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Showing posts from March, 2010

Hyatt Regency Irvine 2009 Review Part 3: Breakfast and Conclusion

Welcome to part 3 of the Hyatt Regency Irvine review. This part isn't much of a "review" of any sort but experiencing the breakfast buffet they had set up the next day for us. If you have not read Part 1 or 2 yet, they are here: Hyatt Regency Irvine 2009 Review Part 1: Check-In and Public Spaces Hyatt Regency Irvine 2009 Review Part 2: Rooms and Conclusion --- Anyway, after waking up, I left the room to go down for more of the conference activities. While waiting for the elevator again on my floor, I looked around and found this plant. Usually, these plants symbolize good things for the Chinese, so I was interested to find it here. Downstairs, although it was almost three hours until we would even have breakfast, the Hyatt crew was already busy setting up. Here you can see the tables. They brought in plenty of prepared items such as the fruit you see above as well as things like small glass jars of Hero jams, lots of plates, and lots of glasses. These were all on rolling

Hyatt Regency Irvine 2009 Review Part 2: Rooms and Conclusion

Here is Part 2 of the review of my Hyatt Regency Irvine visit. Part 1 was mainly about the public areas that you would see around the hotel. I would suggest for you to read Part 1 so that you can feel a sense of continuity throughout this post. In the afternoon we received our rooms and so up we went on the elevators, where we noticed they were ULTRA slow. 4 elevators for a 14 story hotel was decent, but slow elevators were not, especially when the Hyatt was holding a conference with more than 200 people attending. Wait times for an elevator were at average from 3-5 minutes for one elevator, and with the attendees crowding at the elevator halls, it was bad not only for the attendees but for the other customers trying to come out from the elevators. Traffic congestion, for sure! Like other Hyatts, this Hyatt had some windows nearby the elevators which you could look outside at. Walking down the hallways it was bright with clean lines and slight decorations from the trees and lights. And

Irvine 2009 Trip Index

Here are all the posts on my trip to Irvine in 2009: Hyatt Regency Irvine: Hyatt Regency Irvine 2009 Review Part 1: Check-In and Public Spaces Hyatt Regency Irvine 2009 Review Part 2: Rooms and Conclusion Hyatt Regency Irvine 2009 Review Part 3: Breakfast Food: California Pizza Kitchen- Irvine Souplantation- Irvine

Capital Seafood- Arcadia: First Impressions

Read my full post on Capital Seafood- Arcadia HERE for more menu items and photos of the place. This post provides background information.) Replacing Tony Roma's and Fusions, Capital Seafood is an almost unusual restaurant coming to the area. Who would have expected a dim sum banquet style restaurant to even open in Arcadia in a different location compared to the rest of the competition? Located in the densely packed hotel section of Arcadia, Capital Seafood is one dim sum restaurant in the sea of mainly Western restaurants and just a handful of Asian restaurants. Untypical? Yes. There are only two other Chinese restaurants nearby Huntington in this part of town- Bean Sprouts, and Golden Dragon (old favorite that became not so good). Normally I never do posts without the pictures of the food, but a full posting is not coming today. Rather, I am just giving you the first impressions my dining companions had eating dim sum there. I got to eat some things they brought for me and I wi

California Pizza Kitchen- Irvine

(All exterior photos blurry so this is what you get! The exterior is actually quite modern and pretty though) Following the workshops in the conference, our group went to California Pizza Kitchen, like the group did last year for dinner. According to the group, they have gone to CPK almost every year they have been to this annual conference. I find that quite interesting. Interesting tidbit? While one of the group members was going to park their car, a Ferrari came by. We let the Ferrari have the spot and looked at the car after we parked. After all, even in Irvine, it is not everyday you see expensive cars parked. Plus, this convertible had the top cover off, so we could see the interior. Happy car fans are we. Interior: 1 fine, 1 ultra out of focus! The Sony W90's focusing is lacking as time goes on... :( We went into CPK and then they had to prepare for our table. Hmm...I guess that my group forgot the suitable action of making a reservation for a large group. :( Funny thing is,

Souplantation- Irvine

After the first session for the conference, it was time for lunch at an early 11:35AM. So, not wanting to go anywhere far but not wanting to eat at the hotel, we headed for Souplantation, which was about a 3-5 minute walk away from the Hyatt- basically just walking out from the entry to the hotel. It was just a quick decision made by our leaders on where to eat. The positives were that it was extremely close to the hotel and thus we just needed to walk. No need to arrange for transportation- always a nice thing. Inside, we grabbed a tray and then went to the long salad bar, filling up with as much salad as we desired. In the front was a spotlight of an employee making salad for the dressed mixed salads. Plenty of people were coming to Souplantation during that day- not only conference members were going, other people came as well to enjoy their own Souplantation experience. After the mixed salads, it was the make your own salad section, which had dressings, different vegetables, and to