This resort, located right across the street from Southern California’s beautiful Huntington Beach, was my first category 6 hotel stay on points. Hyatt’s properties fall between a category 1 and a category 8. As you ascend in categories, the price ascends as well, and that is the reason I mostly stay in hotels averaging a category 4. However, this weekend was supposed to in the high 70’s-low 80 degrees in January, so I checked availability and the travel god’s made it so that miraculously there was availability.
Points Cost
Because I did not want to brave the traffic driving to the beach on a Friday evening, I decided to just leave early Saturday morning. Therefore, I only needed to book one night, because I have work Monday morning and my daughter’s have school. So I booked one night, checking in Saturday evening and checking out Sunday morning.
When I was booking I first entered 1 adult and 4 children. The only option I was given was a 40,000 point suite. I felt like that was too much for just one night. Coming from staying in lower category hotels, 40,000 would easily get me a couple to a few nights elsewhere. So I decided to change the number of guests checking in from 1 adult to 3 children, hoping there would be a lower occupancy room available. There was! There was a 2 queen bed room for 4 people for 25,000 points. That was much better and I was willing to pay that much for a category 6 stay right across the street from the beach.
I always play around with numbers when looking to book anywhere. Sometimes, like in this case, it saves me a lot of points. One of my children is never above sleeping on the floor if needed. This time however, since we were not flying, I packed an air mattress for one of them to sleep on, avoiding the need to sleep on the floor.
To book this room I just transferred 25,000 points from everyone’s favorite bank to Hyatt. It was an instant transfer and I was able to book this room in minutes.
If you want to know what bank I’m talking about and what cards I opened to get these points, DM me on Instagram @mamitravelswithpoints
The Room:
Upon arrival we were upgraded from my 25,000 point 2 queen bed room to a one king and 1 queen bed room. This room would have cost $716.52 after taxes and fees if I was paying cash for this stay. Sometimes I still can’t believe I get to stay in places like this for FREE. I don’t know why I was upgraded. I did not ask if an upgrade was available. Perhaps I was upgraded because of my hotel status of Discoverist. Regardless, I was thrilled.
The room was big (630 sq. ft.) and very comfortably fit all 5 of us. We didn’t need the air mattress because 2 older children fit in the queen bed and me and my twin 7 year olds fit in the king bed. However, you know teenagers, they did not want to sleep together so we ended up using the air mattress. Because the room was so big, the air mattress was not in the way at all.
The bathroom was also very huge with a separate toilet, separate tub, separate shower, and double sinks. There was also a vanity conveniently placed right outside the bathroom so someone could be getting ready while other people use the bathroom.
Other important things to mention: there was a mini fridge and coffee maker, there was a large walk in closet where all 5 of us fit in at once, and a little patio area. I was very pleased with this room.
The Hotel
Check in was scheduled to be at 4 pm. We had driven to Huntington Beach in the morning so we could have a beach day while we waited for our hotel to be ready. While we were enjoying our beach day, I received a text that our room was ready early, around 2 pm. That was a wonderful surprise. We headed straight over.
When we got there we found out the only option for parking is through valet parking, which will cost $49 a night. Your other option is to drive around and find parking on the street. They do not offer parking in a structure. That is the one thing I didn’t like about this hotel.
After we walked into the hotel lobby, we saw that they had a beautiful sand sculpture. I don’t know whether that is something they do regularly, but this one was in the theme of a conference they were having that weekend. Regardless, my 7 year olds found it very inspiring since they like to build sandcastles.
I was able to skip the long check-in line and go straight to the World Of Hyatt Line due to my Discoverist status. That is when I was offered the room upgrade. Prior to this I had communicated with the hotel through the free World of Hyatt app that we were celebrating my daughter’s birthday. They offered to leave a note for her with a gift certificate free of charge in the room. They also did offer me a list of paid items I could have them put in the room. I politely declined, but the option is there for those of you that would like to take it. Since we ended up changing rooms, she just handed me a card to give to my daughter instead of having it placed in the room as planned.
We went to the room to drop off our things. My daughters know to wait outside so I can video the room and take pictures, so I took this opportunity to leave the card on the bed for my daughter to find. When she did find and open it, it was a nice note in which they wished her a happy birthday and gave her a $25 resort credit at one of the gift shops/Starbucks they had on property. She got her Starbucks drink and we used the rest to help pay for breakfast the next morning.
After we dropped off our things, we went to explore the hotel before heading to the beach. It was very beautiful. There were many areas that you could sit and enjoy looking at the beach, or simply relax in and soak up the California sunshine.
One we were done exploring we wanted to go back to the beach. We found a bridge that connects the hotel to the beach so you never have to cross traffic.
After the sun set and it started to get cold the kids wanted to head to the pool. It was about 6 pm when we got there and the pool was basically deserted because everyone was out for Saturday night. We enjoyed the pool and hot tub to ourselves. It has beautiful views of the beach. The pool was open until 10 pm. They have towels by the pool for you to grab. It is just one giant pool with different depths of 3.5 ft, 4 ft, and 5 ft. I kind of wish they had a separate pool for the 3.5 ft. so you wouldn’t have to worry about your young kids accidentally going into the deeper section. There was also no life vests available for younger children. So if you need one, bring your own. The pool
We woke up early because I saw they offered a complimentary yoga class on the beach from 8am to 9am. Unfortunately, I did not read carefully and saw that it was on a Saturday morning, not Sunday. So if you’re there on a Saturday morning, check that class out. Since we were already up we went to enjoy the beach one more time before we had to check out of the hotel. Check out was at 11 am. It was getting close to 11 and my daughters were having a lot of fun. I decided to take a chance and text the hotel through the World of Hyatt app to see if late checkout was available. They extended our check out until 12 pm. It was just one more hour but it makes a difference.
We decided to head back to enjoy the pool with that one hour we got extended. While we were there we got to see the mermaid instructor in action. The hotel said during peak season she’s out there for guests to enjoy, but during off peak season she is a paid service for customers through reservation.
And thus, that concluded our stay at the beautiful Hyatt Regency Huntington Beach Resort and Spa. It was a very pleasant experience. I highly recommend this hotel.
Quick note: I needed a hair straightener after getting my hair a bit wet in the hot tub but I didn’t bring one. I noticed on the World Of Hyatt app that I could have one sent up to my room. That was a life saver :)
Hope you enjoyed this review. Come back to my blog to see what new places points and miles takes me and my family. Follow me on Instagram @mamitravelswithpoints. If you’re considering opening credit cards, please support my content by using my links located in my link tree: https://linktr.ee/mamitravelswithpoints
Happy travels :)
