I went on a 2,500-mile search for the greatest motels in California. Here's what I found

Listen. That’s the debased hum of the road you perceive down me, offset by the rumble of the crystal instrumentality down the breezeway. We stitchery contiguous to observe the motel, a uniquely American creature, conceived successful California done the unholy clasp of the automobile and the hotel.

Since that opening successful 1925, motels person multiplied similar bunnies. They person been implicated successful countless crimes and liaisons. They person been elevated by immoderate savvy architects, undercut by assorted concatenation operations and often near for dormant by the broadside of the road.

The motel turns 100. Explore the state’s champion roadside havens — and the coolest stops on the way.

Yet definite survivors person done immoderate melodramatic societal climbing, particularly lately. Plenty of motels person moved from fund to boutique, often renaming themselves arsenic inns, lodges oregon hotels and capitalizing connected their vintage looks. Like turntables, typewriters, tiki bars and movie cameras, these midcentury motels are back, seducing millennials, Gen Z and babe boomers similar the quality Johnny Rose connected the beloved TV bid “Schitt’s Creek.”

“I ever saw motels arsenic a past resort, a dreaded pit stop,” said Rose, played by Eugene Levy, pitching Wall Street investors. “But I was wrong. Motels person the imaginable of offering a model into the unsocial charm of small-town life.”

He vows “to revitalize the classical roadside motel for a caller generation.”

Out present successful the existent world, it’s happening.

Nowadays you tin walk $1,000 a nighttime successful a born-again California motel. You tin bid “eight-minute eggs” with your Champagne brunch (Le Petit Pali, Carmel), browse successful a curated bodega (Hotel Wren, Twentynine Palms), nosh connected caviar (Skyview Los Alamos), get a tiny car (Surfrider Hotel, Malibu), oregon easiness the planet’s miseries by reaching for tree-free toilet insubstantial (Pearl Hotel, San Diego).

The cursive yellowish motion astatine the Pearl reverberates with ’50s vibes.

(Megan Morello / For The Times)

Yet if you’re tense astir wealth successful these nerve-racking times, you tin inactive find a mom-and-pop cognition with precocious standards, a agelong household past and — sometimes — rates that dip nether $100. You tin adjacent find 1 of those that features factual teepees (San Bernardino’s Wigwam Motel, tally by a household with roots successful India).

In different words, it’s a wide, wide motel satellite retired there, excessively wide to acceptable into 1 roadworthy trip. And so, successful grant of the motel centennial, I took a roadworthy trip. Well, a fewer roadworthy trips.

All told, I covered astir 2,500 miles, each wrong California, stalking properties calved betwixt 1925 and 1970, avoiding the large chains, sleeping successful a caller country each night. The mode I defined a motel? If a lodging’s impermanent rooms unfastened straight to the outdoors and there’s a parking batch handy, manufacture experts say, it astir apt was calved arsenic a motel oregon centrifugal lodge. Especially if it’s a low-rise gathering with less than 60 rooms, ceramic walls and a VACANCY motion disposable from the street. But owners tin telephone their lodgings what they similar — oregon crook them to different uses.

On the way, I recovered a fewer landmark motels that don’t instrumentality overnight guests astatine all. I besides learned however the state’s Project Homekey — conceived to location radical astatine hazard of homelessness — bankrolled the acquisition and conversion of much than 30 Southern California motels and hotels from 2020 to 2024, with mixed results.

Now, buckle up and let’s rotation the montage of aged postcards, weathered neon signs and swooping Googie rooflines, past zoom to the spot wherever motel past began.

The Mo-Tel is born

The archetypal stop, I knew, needed to beryllium a scruffy batch alongside U.S. 101 astatine the eastbound borderline of San Luis Obispo.

This is wherever a car-loving Pasadena designer named Arthur Heineman opened his archetypal roadside lodging successful December 1925, little than a twelvemonth earlier Route 66 connected Chicago to Los Angeles. Having seen the archetypal abrogation camps and centrifugal courts outpouring up crossed the country, Heineman hatched the thought of gathering 1 midway betwixt Los Angeles and San Francisco.

After a fewer mendacious starts, helium called his spot the Milestone Mo-Tel, combining centrifugal and hotel. Later it became the Motel Inn. Heineman gave the buildings Mission Revival features and planned to physique 18 statewide, his ain ngo system.

That ne'er happened. But Heineman’s lodging endured for decades and the connection motel caught on. As the automobile transformed American beingness and roadside commercialized civilization lit up similar a caller neon light, that connection spread.

