Summer's Shenanigans

Awwwww, look at that happy little picture of that family playing on the grassy knoll at the Laguna Cliffs Marriott in Dana Point, CA! Doesn't it look nice?! Well, I just got back from that Marriott resort and guess what!? It SUCKS royally. I'm sure that little girl on that little white bike left that hellish resort crying because the Marriott is a god damn rip off which made her parents fight and ultimately led to their divorce. I'm sure that poor little girl is a crack whore now and she owes it all to the Laguna Cliffs Marriott.

Any how, let me start at the begining...This last weekend was the one year anniversary of the 1st date I went on with my boyfriend so Stefan decided to surprise me with a getaway to the Laguna Cliffs Marriott Resort, a couples massage at the spa and a nice dinner in downtown Laguna Beach. We take off work early on Friday and head up to the Marriott Resort to check in and relax before our 3pm spa treatment. We pull up to the Marriott and go to enter their self parking garage. We are greeted with a sign letting us know that the Laguna Cliffs Marriott charges their guests $22 per day to park. Since I'm a cheap ass (I mean "frugal") I laughed and suggested that we park somewhere else. The parking attendant happily let us know that we couldn't park anywhere else. The hotel had the city put up "No Hotel Parking" signs on the street so that the Marriott could happily bend their guests over and fuck them for another $22 (plus tip!). Now let me just say, I may be frugal, but Stefan paid $300 for a room for 1 night. I would expect the "courtesy" to not have to pay an exorbinate and obviously severely jacked up fee to park. SO, we park and go to check in. The robot of a front desk clerk tells me that yes, the Marriott charges their "guests" $22 to park. Oh and by the way, our room is not ready so we can't check in. Check in at the Marriott resort is not until 4pm! What the fuck?!?!? I have stayed at hundreds of hotels, motels and inns in my life and I have never heard of something as ridiculous as a 4pm check in. OH, and check out is at 11am and if you request a late check out, they will charge you. $300 for 19 hours at this crap ass Marriott? God, I hate being taken for a sucker. I was about to unleash on roboto front desk girl, but luckly Stefan stepped in and the Marriott was nice enough (AHHHHHH) to get us into a room by 3pm. We get to our room and the decor is horrible. The Marriott looks no better then a Motel 6, except that the Marriott pretends to be nice so they think they can charge you nice hotel prices. Interesting....We were starving so we were going to order room service. Until I noticed that room service is double the price of the Marriott restaurant (for the same food) AND there is a mandatory 20% service charge for room service. Don't get me wrong, I am a big tipper and always tip at least 20%, but a mandatory 20% fee is ridiculous for room service. You are not waiting on me. You are delivering food. Like a mother fucking pizza delivery guy. Do you tip the pizza guy 20%? I bet you don't...

We head over to the restaurant which serves food that is one step up from bad bar food. Let's just call it good bar food, but no, we were not in the bar. We were in the restaurant at the Laguna Cliffs Marriott...

Off to the spa we go for our couples massage. Now, let me just tell you, the Laguna Cliffs Marriott Spa is AWESOME (too bad the hotel sucks so bad). I received the best massage ever and Stefan may or may not have fallen asleep (and snored...) during his massage. After our massages we went back to our room and got an in room movie for $18 (the same price to own the stupid movie, but whatever...) and drank a bottle of champagne. We get ready and head off to dinner in downtown Laguna...

When Stefan booked our reservation, the Marriott agent told him that downtown Laguna Beach was a "long walk" or a "very short taxi ride". Well, after our $50 round trip taxi fare, it was obvious that the Marriott lied in order to book our room...It was AT LEAST 10 - 15 miles. Long walk my ass. WTF?!

All in all, I had a great time because I was with the love of my life, but the Marriott resort at Laguna Cliffs is horrible. The Marriott obviously nickles and dimes their guests and laughs all the way to the bank, so if you enjoy being a sucker and have a thousand dollars or so to blow on crap, please, be the Marriotts guest....

Read what Stefan had to say about The Laguna Cliffs Marriott and even better, read what he put in the Marriott's Guest Survey (I wonder what the Marriott will think about the part where he went swimming in their pool wearing my pink thong panties...)