Quaint Hotel with Manicured Gardens and Pacific Ocean Views

A Tiffany-style stained-glass dome lights the lobby lounge of The Mendocino Hotel - Northern California. It sets the tone for the collection of antiques and fine furnishings throughout the hotel; there’s a Louis XIV–style love seat in the lobby, and Persian runners lead toward the lobby lounge, where you’ll find a carved wooden gargoyle.

There’s plenty to look at outside the hotel, too: luxury garden rooms peer out toward the property’s lush gardens, and some of these rooms have partial ocean views. Each garden room has an Italian-marble fireplace as well.

In the Victorian dining room, seasoned chefs prepare a selection of natural, organic entrees with ingredients sourced from local farmers. You can also have a casual breakfast and lunch in the Garden Room, famous for its olallieberry pie, or you can snack on small bites at the wine and tapas bar and scope out wildlife on the hotel’s 2 acres of sustainable gardens.

Mendocino, California: Quiet Coastal Village amid Redwoods

Perched high atop a bluff, The Mendocino Hotel - Northern California enjoys unhindered panoramas of the Pacific Ocean. In the 1850s, the quiet coastal town of Mendocino bustled with loggers who harvested the area’s towering redwoods and enlivened its saloons, pools, and fast houses. Although the village has since shed its rowdy reputation, the redwoods continue to thrive. Along the bluff, the giant trees shadow traces of old buildings and old anchor lines set into rock.

At the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens, meticulously manicured formal gardens contrast with untouched wilderness. You can stroll through thick pine forests, peer into fern-fringed canyons, and picnic on bluffs covered in flowers.

Meanwhile, the Mendocino Art Center presents displays of visual and performing arts that celebrate still and moving forms, and various studios invite budding Botticellis to fine-tune their own brushstrokes. If you're interested in learning more about the area, the Kelley House Museum, set amid an acre of gardens, recounts Mendocino’s history in artifacts and exhibits.

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