In-demand cottages

CRYSTAL COVE — If you’re hoping to rent a cottage overlooking this impressive stretch of beach, get ready for a long wait.

Reservations open this morning for cottage stays in September. The coastal lodgings are so popular that a month’s worth of dates usually gets snapped up within 10 minutes.

New estimates show that finishing the park’s historic district, including 17 more overnight cottages, will cost $19.2 million and could take five years, if supporters can raise the money on schedule.

The cottages are a unique piece of California history. The seaside hideaway, built around the 1920s, blossomed after Crystal Cove was used for a number of movie shoots. The state bought the land in 1979 and decided in 2001 to restore the historic homes.

If public demand justifies a taxpayer-funded project, no one should have to argue for the cottages. They’ve booked 14,200 stays since opening in June, said Laura Davick, president of the Crystal Cove Alliance, a nonprofit group that holds a contract to manage the park.

Davick said Reserve America, the company that handles online and phone reservations for the cottages, recorded more than 177,000 visits to the cottages’ Web page on Feb. 1, when reservations were last opened.

Some other state parks include historic lodgings, the state parks department’s Richard Rozzelle said, “but as far as the architectural style and location on the coast and Crystal Cove as this little beach enclave, the department doesn’t have anything like that in the state. People tell me it’s one-of-a-kind in the nation.”

Rozzelle is the superintendent for state parks’ Orange Coast district. He said the first phase of work in the park’s historic district cost $14.3 million.

It included 22 buildings, 13 of which are for overnight stays, as well as a store, a marine research center, a restaurant, and infrastructure like water and sewer lines.

The Crystal Cove Alliance recently finished revising plans for the second and third phases of the project, which will refurbish the remaining 24 buildings and some garages.

Top priority in phase two is a four-building educational commons that could host educational programs, lectures and special events.

“We feel that with the continuing deterioration as the days and years go by, there’s less and less historic fabric that can be salvaged,” Davick said on a recent tour.

The second phase will also consolidate park services and move them away from guest areas.

The rebuilt garages will house a catering kitchen, and the “Beaches” cottage — where the 1988 Bette Midler movie was filmed — will be turned into a museum and display cottage to show visitors what their accommodations will be like.

The rest of the overnight cottages are phase three, but how fast that work gets done will depend on the funding, Davick said.

So far her group has raised more than $700,000 in private donations for various projects in the historic district, she’s requested a grant from the final round of a 2002 state parks bond, and money could come from Proposition 84, a $5.4-billion bond voters passed in November.

Completing cottages and other amenities will bring the total for the park’s historic district to $33.5 million, nearly 60% higher than the $21 million officials were estimating in April 2005.

Davick and Dan Gee, chairman of the Crystal Cove Alliance, gave several reasons for the swelling costs. One is the increase in construction costs everyone has seen in the last few years.

Gee also said estimates made before the project started were inaccurate because no one had any experience with this kind of historic restoration.

Some cottages had termites and dry rot. Because the cottages were built with no building permits, others turned out to have no foundation and had to be jacked up to have one poured.

“Each cottage is in a different condition, and until you start looking at it, you’re not sure,” Davick said.

There’s a long way to go to get the park finished, but the demand will undoubtedly be there when it’s ready.

Huntington Beach resident Grenda Penta, who stopped by Crystal Cove this week with her husband John, pronounced it “enchanting.”

She didn’t know the cottages and restaurant had opened, she said, but now she wants to come and stay for her husband’s birthday.

“It’s fabulous,” she said. “I can’t wait to come back.”

And those enthusiastic guests will help perpetuate the Crystal Cove experience. The alliance’s contract is set up to put 12% of the revenue back into park operations and upkeep.

“There’s enough cash flow being developed for the ongoing maintenance and preservation forever,” Gee said.

For information on reservations, go to www.crystalcovebeachcottages.com and click on the “Reserve America” box.