Tag Archives: Cannery Row

Art

Avoid the nightmare before Christmas and book holiday parties early at The Whaling Station

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For many, the nightmare before Christmas surrounds the early run-up to the holiday.

Monterey, CA, October 13, 2019 — For many, the nightmare before Christmas surrounds the early run-up to the holiday. But The Whaling Station on Cannery Row believes the real nightmare is waiting too long to secure space for your holiday party.

Plan your holiday soiree early, and get the best seat in the house at Monterey County’s No. 1 steakhouse for more than 40 years. The Whaling Station offers private and semi-private dining areas for groups of 8 to 50. For reservations call 373-3778.

When it comes to holiday gift-giving, the fallback is always a gift card, and The Whaling Station has you covered with its unique electronic gift card (eGift) system. Go to www.thewhalingstation.com and send an eGift to any favorite foodie via email or text message. You choose the value and the recipient can use that value to make purchases at Monterey’s iconic steakhouse.

During the holiday season, The Whaling Station is open for Thanksgiving, but closed on Christmas Day to allow its employees to enjoy the festivities with their families.

Contact:

Marci Bracco Cain

Chatterbox PR

Salinas, CA 93901

(831) 747-7455

http://www.thewhalingstation.com

Travel

Hottest Trend in Interactive Immersive Entertainment, Escape Rooms, Opens on Cannery Row in Monterey

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Save the Date for The Escape Room Grand Opening Ribbon Cutting with the Monterey Peninsula Chamber of Commerce Tuesday, September 26th from 5:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. Details to Be Announced Soon. Open To the Public

Monterey, CA, August 15, 2017 — Imagine being closed in a room with a half a dozen other people and you’re given just one hour to figure out — through clues, codes and suggestions scattered throughout the room — to solve a murder.

Change the scenario to a bank heist, a hostage situation, a kidnapping, a prison, pirate ship, a space station, and much more, and you have one of the hottest trends in interactive or immersive entertainment — Escape Rooms. They’re based on escape-the-room video and online games, as if the classic board game “Clue” became a live-action game you play with others in real locations.

And now Monterey has its own version — Exodus Escape Room on Cannery Row — founded by entrepreneur Christina Riddoch of Monterey.

“My granddaughter Andrea and I would play these games online together,” says Riddoch, who opened Exodus Escape Room the first weekend in August. “We were walking around Union Station in Kansas City and we saw a live escape room. We did it and we had so much fun. I said, we need to do this in Monterey, so I started looking into it.”

She contacted an owner of an escape room in Los Angeles to discuss franchising and even attended an escape room conference in Niagara Falls. But it was that first experience with a “live” escape room in Kansas City that sealed it for her.

“I was literally on a high from it for days,” she says. “You feel alive again, it was such an experience, it got us outside of ourselves.”

She talked the escape room operator in L.A. into franchising, found a suitable location above and behind The Whaling Station restaurant on Wave Street in Cannery Row, set up two escape rooms there and opened to capacity crowds — “It was nonstop until 11:30 at night that first night,” she says.

Exodus has two rooms, Sherlock’s Study (recommended for four-10 people) and Masquerade Manor (recommended for four-eight people), with the simple goal of working together with other players, crack codes, solve cyphers and study clues within 60 minutes to escape the room.

In Sherlock’s Study, in the midst of a murder investigation, Sherlock Holmes has been kidnapped by the very murderer he was trying to catch. It’s up to the players to piece together the evidence he has left behind in his study. Will you be clever enough to step into Sherlock’s shoes and solve the mystery?

In Masquerade Manor, wealthy and famous composer Ludovico Manin is the prime suspect in a recent, high-profile crime. That night, during his annual Masquerade Ball, is the best chance to look for evidence against him. Disguised as guests, players must infiltrate the ball, find proof of Manin’s guilt, and leave without being detected. Can you find the stolen object and escape in time?

The rooms are monitored by video cameras with audio. If players fail to solve the mystery and escape, they can return to take another crack at it for half-price. Riddoch says she hopes to open a third room with a bank heist theme.