But we’re not lingering astatine the Motel Inn. It unopen down successful 1991 and overmuch of the aged analyzable has been leveled. Despite a connection for a caller edifice that got section readying committee support successful 2023, the tract remained idle arsenic of March 7. An uninspiring motion inactive stands, on with a Mission-style bureau building, doorbell operation and a azygous partition from the aged restaurant. For idiosyncratic who prizes roadside Americana, this is the ocular mentation of the bittersweet trombone sound.

Fortunately, the Madonna Inn — the ocular mentation of an accordion orchestra — is conscionable 3 miles away. Under a large pinkish sign.

When 1 California castle is not enough

At helium Madonna Inn successful San Luis Obispo, Alex Madonna drew connected his Swiss inheritance and gave the inn a mountain-chalet look.

(Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times)

Nowadays the Madonna Inn is simply a immense endeavor with restaurants, bakery, bar, stables adjacent doorway and 110 impermanent rooms — each different, each with its ain postcard successful the inn’s 3 acquisition shops. It’s truthful ornate, truthful frothy with kitsch, you person to smile. But erstwhile Alex and Phyllis Madonna opened successful precocious 1958, the inn was a 12-room experiment.

The timing indispensable person seemed right. Motels had been multiplying nationwide for much than 30 years, often adding swimming pools to lure much families oregon adopting elaborate themes to basal apart.

On Columbus Avenue successful San Francisco, a circular Villa Roma centrifugal edifice roseate up (until it was leveled successful the ’80s). Farther northbound successful Crescent City, a antheral named Tom Wyllie built the 36-room Curly Redwood Lodge retired of a azygous redwood histrion successful 1957. You tin inactive slumber there, often for little than $80.

But here’s what gave the Madonnas a important boost connected their motel successful San Luis Obispo: Earlier that year, the authorities of California had opened the ornately furnished Hearst Castle successful adjacent San Simeon arsenic a tourer attraction. Once the Madonna Inn opened that December, a traveler from L.A. could slumber astatine 1 lavishly decorated only-in-California castle connected the mode to another. Legions inactive do.

Scenes from the Madonna Inn. (Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times)

(Nic Coury / For The Times)

“It is the grandest motel of them all,” roadside plan adept John Margolies erstwhile wrote, “and it is the definitive look of an individually owned and operated hostelry — light-years removed from the astir technological sameness of the ample franchised chains.”

Boom, bust and roar again successful San Francisco

From San Luis Obispo I drove connected to San Francisco, ignoring Union Square, North Beach and Fisherman’s Wharf, heading for the consecutive portion of Lombard Street. That’s the portion that carries U.S. 101 postulation done the Marina territory connected its mode to the Golden Gate Bridge, and it’s afloat of aged motels. In their vintage signs and often-weary façades, you tin spot impervious of the industry’s roar and the diminution that followed.

How ubiquitous did motels get? By 1964 determination were 61,000 motels crossed the U.S. It’s hard to ideate determination were ever truthful many, until you peek astatine @deadmotelsUSA oregon @merchmotel connected Instagram oregon you’ve travel crossed Heather M. David’s splendid 2017 java array book, “Motel California.”

Alas, by 1964, they were already opening to get little interesting. Once the archetypal procreation of mom-and-pop motels prospered, the archetypal concatenation operations arose and followed, targeting travelers who wanted nary surprises. Two of the biggest chains, successful fact, were calved successful Southern California — Motel 6 successful Santa Barbara and Travelodge successful San Diego.

As the nationalist freeway strategy grew done the 1960s and ’70s, much concatenation operations positioned themselves to cod freeway drivers. Along the now-much-quieter highway, the aged mom-and-pop operations died disconnected oregon were gobbled up and “reflagged” by the chains.

By 1980, the freeway strategy and the concatenation hotels were thriving. Motels, not truthful much.

But successful 1987 — successful San Francisco’s Tenderloin, of each places — a 26-year-old Stanford MBA named Chip Conley tried thing that changed the motel narrative. He bought a bedraggled aged spot called the Caravan Lodge and dubbed it the Phoenix, with Miss Pearl’s Jam House arsenic its on-site edifice and bar. Then helium positioned the spot arsenic a hotelier’s mentation of Rolling Stone magazine, each wrapped astir a playfully painted pool. And helium offered escaped massages and autobus parking to touring musicians’ roadworthy managers.

The Phoenix Hotel is portion of the hipster-friendly Bunkhouse edifice group. (Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times)

(Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times)

And lo, the bands came, including the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Sinead O’Connor, M.C. Hammer, k.d. lang, Laurie Anderson, Etta James, David Bowie, Bo Diddley and Deborah Harry. As the Phoenix flourished, Conley revived dozens much motels and tiny hotels, conceived a marque called Joie de Vivre, past sold it to Marriott.

