Living It Up on Valentine’s Weekend

Many New Yorkers, even those who aren’t filthy rich, have weekend homes in the country, second homes to which they flee on as many Friday evenings as possible to escape for a couple of days from the noise, congestion and frantic pace of the big city.

A friend who was thinking of moving to Los Angeles from New York last year seemed surprised, during a visit here, when I told her that very few people living in this area feel the need for a second home.

“Living in many parts of Los Angeles is a lot like living in the country, what with all the trees and how spread-out everything is,” I said, with pardonable hyperbole (pardonable because I was hoping to persuade her to make the move).

“Besides,” I said, growing more forceful, “why should anyone here invest in a place in the country? Whatever our equivalent would be of the Hamptons, Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket, the Berkshires and those other tony spots--within an hour or two we can drive to Santa Barbara, La Jolla, Malibu, Arrowhead, Big Bear, Laguna Beach, Ojai, Palm Springs--you can have something different every week here: the ocean, the mountains, the desert, skiing, surfing, hiking, camping, art galleries, museums. . . .”

Move to L.A.

All of which brings me, finally, to the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Laguna Niguel, where my friend and I spent the recent Valentine’s Day/Washington’s Birthday weekend. (Yes, she--Lucy--moved to Los Angeles, although I don’t think the proximity of Ojai was the determining factor in her decision.)

Having taken Lucy to La Jolla, Malibu and Santa Barbara (twice), and Paris, Nice, Biarritz, Venice and Florence, I decided it was about time for her to see Orange County.

OK, so the Ritz Carlton isn’t exactly what most people have in mind when they think of Orange County. But the Ritz Carlton probably isn’t exactly what most people have in mind when they think of a hotel anywhere. Everything is deluxe. Everything.

Marble floors and polished wood and Persian rugs and a 19th-Century chandelier. Tapestries and paintings everywhere. A big fireplace in the lobby and another in the “library” (where afternoon tea is served). A golf course. A tennis court. Two swimming pools. A pianist playing classical music in the morning. A quartet playing chamber music in the afternoon.

Large bathrooms with two washbowls each and bathrobes for every guest and a mini-bar with tiny jars of nuts for $8.50 apiece.

The hotel sits on a bluff 150 feet above the Pacific, which may help explain why its cheapest room is $180 a night, and its most expensive $1,500 a night. Our room was $250, more than I’ve ever paid for a hotel room anywhere.

But our room overlooked the ocean and we could leave our sliding door open all night and hear the surf crashing below and have breakfast on our terrace above the beach in the morning and, well, it was Valentine’s Day weekend.

Things to Do

There are plenty of things to do if you want to leave the lavish grounds of the Ritz Carlton. You could go whale-watching off Dana Point or tour the art galleries of Laguna Beach or admire the flowers of Rogers Gardens in Corona del Mar. But we decided to stay in the hotel most of the time and relax and enjoy the view and get our $250 a day’s worth.

We had brunch Saturday in the lounge overlooking the ocean, and we had an even more lavish brunch on Sunday on the terrace, overlooking the larger of the hotel’s two swimming pools. Twice we ate in the Dining Room, the hotel’s formal restaurant.

That was our only real disappointment of the weekend. Not that the food was bad; it just wasn’t wonderful, not nearly as wonderful as one would expect in such lavish surroundings. There are at least a dozen better restaurants in Los Angeles.

Actually, the food at the Ritz Carlton was more erratic than inadequate, a generous serving of perfectly cooked lobster, for example, was badly compromised by an overly strong vanilla sauce. And I was disappointed that the maitre d’ couldn’t even pronounce properly the names of the vintage ports he offered after dinner.

Perhaps I quibble. The hotel has only been open since August, 1984, and if it isn’t perfect, it’s splendid nonetheless--an ideal spot for a sybaritic weekend if you want to celebrate a special occasion and have saved your pennies accordingly.

Or you could just do what I may do one Sunday soon, just drive down to the Ritz Carlton for the view and the sense of luxurious self-indulgence and the spectacular Sunday brunch: three kinds of caviar, five kinds of smoked fish, four pates, three salads, hot dishes ranging from veal to duck to roast sirloin to eggs poached on artichokes, 23 desserts, seven of them chocolate. . . .

On second thought, you could go to Santa Barbara instead, check into the San Ysidro Ranch at less than half the price, enjoy a truly superb dinner at either Norbert’s or Downey’s and come back to your room, start a fire in the fireplace and have what I consider to be the perfect Southern California weekend out of town.