Hotel Y Casino Ensenada
San Nicolas Hotel and Casino is een hotel met 3,5 sterren en biedt een casino en gratis wifi. Deze accommodatie is onder reizigers zeer geliefd. Deze accommodatie is onder reizigers zeer geliefd. Hoeveel hotels met gokvoorzieningen zijn er te vinden in Ensenada? Best Casino Hotels in Ensenada on Tripadvisor: Find 176 traveler reviews, 364 candid photos, and prices for casino hotels in Ensenada, Mexico. Call for unpublished prices: 855-516-1090 Nearest airport and around San Nicolas Hotel Casino - Ensenada, Hotel. Ahora 70 € (antes 8̶9̶ ̶€̶) en Tripadvisor: Reserva San Nicolas Hotel and Casino, Ensenada. Ve 176 opiniones y 364 fotos de viajeros sobre el San Nicolas Hotel and Casino, clasificado en el puesto nº.23 de 46 hoteles en Ensenada. Precios calculados a 4/1/2021 con fecha de entrada del 17/1/2021.
The Hotel Riviera del Pacífico was a hotel located in Ensenada, Baja California, Mexico. It was one of the most prestigious and luxurious hotels in Mexico.
History[edit]
The hotel opened with great fanfare in 1930 but was not a real success until the early 1950s. It finally closed in 1964.
Origins[edit]
Prohibition sent North Americans south of their border in search of entertainment and alcohol, developing first Tijuana, then Rosarito, and finally Ensenada as tourist destinations.
The Ensenada Beach Club, S.A. was formed with the goal to build a resort in Ensenada. After the Club dissolved in 1926, a number of its members joined a new company, Club Internationale, S.A., to continue the project, initially called the Hotel Playa de Ensenada (Ensenada Beach Hotel). Architect Gordon F. Mayer was hired to design the hotel; Alfredo Ramos Martínez was hired to do its murals. The Playa Ensenada Hotel and Casino opened on October 31, 1930 with spectacular festivities, including the Xavier Cugat band, under the de facto management of boxer Jack Dempsey. [1][2]
Decline[edit]
The hotel was never a financial success, however, partly because the road from the United States was poor, and the end of Prohibition proved fatal. The hotel only ever operated intermittently, and was put to military use during the Second World War.
Revival and final closure[edit]
After the end of the War, one of the original shareholders, Jerome Utley of Detroit, by then an old man and the only remaining shareholder, gave the hotel to a young lady with whom he was in love, Marjorie King Plant. Plant ran the hotel successfully with her Mexican lawyer and husband, Alfonso Rocha, changing its name to Hotel Riviera del Pacífico. Utley had been led to believe that Plant's marriage to Rocha was a 'white marriage,' that is a marriage of convenience serving only to give Plant the Mexican citizenship she needed to run the hotel, and when he discovered that this was not the case, he pursued Plant and then Rocha with court cases, leading first to Plant's leaving the hotel for the United States and then to Rocha's absconding from the hotel in 1956 to avoid a judgment against him. At this point the hotel was taken over by the Mexican government, which closed and partly demolished it in 1964.[3]
The Margarita[edit]
The Margarita is claimed to have been invented in several different places and at several different times. One claim is that it was invented at the Hotel Riviera del Pacífico for Marjorie King Plant at the time when she was the joint owner.[4] Other versions refer to Marjorie King, an actress, and some move the location from Ensenada to Tijuana. Margarita is a Spanish version of the name Marjorie.
According to an article in the Los Angeles Times, the Margarita was invented in the 1940s by Carlos Daniel 'Danny' Herrera.[5][6]
Current status[edit]
Partly rebuilt in 1978, the hotel was reopened as the Centro Social, Cívico y Cultural de Ensenada.[3] This includes an open-air theater, a historical museum, and a number of rooms used for a variety of functions.
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ^Jack Dempsey's Hotel in Baja California: The Playa EnsenadaThe Journal of San Diego History (May 2018); retrieved June 3, 2020
- ^'Historia y Mistérios del ex Hotel Riviera del Pacífico' Sistema Abierto de Educación Tecnológica Industrial (September 6, 2011); retrieved June 9, 2020 In Spanish
- ^ abMaria Eugenia Bonifaz de Novelo, 'The Hotel Riviera del Pacífico,' San Diego Historical Society Quarterly Spring 1983
- ^Plaque in gardens of the hotel
- ^LOVE, SYD (2 May 1991). 'Margarita Memories From Baja : Recollections: During its glory years in the 1940s, Rancho La Gloria owner Danny Herrera came up with a blend that is still popular' – via LA Times.
- ^CHAVEZ, PAUL (14 May 1992). 'Danny Herrera, Inventor of Margarita, Dies at Age 90' – via LA Times.
Coordinates: 31°51′31″N116°37′09″W / 31.8585°N 116.6193°W
By Greg Niemann
When I was a kid, I was in awe over the large white castle on the beach, a hybrid of Spanish and Moorish style with tile roof and wondrous gardens. It was a strong focal point in Ensenada, dwarfing all other buildings in the post-World War II Baja village by the sea. Like most imposing structures, it was filled with history and intrigue.