“Ours is family-friendly since we’re on Cannery Row,” says Riddoch, referring to some of the more gruesome or frightening escape rooms out there. “I think Cannery Row needs this.”

Originating in Japan as Real Escape Game (REG) in 2007, Seattle-based Puzzle Break became the first American-based escape room company in 2013. They are patterned after video or online games such as Zelda, Myst and Crimson Room. There are estimated to be more than 3,000 escape room venues worldwide. There’s even a website directory of escape rooms (escaperoomdirectory.com) and people who are fans of the games are called Escape Room Enthusiasts.

“There is a growing consumer demand for social play experiences that are live and unique and can’t be repeated,” Sam Roberts, assistant director of the Interactive Media and Games division at the USC School of Cinematic Arts, told the Los Angeles Times. Roberts says that immersive entertainment will be the next frontier of gaming — “the future of play spaces,” he says.

“It’s just so much fun,” says Riddoch. “It’s great for team-building, it’s fun playing it together with friends. It’s such a great experience.”

Exodus Escape Room

765 Wave St., between Irving and Prescott, Monterey

Monterey@exodusescaperoom.com

(831) 324-0513

http://exodusescaperoom.com/monterey

Contact:

Marci Bracco Cain

Chatterbox PR

Salinas, CA 93901

(831) 747-7455

http://www.exodusescaperoom.com

Travel

InterContinental The Clement Monterey the Perfect Location for the Perfect Dream Wedding in the Heart of Cannery Row

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Mesmerizing ocean views, bay breezes and coastal scenery that will captivate hearts and souls — those are just some of the highlights of a dream wedding at the award-winning InterContinental The Clement Monterey.

Monterey, CA, March 28, 2016 – Mesmerizing ocean views, bay breezes and coastal scenery that will captivate hearts and souls — those are just some of the highlights of a dream wedding at the award-winning InterContinental The Clement Monterey.

Situated on Monterey’s historic Cannery Row made famous by Nobel Prize-winning author John Steinbeck, this spectacular oceanfront hotel offers beautiful wedding venues overlooking the sapphire-blue waters of the bay.

One of the most romantic wedding locations on Monterey Bay, The Clement Monterey offers a wide range of wedding services — from catering to spa treatments — that can make any wedding unforgettable.

The Clement Monterey has garnered numerous awards and accolades since it opened in May 2008, including the Condé Nast Traveler Top 25 In Northern California Readers Choice Award; TripAdvisor’s 2014 Certificate of Excellence; Sunset Magazine’s Top 10 California Coast Hotels; and every year, the AAA Four Diamond Award, which is awarded to the most luxurious and pampering properties throughout North America. Less than 4% of AAA-rated properties achieve this coveted rating.

The prestigious US News & World Report gave it a 4.5 Star rating of luxury hotels it surveyed.

“InterContinental The Clement Monterey’s location on Cannery Row is hard to beat,” the publication wrote. “Guests appreciate the hotel’s proximity to good shopping, delicious eateries, and attractions like the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Described as a home-away-from-home by some, this InterContinental property also features a health club, pool, and oceanfront patio that makes guests never want to leave. The C Restaurant also garners good to excellent reviews, particularly for its seafood.”

With an excellent selection of magnificent wedding venues overlooking Monterey Bay, The Clement Monterey can be a magical destination for any wedding celebration.

Wedding ceremonies can be staged on an expansive courtyard facing the sapphire-blue waters of the bay. Two fire pits provide an ambient glow, particularly romantic at sunset. Couples can say their vows with the bay in the background, while seabirds trace graceful curves on the horizon, and otters and sea lions frolic in the waves.

With such a picturesque setting, guests can enjoy social hour out in the fresh ocean air as well. While the bridal party poses for pictures, guests will enjoy the hotel’s boardwalk and pier, which extends out over the bay. Cut-outs along the wooden pier reveal tantalizing peeks directly down at the teeming underwater world of the Monterey Bay Sanctuary.

As twilight descends, guests can retire indoors to admire the vista from another perspective. The Pacific Ballroom is a refined setting for a bayside gala, replete with picture windows that capture a panorama of the moonlit ocean and the star-filled heavens.

