Tuesday, October 6, 2009

"Play and Stay"

This one goes out to any of my local peeps who might be in need of a mini-staycay. You really need look no further than The Pearl Hotel. We celebrated the H's birthday here last Friday night, a mere fifteen minutes from our house, but it felt like we had stepped into another dimension. The place has such a cool, living-is-easy kind of vibe, you'd be powerless to resist their offer to "Play and Stay." Reserving the room was even a pleasurable experience. Oh, it's your husband's birthday? Let me go ahead and comp you for an appetizer and a round. And I'll make sure you have a room with a balcony and a 7:30 dinner reservation at our award-winning, everything-seasonal, everything-local restaurant.I thought about skipping dinner at the hotel. But that would have been asinine. The bar and restaurant scene IS The Pearl, as evidenced by their "dive-in" movie theater. How often do you see one of those? Being there, you just felt like you were somewhere. I don't know how else to say it. And see that small booth in the left-hand portion of the above photo? That's where we sat! And had a fantastic meal while chatting, people-watching, and taking in a classic Steve McQueen movie. This is also where they brought the H his housemade-doughnut dessert. With a sparkler on top! Illegal? Maybe. But a great touch for sure.And what a treat to then tipsily (me) trip upstairs to our room and crash right after dinner. I'm afraid we probably turned in a good two or three hours before most of the other guests even considered calling it quits on that great bar energy. But it had been a long week, and we were completely tuckered.

Of course there's no reason out-of-towners wouldn't totally dig this place too. It's not exactly in a quintessentially beautiful San Diego location, but it's minutes from most any place you'd want to go. And the price is so right. Plus it was a quick walk to Shelter Island for breakfast in the morning. I told the H this is where I want to go on all of our date overnights from now on. So I'm pretty sure that's saying something.

P.S. Thanks to Amber for the idea. To Krista for the convincing. And to Mom and Dad for watching the bumpkins. Again.

3 comments:

Krista said...

i am so glad it was a success! yeah!!!

Alice Q. Foodie said...

Yaay! So that answers my question! ;-) Glad you guys had a good time. You'll have to tell me more about your meal there!

Unknown said...

Wow! That place looks really cool.