Review of Kona Beach House: Seaside Zen Cottage

We had a wonderful trip to the Big Island. Here is the first installment, the review of our rental in Kona.

Kona Beach House: Seaside Zen Cottage

konabeachhouse.com/threebedtour/seasidehome.…

Background:

Family of four, two parents and two grown children.

Requirements: a relaxed, comfortable home steps from the beach with access to the ocean and also near a town; character and charm highly desirable, tackiness to be avoided at all cost

Location: On Ali’i Drive just past the 2 ½ mile marker if you’re headed south. The lots for both Zen Cottage and the adjacent Plantation Home are deep by Ali%26#39;i Drive standards. We experienced minimal street noise. In fact, as you enter the driveway to ZC, the caretaker’s cottage is located off to the right so there are, in effect, two properties on the lot. James, the caretaker, and Mango, a very mellow retriever whose guard dog persona emerged at night, were around but not intrusive.

The House: Downstairs is the living/dining area, kitchen, and a bath with a large shower that opens to the outside, very convenient for coming in from the beach. Upstairs are the three bedroom spaces. Ventilation was good. There are windows on all four sides of the upstairs. There was also a ceiling fan in the back bedroom and column-style fans in the two front bedrooms. We were able to keep the shoji screen doors open pretty much all the time, and we were comfortable sleeping at night (one of us is heat intolerant and he was fine). Downstairs was typically cooler than upstairs. There were two flat screen tvs, one wall-mounted downstairs and another in Bedroom 2 on the website floorplan. Apparently the downstairs tv had conked out the previous week. James bought a new one the day we arrived.

I liked the furnishings—not fancy but overall tasteful and comfortable. The tv/desk area downstairs could use a little work in terms of aesthetics. For me, the dangling wires call for a better solution but they didn’t seem to bother anyone else.

The downstairs bath and the bath off the upstairs hall were spacious and modern enough (coming from SoCal we are accustomed to ultra baths). Both had large tiled showers. Water pressure was good and we never ran out of hot water. The bath off the back bedroom which the boys shared had a tub and also some built-in drawer space. The hall bath overlooked the caretaker’s cottage.

We cooked in three nights and ate out four. There was easy access from the kitchen to the gas grill on the lanai. The kitchen had stainless steel counter tops and everything we needed for simple meals. It was easy for two to get around, and all of the appliances worked.

Critters: We welcomed the occasional gecko, figuring they ate the less desirables. We encountered four roaches, all on the three nights that we had rain. Also saw some of those tiny little ants, mostly upstairs. No mosquitoes.

Maintenance: While not every baseboard and windowsill and hard to reach area would have passed the white-glove test, given that the many windows and screened doors were open 24/7, the house was clean enough and seemed well-maintained.

Outside: There was a grassy lawn between the house and the beach with four lounge chairs. A lava rock wall separated the property from the beach which was about three feet below the wall. The lagoon was perfect for dipping. The presence of sea urchins in the rocks meant that you had to be really careful about staying on the sand. There were sea turtles and they were magical. This brings me to what was for us the one big negative. The beach in front of the cottage was everyone’s favorite gathering spot. Folks started showing up at around ten and headed home by three or so. While this really affected my husband’s enjoyment of the property, the presence of others didn’t bother me as much. What bothered me was that so many people smoked while enjoying their beach time, and the smoke invariably made its way into the back yard.

Overall: A lovely property, high on character and charm, well suited for families. Just fine for four adults, six would be a very tight fit.