I stayed in the most unique hotel and ate within the most romantic garden. I was treated to a fragrant orange spice tea served by a proper Spanish waiter, who gave me my choice from an old rosewood case, like a humidor for teas. The table was covered with formal yet warm white linens piled on top of each other and underlaid with padding on the table - a comfort for the elbows. A giant dark painting stretched behind the enclosure I sat in, with room for two tables of six people, Victorian floral upholstered seats against the wall.
The painting was decorated by a singing red, blue and gold feathered bird of paradise calling to his mate and a giant fine misted waterfall pouring rather tranquilly over orange brown rocks, worn from the work of it, directly out of a dense jungle. Behind this scene in the painting lay purple and blue misty mountains, surely the Himalayan before modern man, when elephants roamed the earth interbreeding with mastodons. When I say the paint was dark, it was mysterious; really the lighting was soft on it, the fixture being a 1890’s style of frosted yellow glass decorated with dogwood flowers and gaily strung strands of glass yellow beads around the rim hanging down from the ornately turned brass poles at the ceiling.
The sound and sight of the two lively and real waterfalls pouring over larger stones in the central courtyard of the hotel backed up the feeling of the painting, full of vines, ferns, and the moist ancient tropical day. In the pools at the base of the waterfalls, under the live and very green tropical plants swam koi; orange and white, yellow and black, many, maybe twenty the size of salmon. The waterfalls gurgled and sprinkled their tinkling sounds everywhere. The koi splashed occasionally lost within the greenery dipped in the ponds and swirling pools along the footpaths and under bridges inside the courtyard.
There are several levels to the restaurant, a feeling that around each turn you would find yet another unique vista. Now one group of people chatting under a bright lit and ivy covered rotunda, sitting on heavy black iron chairs, with a feather design in the back, yellow table clothes and a pendulum light fixture of thick carved glass and brightly polished holdings, now another cluster of folks, some techies, beneath a painting of the Indian subcontinent.
The dinner was a delight! Cagin’ blackened shrimp piled on a fine thick steak with buttered coated vegetables - tiny red potatoes, sliced red peppers, yellow squash, green broccoli - as if flowers decorating the rim of the plate, all perfection. A gently flickering candle also lit the table, with two fragrant pink carnations in a clear cut round glass vase. A fresh slice of lemon floated in the cold water glass, it glowed rather from being placed in front of the cut diamond shaped glass candleholder.
On the ledge of the enclosure is a huge bouquet of pink and white flowers with willow branches in a very large green ceramic pot about 2 and ½ feet tall and wide. Tulip lamps are placed around the restaurant and courtyard, in all the little crannies. The walls are a burnt orange color nearly the same as the stout polished marble columns of the same color. All the wide wooden trims are painted a cream color, the gazebo wood is painted a pale green with the same cream trim.
The dinner was an excuse for desert -- a burnt cream (cream bulee) – no doubt it is illegal in some countries it is so decadent and so good. I wonder if they use a flame thrower or butane torch to get that correct color and burned texture. And were does the cook keep his matches? Cold on the bottom, warm on top, served over a half-folded white doily with a dollop of fresh whipped cream and sliced strawberry with a fresh upright mint leaf.
Nearby in the bar a guitarist began playing a Californian melody. The 12 story hotel is balconied outside, surrounded with palm trees, and inside, with mother of pearl encased mirrors at the ends of the brick paved passageways, paintings of tigers, and of decorated elephants, with statutes of be-turbaned Orientals in splendid gold robes supporting lamps.
A large long dark mahogany desk and doors with brightly polished brass handles greet the hotel guest, it is very comfortable if not a little confining. Each store in the courtyard has a shaped green and cream cloth awning, with one in particular mirroring the architecture of the whole hotel in miniature and crowned with a fine gold and turquoise blue dome, intricately decorated with inch wide tile.
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