SULTAN'S TABLE, TRAVEL MATES.

After our boat ride on the Bosporus River, we retreated to our hotel for a half hour to get ready for our first dinner together. Usla chose an Historic Restaurant that could feed 200 people during the reign of the sultans. He emphasized it wasn’t for the food, but for the historic atmosphere. The picture above shows the courtyard.
You are looking at a huge scales in this huge restaurant.

And the well from which they drew their water.

A painting of a dinner in this restaurant with the Sultan and his guests.  People sat on the floor around round tables and ate from a common bowl.

I was impressed with the chairs because the multiple holes in the back are to slip your fingers into the holes and pull the chair away from the table with ease. I loved them.

On past trips I liked to take a picture of all of my travel mates and send them a copy. But, alas, I had reading glasses on a beaded string around my neck that whipped away never to be seen again while I was loading or unloading from the bus. My camera setting was not on automatic focus and unfortunately, most of the pictures are out of focus. Just like my eyes when I checked them. This is Joyce Jacobs, a fiesty 80 or 82 year old who let’s no moss grow between her feet. A world traveler, Owen was fascinated by her passport stamps.  (shhh. You can’t say the word short around her. )

Judith Feldman, a Public Health Administrator, and MD. She carries her medical bag everywhere and came to the rescue of anyone in need of anything. She is very knowledgeable about medical politics.

Is there a doctor on board?  This actually happens, and Michael Cutaia and his wife Judith have answered the call on an airplane once.  Pardon the blur, Mike. This picture lies because you cannot see the twinkle of impish humor in his eyes. A very enjoyable personality.

Blurry, (I ask forgiveness,)  Joel Montion, a barber with the most gorgeous hair, a flirty French accent who claims he no longer speaks French because he has been in the U.S. too long. An inquisitive mind and the loving husband of Maria who he refers to as “My Cherie’”.

Maria Shea is from Germany and swims like an olympian despite having had recent back surgery. Friendly and always sweet and smiling. “Joel is the best,” she says.

Barbara Shubert, a teacher who entertained us by singing fun kids songs. And a hiking dynamo, also having had recent surgery. She travels with her long time friend Joyce Jacobs and the two are great ambassadors for OAT.

Norman Segel, a pleasant, gentle giant with an inquiring mind for history and archaeology and agriculture...at home with any subject. He is paired with beautiful Joan Zucker whose picture is absent because she’d kill me if I published it. She was so blurred…well, my humblest apologies, Joan. She is a cellist for a symphony orchestra in Albuquerque, where they live. I’ll publish a photo of her down the line.

Joyce Brody is an effervescent, unstoppable, helpful, do anything and everything personality who never met a person she didn’t like. She set the example of ultra friendliness and inspired all of us.

Leonard Brody, kept in touch with sports while on the trip. He and his daughter are avid baseball fans and followed the game while in Turkey. We worried he’d go into a depression if his team lost. It is that serious, folks. He had us to distract him. He is quiet and sharing and... (men don’t like to be called sweet.)

Georgina Smyer is a relocated Brit with a medium strong accent who recently retired from the Teamsters Union. An unlikely looking truck driver but she loved her job delivering asphalt to the spreading crews building highways. She was the leader of the Happy Hour on our trip, very friendly and outgoing.

Usla, our unflappable leader, solver of all problems, who is very forthright about his political views, willing to discuss any controversial subject with us, educated beyond belief, speaker of perfect Kurdish, Turkish,  English and who knows what else. He made our trip flow smoothly,seemingly without effort,  and like the Mafia, he has connections in every part of the country. A cousin, an uncle, a friend…endless. Also, newly married and expecting his first child. (Just kidding about the Mafia comparison, Usla.) What did he learn from us?  Happy Hour!  Yay!

Owen Puleston, who I have it on account from our mates, was well liked. He was appreciated for his ability to relate with adults and be conversational and able to comfortably mix with the group.

And, myself, I guess I’d have to qualify one such as me as the camera addict. I tried to sing a child’s song, like Barbara, and muffed it. When asked to talk about myself for the homestay hostess, my tongue got twisted and I couldn’t remember my kids ages…Hopefully I’m a better writer than a speaker. And now, my photo skills are in question, too. (I’m laughing.) This was such a wonderfully, fun group of people to share a trip. We laughingly pointed out we had a frog, a limey, a kraut, some jews, a moslem, an atheist, and a boy who aspired to be a Pope. And, we all got along.

