The Varden Hotel

I’ve stayed here several times over the past three years, and it’s been reliably good. The renovated rooms have a nice character and are always clean and well kept. Staff are very friendly, the location is convenient, and breakfast and wine tasting are nice extras. Given the price and location, I always look here first. If you want a quieter room, it’s worth paying more for a higher floor, since you can hear the person above walking around.

The people here were friendly and helpful, and I’d stay again. The rooms are small, so I wouldn’t choose one for a family, but it works nicely for one person or a couple. You can walk to lots of restaurants and around downtown Long Beach. The coffee at breakfast was great, though a lot of the pastries were stale. There’s a good bakery only two doors away.

The rooms and bathrooms are really small. My childhood bedroom, which was small, was still bigger. But the friendly service goes a long way. They were flexible when I asked about checking in a bit early or leaving a little later, and they gave me water bottles for free. Everyone was warm and courteous. Breakfast was light but good, with milk, oj, muffins, cereal, oatmeal, and fruit. The Varden is a nice boutique hotel, with a more personal feel than the big hotels. I’d return for the service, though I’d like at least a queen-size bed.

The rooms were tiny, which I knew before booking, but I was still shocked by how little space there was. There was barely room to sit in the bathroom. The Wi-Fi was useless, and it was hard to get good service in here. The lobby and entrance smelled weird, and sometimes the entry code made me enter it twice for no reason.