So my wife and I had a belated Valentine's Day weekend and decided to spend it overnight at Cameron's in Half Moon Bay.

Positives:

• Right...over...a...bar (an English-style pub, in fact, with great food).
• Saturday night karaoke.
• Not too expensive ($109 for the night).
• A free beer with night's stay.

Negatives:

• The room was quirky. Very quirky. Almost too quirky for us (and our tolerance of quirk is legendary).

In summary, we were glad to have the one-night adventure and it was fun but not worth doing again. It was the sort of experience everyone should have exactly once. Enumerated list of quirks after the break.

So like I said, the room was quirky. I was quite relieved that the heating in the room was up to the rather chilly HMB night (surprising), and that the bedclothes were also up to the task (even more surprising). The decor was full of nice throwback bric-a-brac, as well. The room was very clean, warm, and dry. I have no complaints with the fundamentals (which means that it was quite acceptable overall), but that's where the positives end...

1. The door was, I believe, an office door at one point. With a large glass window and some rather funky mini-blinds for privacy (ish). Walking into the room gave an initial impression that we'd walked into some weird 1930s film noir porno of some sort. Imagine Sam Spade: Private Dick.
2. Someone had a real fondness for hanging coats. I counted no less than 15 places to hang one. I almost felt bad for putting my shoes on the floor--I should've hung them instead.
3. The bed (there was a queen and I believe a double in the room--we took the queen) was firm and reasonably comfortable. And squeaky. Every movement on its surface came with a seven-note chord that noted the shifting of its mattressy load. I'm pretty sure that, with a couple of microphones and some advanced software, enough information would be available from bednoise alone to accurately predict where its occupants lie and calculate their sleep disorders to three decimal places.
4. Below the surface, the bedclothes seemed rather threadbare. I was very relieved to find them up to the task of keeping us warm, but I was tempted to run out and grab something to augment them for fear of waking up chilled.
5. The lighting was equally iffy, though surprisingly effective. The overhead lighting was of the two-fluorescent-tube variety that looked more like kitchen lighting (and worked well, though out of place). One of the lamps looked to be the breeding ground of a new generation of electrical fires (but I'm probably overreacting).
6. Mixed in and among the wonderful retro bric-a-brac was a industrial-grade-bathroom-style soap dispenser and paper towel dispenser above a small sink surrounded by laminate countertop. Easy to maintain, I imagine, but it detracts from the feel of the room horribly.
7. Speaking of retro, the TV was a of a 1980s vintage, with broken rabbit ears and a nice new satellite receiver on top. The picture quality varied depending on whether the restaurant climate control was running or not...
8. ...which also varied the amount of vibration that could be felt on the outer walls. Seriously, when the climate control was humming, so were the walls. We stayed in the master bedroom which was right below the physical plant for the building, so it may have been better in the other rooms.
9. The master room, by the way, is the only one with its own bath. The other rooms share a bath that's accessed from the hallway.

We were also warned that we might experience noise from the restaurant below. We had no problem with this at all (the humming from above easily drowned out anything from below).

If you decide to stay at Cameron's, you are above one of the best English-style pubs in the US (modulo the fact that their liquor license is beer/wine only). You will not be disappointed in the overall hospitality of the people or the cleanliness of the room--these things are above reproach. You will, however, experience the closest thing to a scene from a National Lampoon's movie possible without the likelihood of physical harm. I can recommend having the Cameron's overnight experience for exactly one night only--any longer will probably drive you mad.