From the pictures, you’d think we had nothing to eat but bread and water and flowers. The food was good and the drink was selap a milk and honey drink and a cinnamon and yoghurt drink, both good. I took this picture out the restaurant window of the Blue Mosque in the distance. I’m hoping I remembered the name of the restaurant correctly as Suliname.

We walked back to our hotel with the spires of the minarets from a nearby Mosque lighting up the night.

HOTEL HELL

The Murphys Hotel was registered as a California Historical Landmark and later it qualified for recognition as a Natiional Historic Place.  When we moved here in 1978, it was the only game in town. Some say, in the county, which then boasted a total population of 29,000 people.  There wasn’t a single stop light in the whole county and not many stop signs, either. The sleepy, quaint town enjoyed a steady trickle of tourists on their way up to Calaveras  Big Trees State Park, or up to Mount Reba Ski area on Highway four in the winter.  Highway 4, Ebbetts Pass,  is one of the narrowest passes over the mountains to Reno, Lake Tahoe and is closed completely during the winter.  Old time skiers say Mt. Reba  was one of the best kept secrets in the skiing community.  The trouble is no one with a business in town could make a living, and the hotel has struggled through multiple owners over the years.

I’d heard rumors that Gordon Ramsey, who hosts Nightmare Kitchens, and Hotel Hell was coming to the Murphys Hotel. I couldn’t pay much attention, but one cruise through town and I saw the yellow tape, the hotel was closed for a week and no one was allowed in. But, on their last day, I just happened to be returning from Angels Camp and they were packing up their gear.

I walked in and no one stopped me. I was allowed to click away. This guy said, I’m a  local, I’m a local. He was an electrician fixing something.

The lobby has been modernized over the years.  I remember an old rocking chair next to the stove where a Miwuk Indian used to hang out and tell everyone stories of the old days. Once the wine interests  took over the town,  I quit frequenting the hotel or just about any business downtown and hadn’t paid much attention to what goes on there.
I felt like an intruder in the empty bar, with its Indian Rug and deer horns that have been there forever, it seems. One of my best friends met her husband to be at this bar.  So what, I asked myself is Hotel Hell?

The technicians moving out of this tent behind the hotel where they stayed were hustling and I didn’t get one picture of them as they packed themselves out of there. It seems Gordon Ramsey,  helps struggling hotels with the issues that drive business away. He goes over their menu, tastes everything. He checks every aspect for cleanliness and appeal, the effectiveness of employees and so on. Then he presents his findings on TV. It can be brutal, but the price tag for an event like this is about $7,000,000 according to one technician’s estimate. (No cost to the hotel, just the program’s expenses to film here.)

The hotel has patio dining in what was once part of their parking lot. I thought that was a great improvement.

At the back and a parking lot’s distance from the main, historic building, is a 1950′s style set of rooms I’ve never been in. Most people stay in this part of the hotel. The historic hotel rooms are few. They are  quite quaint, and the rooms share a bathroom down the hallway. There are no closets. I couldn’t do the steep stairs to take pictures, but I’ve been upstairs  in a lovely party/ meeting room many times in the past.

I suppose the idea of sleeping in a hotel once frequented by famous people wears thin and the historic aspect carries a limited amount of cache. So, my guess is Ramsey has plenty to attack in the 50′s part of the hotel.

It was interesting to see how they lit the place for filming. They brought  their own lighting temporarily attached to the ceiling out of sight of their  camera. The chandelier lighting isn’t bright enough for television production. This tech was removing the lights from one of the dining rooms when I walked in.

One former bartender worried that the “Ramsey Machine” will have the owners modernize the hotel to the point where it will lose its sense of community. All the old wonderful stories about the hotel even the new owners don’t know anything about. We talked a bit about how do you address that?
But, we’ll see sometime in September when the program is expected to air. Tune in if you can. I am not a TV watcher so I don’t know what channel Hotel Hell appears on. And, in the meantime, I’ll try to remember some of those old stories and write them down.