You may live in one of the coolest cities in the world with scores of restaurants, museums, a world-famous stadium, mountains, a river with waterfalls, and renowned campuses, but that doesn’t mean you have a beach.
Sometimes you actually have to go to the beach.
That’s why a mid-July Sunday afternoon found me tooling down the 5 South on my way to Huntington Beach. (Here’s Huntington Beach’s dark little secret: there’s no easy way to get there. You don’t just hop off the 5 and you’re there. It’s not Mission Viejo. But I digress.)
I was on my way to the Paséa Hotel and Spa on Pacific Coast Highway, an impressive hotel in a beach town full of impressive hotels. As I pulled up, my eyes were drawn to the towering superstructure and multi-story light display that houses the hotel’s 300-plus rooms.
Valets appeared like magic and whisked my car away, and I entered the property and its dramatic lobby like they were expecting me. Apparently, they were.
The check-in service is brisk, friendly and efficient. The desk clerk walked me through the hotel layout and directions to my third-floor ocean view studio, which overlooked the busy pool, and looking further to the north, a wide, expansive California beach filled with families. It was a summer Sunday afternoon, after all.
The striking and expansive lobby, filled with evocative ocean murals under unique oversized woven metal and glass light fixtures and basket-style chairs, opens directly out onto the open pool patio. (The hotel is actually across a busy PCH from the beach itself. I never crossed that highway. I never needed to.)
My expansive room, an ocean view studio, is filled with subtle earth tones, set off by a dramatic wave mural over the king-sized bed. There is a large work desk, should you be so inclined, with plenty of outlets and de rigueur USB chargers, and a tufted cloth chaise lounge for you to lie on, on a lazy afternoon, to listen to the dull roar of the popular pool (or not).
Like a lot of hotels these days, the room also features a large open, walk-through shower, accessible directly from a glass door alongside the bed, or from the bathroom itself.
It directly faced north which meant that I was positioned right over the crowded pool. And that means loud. Heavy glass doors solved that issue.
And yes, there are comfy bathrobes hanging in the large closet.
Soon I was in a deep power nap, lost in the cruelly comfortable bed.
Dinner brought me to Lorea, the hotel’s latest showcase restaurant addition, which just opened this summer. It’s one of two main restaurants on the property, along with the more-casual Treehouse, which sits a floor above.
We sat under heaters on the beach-cool evening and listened to a mellow bossa nova of auto traffic and ocean waves.
The summer dinner menu is a combination of meats and seafoods, from Tomahawk steaks and roasted salmon, to a duck and goat charcuterie plate.
I began with a Jumbo Lump Blue Crab Cake the size of a Big Mac, served with fennel and Citrus salad, Buerre Blanc, and trout roe. Perfectly prepared, and duckpaddling through the Buerre Blanc, it disappeared like a cheap magic trick at a child’s birthday party.
Faced with an embarrassment of steak and ocean delights, I opted for Lorea’s version of a Cioppino, served with a rich tomato broth, lovely chunks of fish, shrimp, and mussels, with toasted sourdough bread.
Everything was delicious, but after seeing the restaurant’s signature carrot cake with cream cheese icing and glazed walnuts pass our table too many times, we succumbed and ordered that, too.
And they were out. Recovering, we searched for dessert in the nearby shopping mall. But alas…
The next morning, breakfast brought the CB&J French Toast, served as a long rectangular slice of brioche topped with a river of blueberry compote, and served with cashew butter maple syrup. The whole affair was inexplicably topped with small leafy ferns, an odd topping to the dessert-like dish.
The French Toast was accompanied by plump Turkey sausages (the stars of the show), along with fresh-squeezed orange juice, and a very friendly and eye-opening cup of coffee.
After an afternoon of pool lounging at their magnificent pool, interrupted by naps and more pool lounging at the same magnificent pool, I visited Lorea again for dinner. This time I chose the simple Lorea Burger, which of course was prepared with a 8 oz. Wagyu beef patty, and served with cheddar cheese, cured tomatoes, baby kale, avocado, black pepper bacon, and Giardinier, on a Brioche bun, and Rosemary Fries. Sharing the stage was a bowl of the most decadent mashed potatoes I’d seen in some time, drowned in creamy butter.
I finished the burger, but there was no way I was going to finish the mashed potatoes, a dish most likely prepared for two. Last time I checked, I am only mostly one single person. But they were great.
I boxed them up, along with that huge slice of the extraordinary carrot cake, which they had plenty of, much to my relief.
I devoured it all for lunch the next day, after yet another morning by the inviting pool.
The family-friendly Pasea Hotel & Spa has a lot to offer, whether you’ve opted to bring the kids along, or your significant. Or even just yourself. Even if you never cross the street.
I’m very sure you deserve it.
The 411:
Paséa Hotel & Spa, 21080 Pacific Coast Highway, Huntington Beach, Calif. 92648.
855.622.2472. frontdesk@paseahotel.com