Our family used to camp down the beach a ways and I tried to imagine what the fancy hotel might look like inside. It had to be for rich people, as I remember hearing that Hollywood stars used to frequent the place. I’d look for movie stars when we’d drive by, but I didn’t see any. Known today simply as the Riviera, the Hotel Playa Ensenada (as it was known when it opened on October 31, 1930) was an elegant hotel with a gambling casino said to rival that of Monte Carlo’s. To help attract the Hollywood and international set to Ensenada, world famous heavyweight boxer Jack Dempsey, one of the most recognizable names on the planet at the time, became part of the developing corporation. A huge villa was built for Dempsey, just to the south of the main building. It is rumored that gangster Al Capone was one of the corporation’s silent partners.
Work had begun on the Riviera in 1928, two years before the opening, by James L. Miller, contractor. The elaborate building’s architect was Gordon E. Mayer. And the inspiration was purely Hearst Castle, a similar-looking structure built earlier about 400 or so miles up the coast.
Big Names In Ensenada
During the early-1930s, the hotel flourished, and not only did the Hollywood crowd come but royalty as well. The opening act in the hotel ballroom was Bing Crosby who was accompanied by the Xavier Cugat Orchestra.
A local Latin singer named Margarita Cansino, who would later find fame in Hollywood as Rita Hayworth, sang and danced at the Hotel Playa Ensenada. She and her father also entertained the tourists at the Agua Caliente Casino in Tijuana.
When prohibition was finally repealed in the United States in 1933, attendance started waning as fun-seekers no longer had to leave the country. But the final death knell came five years after that when Mexico outlawed casino gambling in 1938. The place closed down.
The beautiful building sat vacant until 1941 when it was used by the military. In 1942 a newly-renamed Riviera del Pacifico reopened under the management of Jerome Hutley and Marjorie (Margarita) Plant.
While the invention of the Margarita cocktail is claimed to have been invented in several places and at different times, one claim is that it was invented at the Hotel Riviera del Pacífico and named for owner Margarita Plant. ¿Quien sabe?
What had been one of the most prestigious and luxurious hotels in Baja California finally fell victim to the times, a white elephant that had lost its major attractions and never really reached its potential. The hotel closed its doors in 1948.
While there were several openings and closings under the name Riviera del Pacifico, the huge building eventually fell into disrepair. By the 1960s even squatters had occupied the formerly opulent Dempsey Villa, by then windowless, doorless and stripped of furnishings.
During the 1960s it floundered, and by the ‘70s a group that wanted to destroy the building had organized and if nothing else, caught people’s attention. By then another street had been added in front, essentially moving the Riviera off the waterfront. The Mexican federal government stepped in and began restoration in 1978. A couple of years later the state of Baja California took over and completed the restoration.
The Riviera Cultural Center of Ensenada
For the past 34 years the Riviera has become the Centro Social, Civico y Cultural Riviera de Ensenada, in short the Riviera Cultural Center of Ensenada. The Cultural Center is part of the Instituto de Cultura de Baja California (ICBC), and Ensenada’s Centro Estatal de Las Artes (CEARTE). And it is used regularly by the people of Ensenada, dispensing knowledge and art and pride to a degree much more beneficial to a society than one-armed bandits fleecing tourists from another country.
Once while attending a Seafood Competition among Ensenada restaurants, I wandered the ornate hallways, replete with inlaid tile, gorgeous chandeliers, painted ceilings and beautiful murals. The three courtyards with potted geraniums and bright billowing bougainvilleas are refreshing and restful. The compact timeless Bar Andaluz off one courtyard is a hideaway respite.
Nowadays the cruise ships that make Ensenada a port of call offer excursions to the Riviera, and tourists wander the courtyards looking for bargains among the displays of local artists and vendors.
One wing of the Riviera has a library with text books, history books and novels. People studying or poring over old books are seemingly always in evidence, and late one evening I noted a chess club had commandeered the library for some head-to-head matches.
Before it moved to a different location in the former carcel (jail) downtown, a museum (el Museo de Historia de Ensenada), which features the history of Baja California and some of the finest photographs of the Baja missions I’ve ever seen was upstairs.
Caliente Casino Ensenada
A Convention Center by the Sea
The greater part of the building is reserved for weddings, parties, classes, and exhibits. The Riviera has been home to both national and international conventions, bringing added importance to the former fishing village. There’s always some type of event happening at the Riviera: concerts, festivals, benefits, dancing and music shows. Early in 2014 the center’s Galeria de la Ciudad featured 30 works of the state’s most talented 5-12 year olds. At the same time the Artani School of Drawing and Painting offered an exhibit of fine art in the International Art Gallery at the north end of the building.
San Nicolas Hotel Casino Ensenada Mexico
Much of the center is used for various classes. There are classes for kids, and classes for adults on how to raise kids.
Budding ballet stars and artists and folkloric dancers come and go all afternoon. Cars pull up to the side entrance to drop off their children in tutus and regional dance costumes.
During this past summer there were photographic exhibits and a movie festival. In September I noticed Tango classes were offered, creating a South American tempo in Baja’s port city. Later that month, on September 28, 2014 the 14th annual International Jazz Festival was held in the Riviera plaza.
Hotel Casino Ensenada
Suffice it to say, there’s an ongoing cultural tapestry being painted these days at the Riviera. It's importance as an architectural icon and cultural renaissance for a growing city has also been noticed by others. In January 2014 the Riviera Cultural Center of Ensenada was named a World Heritage Site of the State of Baja California.
San Nicolas Hotel Casino Ensenada
It turned out my dreams about the building for rich people were accurate. But the richness is far more substantial than the surface glitter for which it was originally intended. It took a while, but the Riviera has realized its dreams of wealth with its vast richness of culture and art and history.