About Crestline's Crestline Village

Crestline Ca Local business spotlight on Look Tantastic Salon and Tanning in Crestline Village.

Look Tantastic Salon and Tanning opened its doors in November of 2008. It is a bustling salon that is kept super clean and a really a great experience! The shop was opened in two stages as the salon was the first to get up and running and with some delays for the owners to get the space ready for the tanning beds, the tanning was fully operational in February. The salon is located at 23875 Lake Drive in the Crestline Village, next door to the Stockade restaurant.

Let me tell you how nice it is to go into Look Tantastic and lay down in a tanning bed when it is freezing cold outside and snow covers the ground! And not even just to get a little color on your pale skin after nearly 4 months of covering up with long pants, scarves, beanies, gloves and heavy boots(only when there's snow, which we don't get a whole lot of). The feel of warmth, though it may be fake sunshine, is heavenly! I am not one for tanning a lot but it was a warm day in Crestline for me when Look Tantastic opened!

The owners are James and Heather Keenan, who moved over to Crestline from England last year, and are good and fun loving people. They keep their tanning beds running smooth and are kept very sanitary. They are thorougly cleaned after each use. Each of the two tanning rooms are private and well ventilated. The salon does keep the air conditioning on in the summertime too. Each tanning bed also has a fan that blows directly on you to keep you on the cooler side. The rooms also have certain personal care items to help you freshen up after your session and is comfortable with a chair and rug and small table for your personal belongings.

On the salon side, they offer a full menu of treatments for ladies and gents and children alike. Hair care, nail care, spa pedicures and waxing services are available here. The hair care gals have each at separate times cut my hair and I have always loved the way it is done and how it looks and how I feel when I leave!

The salon does have specials for wedding day hair and nail care, as well as prom specials. There are also some great packages available for a day of pampering! The salon serves yummy beverages to it's clentele while they wait as well as snacks and water.

The salon is also kept very clean and sanitary and is full service. Because we are a small town and this salon is located right in the downtown Crestline area, it is a great place to sit and relax while waiting for your service to begin. You can watch people walk and drive by, and the owners are always on hand to chat with you and make you feel at home. The decor is clean and minimal, with pictures taken of the Crestline area by a local photographer on the walls.

So if you are ever up here in Crestline, or if you currently live here on the mountain and have yet to stop by this great place, make sure you do! Click on the link to the Look Tantastic website for more information on the salon services!

And as always, if you have questions about moving up here to the beautiful mountains to the Crestline and Lake Arrowhead areas, please email me at steeleofalifetime@gmail.com and make sure to visit my websites!

www.HomesForSaleInCrestline.com
www.CrestlineForeclosures.com
www.LakeArrowheadVillas.com
www.TheLakeArrowheadWoods.com

Take care!

Amy Steele

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ALL PICTURES SUBJECT TO COPYRIGHT BY AMY STEELE AND MAY NOT BE USED IN ANY MANNER

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This is part two of Crestline Village: Crestline Village and Homes in Crestline Village.

In my last post about Crestline Village I spoke about some of the features of the houses here. There is so much more that part two is here! Because so many of our homes were built a long time ago, you need to make sure that before you do any remodeling you get a qualified contractor to look at the house, even above your initial home inspection. A lot of these cabins probably haven't had the electrical and plumbing updated in a while, so it's important that you find out exactly what's going on before you start messing with it! Many Village homes and other cabins here in the mountains didn't have proper electricity installed, depending of course on the age and generational history of the home and they used to use oil and gas lanterns for light. Always check and see if the plugs and lighting will work for you in the home you are intending to purchase, or the feasibility of adding in wiring for new lighting. Our breakers kept tripping when we had too many modern conveniences on: microwave and the washer and the computer with a light or two. It may be as simple as installing a slightly larger breaker, or even a new breaker. Again, ask an electrician!