Decorating with luminarias and fairy lights brings the sparkle indoors — the banquet staff can customize an event according to the bride and groom’s wishes.

The view is even more impressive from the Ocean Terrace Ballroom, located upstairs. It’s an intimate space that boasts a huge bayview terrace.

The Pacific Ballroom can accommodate from 150-230 guests, while the Ocean Ballroom holds from 25-150 guests for receptions and other functions.

The resort’s equally impressive public spaces are tranquil and welcoming, thanks to the stylish use of wood and other natural materials, along with décor in soothing shades of green and blue, evocative of the sea and sky.

One of the most notable spaces is the Reading Room, warmed by a contemporary stone-faced fireplace. Adjacent to the Reading Room, the Library serves as a private dining salon that’s perfect for formal rehearsal dinners.

The wedding party can enjoy fresh, innovative coastal cuisine from The Clement’s celebrated chefs and culinary experts. The hotel’s dedicated catering team will create a wedding feast, including sumptuous entrees like Arctic Char Papillote and Roasted Angus Beef Tenderloin, delicious hors d’oeuvres and fresh salads. Menus also include champagne and a premium selection of spirits, wines and beverages.

Hotel accommodations feature up-to-the-minute amenities, and many have fireplaces, ocean views and balconies. The on-site spa pampers guests with the latest in beautification and wellness treatments. VIP Babysitting is also available for children, enabling parents to enjoy the wedding celebration.

One of the benefits of a wedding at The Clement Monterey is that friends and family can enjoy a mini-vacation, because there’s simply no end to the area’s fun-filled activities and sights, from Old Fisherman’s Wharf to Pebble Beach, Carmel-by-the-Sea and Big Sur.

And one of its advantages is that the hotel is situated in the heart of historic Cannery Row, once the home of a thriving sardine fishing and canning industry.

Throughout the years, Monterey’s timeless natural beauty has been the inspiration for artists, poets and novelists alike. Recently, a downtown renaissance has put a glamorous polish on historic districts like Cannery Row, and author Steinbeck would be amazed to see these formerly rough-and-tumble dockside streets dramatically transformed into a thoroughly modern boulevard.

It’s been a long time since Steinbeck referred to Cannery Row as “a poem, a stink, a grating noise, a quality of light, a tone, a habit, a nostalgia, a dream” in his celebrated novel “Cannery Row.”

Today’s Cannery Row is alive with fashionable boutiques, delectable eateries, upscale galleries and a vibrant street scene that attracts visitors from all over the world. And right next door, literally steps from the hotel, sits the word-renowned Monterey Bay Aquarium.

Can this quaint yet oh-so-now slice of paradise get any better? Yes, it can. InterContinental The Clement Monterey was designed as a serene coastal retreat for personal rejuvenation and a luxury destination for the discerning traveler, but it’s also the perfect location for the perfect dream wedding.

InterContinental The Clement Monterey
Overlooking Monterey Bay and next door to the world-renowned Monterey Bay Aquarium is Monterey’s premier waterfront hotel, InterContinental The Clement Monterey. Situated on historic Cannery Row, the hotel offers affordable luxury in the heart of it all. The stylish C restaurant provides stunning ocean views from every table, and features the C bar and the open-air C side patio. Enjoy The Spa, fitness center and whirlpool, as well as Monterey’s most desirable location, situated on the pristine Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary.

About Pacific Hotel Management, LLC
InterContinental The Clement Monterey is owned and managed by Pacific Hotel Management, LLC. Pacific Hotel Management, LLC. is a privately-owned company that specializes in the development and management of high quality hotels using a variety of franchise brands. Pacific Hotel Management, LLC (PHM) manages all of the hotels owned by affiliates of Clement Chen & Associates, combining a focused corporate administrative staff with a “hands on” management philosophy to operate profitable, well-maintained hotels PHM is based in San Mateo, California, and can be visited on the Web at www.phmhotels.com.

Contact:
Marci Bracco Cain
Chatterbox PR
Salinas, CA 93901
(831) 747-7455
http://www.phmhotels.com