Catalina Motel Corpus Christi, Texas — Hotel in Corpus Christi

Time for some truths. is the ritz carlton? no. should you expect the ritz carlton for $55/ night on an ocean front property.....definitely not. if you are, you're just daft. this is a perfectly fine motel run by a wonderful family. they are very friendly and pleasant to do business with. i'll address some of the negative reviews i've seen to clarify some things. the room smelled a touch like bleach. do yo uknow what that means? the room had just been cleaned. I watched Lupita, the house keeper, work for a bit, and she really gets after it. the room smelling like it has been cleaned is no fault of theirs. I definitely like the fact that the floors are tile. these are much easier to clean than cheaper carpet. now the bed. is it a plush ultra comfortable mattress i would consider purchasing for myself? no. i slept just fine on it with no issues. the pillows were a little small, but you get 4 per bed, you can sleep just fine. it has everything you need or expect of a motel. i'm not sure how the shower would be considered hard to operate. red=hot, blue=cold. the A/C, and heat, worked fine and were a standard window unit that also, wasn't difficult at all to operate. everything was structurally sound and attached. maybe one reviewer had a room with a loose toilet, but they are attached with large bolts and walk themselves loose from time to time. it's not the end of the world. also i saw not a single roach or roach sign. negative reviews aside, everything was in working order and not dilapidated. I travel a lot for work and their WiFi is more than 4 times as fast as most of the chains i go to. consistently achieving ~ms ping and 18-20Mbps. very solid for the time i was testing (Superbowl, i was definitely not the only on one.) i'm an IT professional and happened to get a glimpse of their WAP (wireless access point) , and it looks like a beast. very nice. basic cable with a wall mounted TV in perfect working order. then there's the location. you are litterally right next to the bay. also you are 5-10 minutes away from anything you need. there is even a sushi restaurant that delivers there. HEB, Walmart, and Spec's are quite literally 5 minutes away. In summation, this a great place to stay. from my experience, i have zero complaints. I will most certainly be staying here...

Arrived at around 11pm, the man running the desk seemed annoyed that we had awoken him, but that's understandable. After getting processed for the room, my friends (who paid for the room) were internationals, but they require a driver's license, which they didn't have. I went to use mine, but seemed very annoyed and explained that the person who paid must have a driver's license. So we couldn't use mine. But in the end we did anyways, after I said that we'll cancel the room and I'll go online on my phone right here and make another reservation. A bit silly in my opinion.

Location is in a decent place, not very far from the coastline. Some attractions are nearby, but in the end, the price we paid for wasn't worth it ($75 after tax). We ended up going to Mustang island for a place that was $10 cheaper and was better quality in every way.

The rooms were a decent size for two beds and had some covered parking if you're lucky to get it. The comforters are you're typical super cheap motel type. There were some holes in ours (cigarette burn holes?) But we just don't touch them and we're fine.

The strangest thing is that in the middle of the night, maybe 4 or 5 am, the power goes out. I don't know ow if it was because of the storm or because that's what happens in the morning. All light switches were out and the ac unit doesn't turn on.

Also the cleaning lady that was going through the rooms doesn't use gloves. She just picks up sheets from the floor with her bare hands and walks around as if this is what she normally does. A tad bothersome.

But it is a 1 star motel. We needed it as a place to sleep. It did its job, but wouldn't choose this one again since there are cheaper motels at better locations...

Pros: cheap, very nice people running the place Cons: nasty floors, dead roaches, homeless people milling about, missing smoke detector, not really a good value considering

The people running the place were very kind, so it pains me to leave such a negative review. We arrived at 9pm; there was no one there to check us in even though the sign says 'no check ins after 10pm' so someone should have still been there. It took 10min to get someone to check us in. They didn't give us the Wi-Fi code until the next evening. The room was actually nasty, we found dead roaches during our stay, and did I mention the missing smoke detector? I'm used to staying in motels, but this was low quality even for a motel, and it had nothing to do with 'outdated decor' or 'old furniture' or anything stupid like that.

If you can't afford anything else, this will do, but I don't really think it's worth it. Do yourself a favor, if you can, spend a little more money and get a...