Our Crestline Village home was built in 1925, with an addition in 1936. We haven't begun remodeling anything really serious enough to get a permit. We took down some of the original tongue and groove paneling to create some more open spaces between the two living rooms, and tore down a half wall so it seems like our home is bigger than it is! Our fireplace was built on top of a pile of rocks that goes underneath the house into the basement, and the main fireplace is a beautiful natural stone(that still needs to be seriously cleaned). I don't know what the original builders were thinking when they built this place(I'd love to find out, as well as get some old time photos of my house) but they built the fireplace in the center of the house, and the chimney goes through the middle of the master bedroom. Someone over the years covered the brick with wallpaper and then tongue and groove pine paneling so it looks neat, but in the middle of the room? Seriously? So our room is almost cut into two.

These older Crestline Villagehomes usually have narrow internal staircases that were built where they could fit them. I have been in many of these cabins and have to duck going up and down the stairs, and it almost becomes a game of limbo. I believe that people must have been shorter back in the early 20s, because this is a prevalent feature. Many homes in the Village and elsewhere on the mountain also do not have bedroom closets. They used to use armoires, but it is still a bedroom! There are also cabins that have a loft style bedroom also. Lofts=bedroom. Go to any downtown area in the world, and a loft is considered a space that is habitable and sleep-able(!), so don't discount a loft sleeping arrangement unless it truly won't fit your needs. You may be able to wall a loft off or put in a door, depending.

Working on your cabin here in Crestlineis fun and rewarding if you have a passion for shining up old pennies. Our home was all wood and gross old carpet when we bought it, and it was a true old cabin. We have removed the carpet and discovered the original hardwood flooring that is now a feature of our house. All of the walls are wood and the ceiling is wood, and it was kind of blah. Ok, really blah.

For those of you that know me you know that I am a creative, colorful personality(mess) and that had to change for sure! We did, after much debate, decide to paint some of our wood walls to create an updated yet vintage cottage/cabin feel. We've added some funky modern print curtains and rugs and have all antique furniture(found around Crestline Village at the antique shops and even refinished some things found by the side of the road) and it is nearer to being US. That is the most fun about having a home or a cabin, that you can create your own space(pay attention first time home-buyers: $8000 tax break from Uncle Sam goes only until November 30th and you're running out of time).

Ok, again, since this post is already long, I will have to do another part of Crestline Village, A Local's Guide. If you have any questions about purchasing a home here in Crestline, Crestline Village or elsewhere in the Lake Arrowhead area please email me at steeleofalifetime@gmail.com.

You can also visit my websites www.HomesForSaleInCrestline.com, www.CrestlineForeclosures.com and www.thelakearrowheadwoods.com .

Take care!

Amy

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ALL PICTURES COPYRIGHTED BY AMY STEELE AND MAY NOT BE USED IN ANY MANNER WHATSOEVER

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Crestline Local's Insider Guide to: Crestline Village and homes in Crestline Village are a close community of older homes, many that were built in the early 20th century. Many are cabins that were built for people who came up here to the mountains to live while they worked at the saw mills and other forestry activities, eventually used for vacation homes and now mainly full time living. Crestline Villageis made up of a single street through town with shops and restaurants on either side, along with a post office, grocery store, and hardware store that seem to reflect the smallness of ourit as well as the more laid back lifestyle. There isn't a single stoplight to be found, and most days the only light traffic that occurs is when the local school bus drives through town to drop off the kids from school.

The cabins in Crestline Village are usually smaller as far as square footage goes, with many that have been added onto at some point in the past. It's not surprising to walk through a Village house and wonder what the previous owners were thinking when they built it or added onto it! Due to the nature of these cabins being as old as some of them are, many have not been updated at all as far as current building standards and codes, and some do need work. I have seen cabins in the village that were partially built onto a pile of local rocks that were mortared together to make up the foundation. Many do not have a true foundation of a concrete slab, and are built on a pier and post constructions, with partial masonry or the ever favorite pile of rocks.

Since there was no such thing as central airback in the day, most homes up here do not have air conditioning. Nor do you really need it here in Crestline and elsewhere on the mountain if you have nice windows that you can leave open, with some ceiling fans and maybe a fan in the window to create a lovely cross breeze. In the summertime, our temperatures are mostly 20 degrees cooler than elsewhere in the Inland Empire and Orange county. It is a pleasure to come up where it's always cooler!

