Just completed a 1-night stay here.

It's a spectacular property - the location is stunning, the beach felt basically like our own private beach, and the grounds are immaculate.

Bring good walking shoes: the property is set into a fairly steep hill so you will have a lot of elevation change just going from check-in to your room, to the pool, beach, etc. They have golf carts that will sometimes offer you a ride but the carts aren't everywhere all the time.

We booked a standard room using our annual 50k free night certificate which was expiring in July, plus of course the $109 surcharge on every room for parking + resort fee. We were upgraded to a 1-bedroom garden view suite the day prior to arrival, and then upgraded again at check-in to an ocean view suite. The room was fantastic. I know there have been some comments that the rooms are a little dated....I mean, the whole place is a little dated in terms of decor, but everything was in working order and things like the shower and mattress were clearly newer and in good shape. I especially like that we had two private balconies both with ocean views - one in the sun, one in the shade.

We decided to take a pass on the fine dining restaurants based on the so-so reviews we'd read. Ended up grabbing dinner at the lobby bar, which had a Latin theme and a pretty decent tapas menu.

Only quirky thing that left a little bit of a bad taste in our mouth was that the pools were open very limited hours and an attendant chased us down and chastised us for going into one 5 minutes early. (At 10AM!!) There is no late-night pool or hot tub at all.

I could see us returning again with the free night certificate. Nice experience, solid use of the cert especially given that other Marriott options in this part of CA are kind of limited. I doubt I'd spend 50,000 actual points here....and I can totally see how that $109 per night fee rubs a lot of people the wrong way.