First, let me say that the Zaballa House is in a fantastic location – smack dab in the middle of the quaint Main Street of Half Moon Bay. They are sitting on a goldmine here, and if they would spend a little to update the place, they would see a huge ROI.
I will say that the room was very large and clean. When we checked in and went to the room, we noticed that there was no air conditioning, and it seemed rather stale. So we saw that there was a large ceiling fan. It did not work. We went to the front desk and were told that the maintenance person would not be there until the next day, and we were handed a box fan. We also noticed that there was no phone, and we were told that they were changing out their phone system or something.
The room that we reserved (Room 10) was advertised as a ‘suite’, but it was just one large room; not a suite. The key feature of the word ‘suite’ denotes multiple rooms, and we needed that for certain reasons. We did not get what we paid for.
The furnishings appear to have been purchased in the 80’s or 90’s, and not updated since. There were several plastic plants and the small sofa’s cushions were sagging and worn out.
The breakfast was okay – a really good variety of fresh fruits along with yogurt, cottage cheese, breads and 2 kinds of quiche. When we returned from breakfast to our room, we found that our key card no longer worked.
We traipsed down the stairs to the front desk to find that they updated their key card system, and all key cards were cancelled. They reissued the key card. It did not work – they had reissued us one for someone else’s room. They reissued it again. It did not work. Keep in mind that this kept us running downstairs to and from the check in area. We finally insisted that they come to us and get us in our room, which finally occurred after much hassle.
They require you to pay for your room up front, and we know why: if you did not prepay, you may be very likely to leave. It’s really a shame, because this place really has a lot of potential. It would be a great subject for one of the hotel renovation reality shows.
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