Abandoned places, lesser-known attractions, and assorted oddities
The rear section of the Hotel Gaia had a totally different layout and architectural style to the front section. The cottages were all in a single block, with a driveway running all the way around. The cottages were larger than those in the front section, and most of them were two storey.
The rear section was to the north of a small hill, so when I explored the place in December it was in shadow for most of the day. The ground was damp and there were a few large puddles on the driveway.
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The rear section of the hotel had its own office building, which was larger than the front office. It was in worse condition than any of the other buildings. The roof must have leaked, because there was some serious water damage. Someone had ripped up parts of the floor for some reason.
There was a pneumatic tube system, which was apparently connected to the cottages in both the front and rear sections. These are not uncommon in love hotels, since they provide a convenient way to pay the bill without any face to face interaction. I didn't see anything resembling accommodation, so I don't think any of the staff slept on the premises. There was a fair sized kitchen, which was presumably used to prepare small meals for the guests. A flight of stairs led up to an attic storeroom.
A staircase in the office building descended to an underground tunnel, which provided staff access to all the cottages in the rear section of the hotel. The tunnel was almost pitch dark, so I had to use extremely long exposures for the photographs below. I mounted one of my cameras on a tripod, started the exposure, and went off to photograph elsewhere while I waited for it to finish. The tunnel was still in perfect condition, and bone dry, so it was evidently well made.
The cottages in the front section of the Hotel Gaia had been interesting, but those in the rear section were even more so. Each cottage had a different layout and décor, and some of them had elaborate themed rooms. One featured a bed made from an old Mercedes - a real car, not a replica. Another had a bed inside an old boat, mounted in a room decorated to look like a marina. A third room catered to guests who wanted to make love aboard a giant toy locomotive. This was mounted on a short section of track, and appeared to have a motor, so perhaps it could be made to roll back and forth. For some reason these cottages also had more conventional bedrooms, although the themed beds looked like they would have been perfectly comfortable to sleep in.
The cottages also had impressive bathrooms, a few of which had water slides. One cottage had a bath on the ground floor, and a spiral staircase which led to an underground chamber with a second bath.
Most of the cottages were still in good condition, but a few of them had leaking roofs and were starting to suffer severe water damage. Scrap metal hunters had removed the taps from the bathrooms, and there were was some juvenile, artless graffiti here and there. Fortunately I didn't see much other vandalism.
The cottages were arranged in two rows facing in opposite directions. There was quite a lot of space between them, which was gradually being taken over by weeds. The low roofs that you can see next to some of the cottages covered the stairs to the underground tunnel.
The exteriors of the cottages were starting to show signs of damage and decay. With nobody to maintain them, the walls and roofs will inevitably cease to keep out the rain, and the process of decay will begin in earnest. The Hotel Don Quixote shows what the Hotel Gaia will be like in a decade or two, if it's not demolished first.
