Hotel Atwater, Avalon

The room, the bathroom and the hallways were small. In all fairness, everything in Avalon is built on century old buildings and isolated from the main land by 26 miles of ocean. There is no elevator. That is no big deal unless you have a bunch of bags to bring upstairs. No pool or open space for this hotel. The most precious thing on Catalina is flat land. You could not ask for this hotel to be any closer to the main strip and not be kept up all night from all the noise from the bars. The staff is friendly. The best thing is that enen though the check out time was 11:00, for free they would check you baggage and send it over to the dock a couple of hours before your boat arrives.

We booked a suite in this hotel for a family vacation, and we were not disappointed with the room and the gracious service. Albeit, it is a bit noisy in Avalon however our kids didn't mind since they were asleep as soon as their heads hit the pillows. We opted for a "Family Getaway" plan, which included some island activities, and took advantage of everything except the kayaking, as no one wanted to get wet. This hotel is run by the Island Company, so it was easy to get tour tickets for the inland bus trips and charge it to your room. The tour buses leave from right across the street, and the mini golf course is next door. I would recommend this hotel especially to city dwellers who can stand a bit of noise. There is a sports bar across the street from our room which was frequented primarily by yelling drunk idiots, but we were lucky to have an air conditioned room so we could keep our windows closed. Another plus with this place is it is right off the beach so you don't have to schlep your luggage from the landing all the way up the hill like many of the other places. If we ever venture back to Catalina we would stay here again.