As far as heating, these cabins have wood burning stoves or regular brick or rock fireplaces, and many have been updated to include gas furnaces. With winter temperatures dipping into the teens on the coldest winters, you need to make sure your Crestline Cabin has a good heat source, and if it's an older cabin, plenty of insulation and other upgrades like dual pane windows and weatherstripping. It's important to make sure your heat stays in your home! Our cabin didn't have a lick of insulation when we first bought it, and our first winter gas bills were in the high $200 range for a 960 square foot home! The very next summer we insulated the basement and have saved literally hundreds of dollars in only one season!

Speaking of basements, many Crestline Village cabins have a basement or a build up. The difference is that a basement is finished off into a usable space, usually accessible from the interior of the home. A build up is just the space beneath the cabin, and is usually a dirt floor used for storage. MAKE SURE THIS SPACE IS ALWAYS INSULATED. You lose a ton of heat into the underside of your cabin if you do not. Obviously a finished basement that can be used as extra living space will add money to your home.

Crestline Village living is very simple, but we have everything here for the full-timer or part-timer. There is a grocery store called Goodwins that has been serving the community for decades. We have a bowling alley that serves great pizza and buffalo chicken wings and is fun to go to on a Friday, or any evening! The alley just opened up a Subway also, which has been very busy! We have a lot of really neat antique stores that I've got a lot of my furniture from, as well as an excellent used book store. There are various business, CPA, attorney, real estate, tanning salon, deli, and several very good restaurants.

I have never had a bad meal here in Crestline Villageat any of the restaurants. They are all really good! We have a Mexican food place called Cocina de Tony's that has a great outdoor lakeview seating area, several American-style diners: Crestline Cafe, Loose Caboose, and Hungry Bear Restaurant, a Chinese food restaurant called Mandarin Gardens, an Italian restaurant called Francescos, The A Burger which makes great burgers and shakes, a Round Table Pizza, and two fast food places Subway and McDonalds. There are two coffee shops, Paradise Coffe and Lake Gregory Coffee Co. The latter during the summertime has their Al Fresco Fridays where they have good happy hour style food and you can grab a cold beer, glass of wine or coffee beverage. It's nice to sit outside and people watch!

This is only part one. Crestline Village is a small town, but our simple way of life up here has more to offer! Make sure you look for part 2!

And as always if you are looking for more information or would like lists of homes that are available for sale here in Crestline and Crestline Village, please email me at steeleofalifetime@gmail.com or call! Please also visit my websites at www.HomesForSaleinCrestline.com and www.CrestlineForeclosures.com.

Take care and God bless!

Amy

ALL IMAGES SUBJECT TO COPYRIGHT BY AMY STEELE AND MAY NOT BE USED UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES

Getting away to a mountain resort shouldn't just be for the elite. Nestled in the San Bernardino mountains are a network of communities that range in price, area and availability. When coming to our beautiful mountain, the first place people think of is Lake Arrowhead. It has a gorgeous lake, shops, dining and homes ranging from the low $300,000 range to the $11,000,000 range.... but there is another community up here that offers lake views that might appeal to a more moderate budget.

Lake Gregory which is part of the San Bernardino Regional Parks is in the heart of Crestline. With vast history of early pioneers and tranquil beauty that your children will remember for a lifetime. With lakeview homes starting at $219,000 and going up to the mid $500,000 range, this makes Lake Gregory a great buy for lake view property.

Lake Gregory offers fishing year round, a nature trail with work out posts, and swim park that is open in the summer time. Crestline - Families... enjoy Summertime swimming on Lake Gregory and our huge, 300 foot Dual-Flume Alpine Water Slides in complete safety, surrounded by County Life guards!! Rent Aqua Cycles and Paddle Boards for water fun, and enjoy groomed white, sandy beaches when you're not in the cool, clean mountain water! A new skate park opened for the kids this past year and has proven to be a winner with the kids. The location to the LA area is perfect, just a 15 minute drive from the bottom of the hill on a four lane road, you are in the heart of Crestline. The 210 Freeway was finished this past year right to the Waterman Road exit. With the opening of the last phase of the 210 Freeway, we are now a direct shot into the LA areas. Easy getaway for the weiry minds of the hustle and bustle of the BIG CITY...

Kim Kelley Realtor at Coldwell Banker Sky Ridge Realty

909-336-7949 Direct Line

909-725-1248 Cell

email at kkelley@cbskyridge.com