Birmingham and whenever I came down here I made sure on Sunday afternoon I would go to the Gulfgate Lodge. There would be cars parked along the road.”

Other “pending” restaurants east of Alabama 161, include Pleasure Island Tiki (aka The Pit) at Sportsman Marina and Cayman Grill in the old Gautier location which is undergoing refurbishing and expanding as well.

“Larry Wireman is the owner of the (Gautier) property and he built the Caribe condominiums and Turquoise Place,” Orange Beach Community Development Director Kit Alexander said. “It’s going to be called, according to the plans, Cayman Grill.”

Also coming at Canal Road and Gulf Bay Drive is the brunch/lunch place, Brick and Spoon in the old Café on Canal location.

Three new restaurants are coming to The Wharf including the 16,000 square foot I Love This Bar by country superstar Toby Keith which will take up two retail spaces on the east side of Main Street.

Famed chef Thomas Wolfe will open Wolfe’s Louisiana Pantry in the Rum Runner’s location, and Bob Baumhower is adding Binimi Bob’s to his stable in the old Shucker’s location.

At Orange Beach Marina restaurant guru Johnny Fisher, formally of LuLu’s and The Gulf, is working to rebrand and relaunch two restaurants in the former Calypso Joe’s location downstairs and the former Palms space upstairs.

Next to Cosmo’s, where owners originally planned to expand parking, a building is going up there as well amid speculation another restaurant, possibly a sandwich shop will accompany the parking.

“We don’t know anything about what they are going to do in addition to a parking lot,” Alexander said. “I know Brian (Harsany) has been talking to us about what he can put there, but we haven’t received anything else other than a parking lot at this time.”

Others in the works include Fat Daddy’s, a pizza arcade being built on the old Jake’s site on Alabama 182, High Tide Oyster Bar near the Boardwalk shopping center in Gulf Shores and a new Zaxby’s is under construction at the Winn Dixie shopping center in Gulf Shores as well.

Island Wings is preparing to open in the former Sassy Bass/Champs location in Gulf Shores and the former Shaggy’s upstairs at Zeke’s Marina is vacant.

Hutto is a restaurant veteran of 40 years with experience running Waffle House franchises, working at Doc’s Seafood Shack and more recently at Big O’s in Gulf Shores.

The manager will be Terry Lash, also formerly of Doc’s Seafood Shack who has also worked for restaurants for years on Pleasure Island.

“Roe Burton, my partner and I, he called me and said let’s check this place out,” Hutto said. “I had no idea how big it was or anything like that. When we looked at it, it just reeked with possibility. There’s more possibilities with this restaurant that you could do than we have management to do them.”

Work is still ongoing including putting in a new floor and revamping the bar area to add TVs, a wall to separate the bar from the restaurant and just general improvements throughout the building.

“We knew we needed a new floor because the carpet situation was so bad,” Hutto said. “We’re putting in a vinyl plank. We knew we needed a dance floor and that’s very good to dance on.

“We knew we needed TVs so in the bar area we’re putting in five 42-inch TVs and one 60-inch TV. And we knew we needed to fix the bar up. What we’re doing, is everything will be at each end of the bar so if we get busy there won’t be any crossover. We’ll have two bartenders going full speed and they won’t have to cross over each other because we’ll have the same stuff at both ends.”

A menu is still being worked on and Hutto is interviewing a chef next week. He hopes to let the chef finalize the menu with his own touches.

“We’re going to have three or four nice fish items, some nice steaks,” he said. “We’re going to have a Jack Daniels ribeye, we’ll have a filet and strips. Capt. Kendall has a recipe for those strips called gunpowder sauce so we’ll use that one for sure.

“We’ll have chicken, a 12-ounce chicken fried steak, a big ol’ pound-sized pork chop. At lunch we’re going to have a meat and three.”

Gulfgate will have the traditional seafood favorites. Fried shrimp, fried oysters, all-you-can-eat shrimp and all-you-can-eat fish will be standards. Steamed and raw oysters will be available as well.

In the coming weeks Hutto is looking to add more staff.

“We understand totally we’re in the people business not the restaurant business,” he said. “The quality of employee you hire is very important. I’ve been in this business 40 years and you’re no better than the person who is out there representing you.”

Hutto is looking forward to the day when the construction crews leave and the customers are coming in the door.

“I think we can be successful,” he said. “I want to get rid of this construction so we can go to work. We want to get open a few days before Memorial Day to make sure we’ve got everything running.”