The Phoenix has little momentum now. Its edifice opens lone for peculiar events and the Tenderloin’s transgression and blight persist. If I were successful the metropolis with children, I’d sooner enactment adjacent Lombard Street astatine the Motel Capri oregon Hotel Del Sol (which charges a staggering $45 for parking but has a pool).

Then again, a caller proprietor took implicit the Phoenix past August — Michel Suas, a celebrated Bay Area pastry chef. If immoderate Phoenix tin emergence from the ashes twice, it’s this one.

Rethinking rooms for a caller generation

Meanwhile, up and down California, there’s a caller procreation of motel entrepreneurs and designers pursuing Conley’s lead, rethinking what it means to beryllium a motel. Though the nationwide fig of motels dwindled to an estimated 16,000 by 2012, reclamation projects person been multiplying.

Kenny Osehan’s Ojai-based Shelter Social Club manages six reclaimed California motels successful Ojai, Santa Barbara, Los Alamos and Solvang.

The Beverly Hills-based Kirkwood Collection includes 11 redone California motels and hotels.

The Santa Barbara-based Casetta Group has opened 4 redone Southern California motels and hotels, with 2 much opening soon successful Los Angeles and Taos, N.M.

The San Luis Obispo-based Nomada Hotel Group has relaunched 5 motels and hotels on the Central Coast.

None of those companies existed earlier 2012. All are inactive increasing and trading connected the thought that a lodging with 30 rooms feels friendlier than 1 with 300.

Drive southbound from San Francisco with a motel geek — which you’re present doing, by the mode — and the born-again motel variations rotation past similar Kodachrome images successful a descent show.

At the Glen Oaks Resort Adobe Motor Lodge successful Big Sur, the rooms huddle astatine the borderline of a heavy forest. You crook an old-school metallic cardinal successful your doorway and find a country afloat of stylishly recycled furnishings — woodsy but luxe, with yoga mats leaning successful a corner.

A vintage-style cardinal astatine Glen Oaks Motor Lodge successful Big Sur.

(Christopher Reynolds / Los Angeles Times)

At the Cambria Beach Lodge, wherever erstwhile you mightiness person recovered a bedside Gideon Bible oregon a Magic Fingers vibrating mattress, present you get a motorcycle to thrust by Moonstone Beach oregon bathe with immoderate of the motel’s goat’s beverage soap.

Rolling done Paso Robles, you face a generational motel choice. You tin question reassurance astatine the Melody Ranch Motel with its tidy, basal rooms, Gideon Bibles, second-generation household absorption and rates astir $100 a night. Or you tin caput to Farmhouse Paso Robles oregon the River Lodge, some of which person been updated dramatically by the Nomada Group.

“It’s not that we acceptable retired to refurbish motels, necessarily,” Nomada spouse and originative manager Kimberly Walker told me. “One happening we are passionate astir is giving aged buildings a caller chapter. We can’t ever spot ourselves buying a portion of onshore and starting from scratch.”

With the champion aged motels, “There was conscionable truthful overmuch property and thought enactment into what these buildings look similar that they’re capable to beryllium reconceptualized again,” Walker said. “You tin ever find 1 happening to commencement your plan travel with, and past physique disconnected of that.”

Two of the biggest challenges, Walker said, are parking and bathrooms. At the River Lodge, Skyview Los Alamos and Hotel Ynez successful Solvang, Walker’s squad moved the parking country farther from rooms, making much abstraction for greenery and patios. In tiny bathrooms, the squad has deployed fancy tiles, tons of airy and solid partitions alternatively of ablution curtains.

Especially astatine Skyview, the operation of Modernist and farmhouse plan elements yields entertaining results. Agrigoogie, anyone?

And past there’s the question of those chill aged signs that accidental motel.

“When we archetypal bought Skyview, and I hatred that I did this, but I was like, ‘Maybe we should alteration the motion from “motel” to “hotel,”‘” Walker confessed. “I’m truthful gladsome that I didn’t travel done with that, due to the fact that the motel motion is the beacon. Guests emotion taking their pictures with the sign.”

In Cayucos, plan veterans and hospitality newbies Ryan and Marisa Fortini faced a akin question erstwhile they bought and renovated an aged centrifugal inn connected the main drag. They chose to thin adjacent harder into the m-word and called their task the Pacific Motel. It opened successful 2022.

And present the Fortinis are doing it again. In 2023 they bought the adjacent Cayucos Motel. So far, that still-open spot remains arsenic beach-rustic-plain arsenic the Pacific Motel is beach-rustic-chic. But much changes are coming and Ryan Fortini shared with maine a caller connection that whitethorn assistance picture them.

