Portola Gardens

Mary Fossourier

ROOMS: The rooms are quiet and clean Residents do not need to bring their own furniture. Furniture, plus bed and bedding are provided. FOOD: I have visited but have not participated in any meals. So I cant say much about the food. STAFF: They have always been friendly, helpful, and the resident certainly seems to appreciate them. Service seems to be good. ACTIVITIES: Those that I have observed seem to fit the needs of the residents. I am especially glad that the residents get lots of current events on the TV screen. Staying abreast of current events is essential to feel part of the outside world.

Isaac

I toured Portola Gardens. I thought that it was a nice, open atmosphere and everything was very clean, and orderly. They have a very nice property, and a lot of places to walk around. They have gardens and trees, and everything is very well-landscaped. There's tables outside for people to sit down. Just walking into the facility, you could tell that they had a lot of activities going on, and everybody was very engaged. So, the facility was nice. The staff was very informative, very patient, and did a good job of giving us a tour and explaining all of the different options. She was excellent. I saw the menu. I went by the kitchen, it's like they offered a lot of nice options and snacks throughout the day. So, I saw a lot of the snacks in some of the stock rooms. They were just readily available for the patients.

Irina

I toured Portola Gardens. It's like the rooms are upstairs and there's no door to secure the stairs, and you can go up and down by yourself. There is no security. The person can just leave the room and wander off to go outside and no problem. It's a very nice facility, but it doesn't suit your needs and it's not secure for memory care. The staff was very nice. The facility is very pretty and has lots of trees. I think this place is more for people who can walk. I didn't see that place as wheelchair accessible.

Alan

The tour at Portola Gardens was good. The people were nice. The facility is really old. It's probably 1918 designed, so it's like a dormitory or institution. My dad was there for like two weeks for a long time. It's been there a long time, and it has that institutional smell. But the people there looked happy, and they had a bunch of stuff to do. They have services where they can drive the patients to doctor's appointments and stuff which nobody else offered, so that was kind of nice. The facility had a nice view. If you had a room there, it had a view of the bay, but it was really old. It's probably over a hundred years old. I think it was built before the wheelchair, so, it could use an overhaul. It's like an old dormitory, so people are just lined up. There's just a hallway with rooms, like a long hallway. This one felt like an old mental institution from the movies, or my old school dorm. But everybody there was nice, they were accommodating, and they answered my questions. The facility is not bad. You got a big yard in the back where they can hang out, and they got gardening and stuff which is nice. They did have a big activity area; they had quite a few. They had 2 or 3 activity rooms, and they were fairly good size. They're all kind of in the same location. So, if you were on the third floor or second floor, you'd have to walk down or take the elevator down. But they had plenty of open areas and they have the whole outside, which they let patients walk around.

James

Portola Gardens was a terrible place. The lady who assisted me with the tour was very nice, but the place was just really bad. It stunk. The rooms were extremely small. It didn't meet any of my requirements. They did have activities going on, but not many. They had a garden. The place was not clean. The facade of it was beautiful, but the inside was terrible. They were having construction going on, but it looked like all they were doing was slapping paint over stuff. It just wasn't nice.

Reviewer RC#1020f

Portola Gardens was huge. The people there seem to be good and very friendly. They're really on top of things and very detailed. They showed me both assisted living and memory care. They've got an outdoor garden and it's a pretty enclosed area where they allow the residents to go out (of course they have somebody with them). They can also grow things there and it's nice. They had a lot of bathrooms and everything looked pretty clean. The rooms looked pretty good size. They had a group thing where people were singing and they had a van where they could take people out to do things. The pricing was a little higher than I expected, but it's a little bit cheaper than the other facility we saw. The lady that gave me the tour was knowledgeable and friendly. All the people were pretty nice. It's just kind of institutional and I think you can get lost in there.