“Motique,” helium said. “A boutique motel.”

The Pacific Motel successful Cayucos. (Jacob Tovar / For The Times)

(Jacob Tovar / For The Times)

Motel variations: Hot springs, beachfront perches and iconic signage

The farther southbound you go, whether connected the seashore oregon successful the desert, the wider the assortment seems to get.

At the Surfrider Malibu, guests ordinarily person exclusive entree to a roof-deck restaurant, respective loaner surfboards and a brace of Mini Coopers — but immoderate amenities are connected clasp arsenic the edifice accommodates galore guests displaced by the Palisades occurrence successful January.

In the boulder-strewn hills betwixt San Diego and Calexico, the revivers of the once-moribund Jacumba Hot Springs Hotel person rebuilt that edifice (which opened successful 2023) with geothermally heated pools and a planetary godforsaken theme.

On a pier successful San Diego’s Pacific Beach, there’s been nary melodramatic rebirth — due to the fact that nary was necessary. The tidy cottages of the Crystal Pier Hotel, tally by the aforesaid household since 1961, inactive look overmuch arsenic they did successful the 1930s, tide lapping below, reservations required months ahead. (And you person to marque them by telephone oregon successful person.)

“The motel happening is coming back,” said wide manager Julie Neal, sounding surprised. “It’s really benignant of chill now.”

Out successful the desert, wherever Midcentury Modern plan has ne'er gone retired of style, determination were revived motels near and right.

The astir subdued of those was 1 of the astir tempting: Hotel Wren successful Twentynine Palms, which lone opened successful March, a 12-room, high-end retreat with muted colors, tremendous rooms, customized furnishings and poolside upland views.

The slightest subdued? That would beryllium the erstwhile Ruby Montana’s Coral Sands Inn, successful Palm Springs.

My household and I booked astir of the spot with friends respective years ago, and I was struck past by however entertaining it was to sleep, work and play successful a seven-room motel that had been painted pinkish and filled with thrift-shop tchotchkes and vintage furnishings.

Well, Ruby’s gone now, and the Trixie Motel (its sanction since 2022) is impervious that adjacent if 1 hotelier goes wild, there’s inactive country for the adjacent 1 to spell wilder. Especially if that adjacent proprietor is simply a resistance queen.

The motel is inactive pink, but present staffers deterioration pinkish outfits, each country has its ain customized thematic wallpaper (Atomic Bombshell, Pink Flamingo, Yeehaw Cowgirl). Barbie dolls cavort successful the bureau and trendy persons capable the motel’s Barbara bar. Next to each this, the Madonna Inn looks similar conscionable different Ramada.

Drag queen Trixie Mattel, David Silver and Team Trixie (including interior decorator Dani Dazey) bought the motel, renovated and reopened it successful 2022. It’s present pinker than ever.

(David Fotus / For The Times)

The roadworthy up runs done the mediate of nowhere

Because the constituent of a motel is to assistance you toward someplace else, there’s nary cleanable mode to extremity a motel journey. But Amboy works.

It’s a 20th period shade municipality on Route 66, astir 45 miles northeast of Twentynine Palms. Roy’s Motel & Cafe stands determination similar a forgotten signifier set, topped by an iconic 1959 motion whose promises are each false.

Roy has been gone for decades. With potable h2o successful abbreviated supply, neither the cafe nor the motel nor its six roadside cottages person been unfastened since the 1980s. But Roy’s has gas, snacks and souvenirs, which is capable to pull movie crews, selfie snappers and legions of drivers (especially desert-smitten Europeans) connected their mode betwixt Las Vegas and Joshua Tree.

With Route 66 turning 100 successful 2026, Roy’s proprietor Kyle Okura and manager Ken Large are doing their champion to someway get the six roadside cottages up and renting earlier that twelvemonth is over. (Who tin defy a centennial?)

It’s excessively soon to archer if that rebirth volition happen. Still, the roadworthy warriors come, including off-duty trucker Chris Birdsall, 51, of Omaha, who turned up soon earlier sunset 1 caller day.

“I privation to spot the motion lit up,” helium said.

Soon after, Roy’s adjunct manager Nicole Rachel called Birdsall into the aged motel office, showed him the 3 switches that power the 50-foot motion and invited him to bash the honors.

Birdsall did his bit, past grinned similar a kid arsenic the motel motion blinked to beingness successful red, bluish and yellowish similar a neon mirage oregon a road-tripper’s dream.

Rachel often invites visitors to propulsion the switches, she told me. But adjacent if you don’t get that privilege, I can’t deliberation of a amended spot to basal connected the blacktop and ideate what mightiness beryllium down the road.