When you have months of cold weather, you start to think that the sun is the single best natural creation on earth and It doesn’t matter if you’ve lived in the tropics all your life. That’s how I exactly feel these days. I looked forward to spring everyday since January and when it finally came, I basked under the sun for one full hour and then some — something I won’t do and never thought of doing a year ago. If you balance this beautiful weather with a long walk around the off-the-beaten paths of San Francisco, your day will be fab. Ours was.

The rendezvous was at Starbucks along with 25 other “leisure walkers.” Starbucks is a smart location to congregate because it is central enough for people to find and it’s also very accessible to BART. If you also love coffee and haven’t had breakfast yet, you won’t really mind waiting here.

The Garden Court, Palace Hotel, San Francisco

The Historic Palace Hotel

We started our 5-hour walk with a visit at Palace Hotel that sits high and mighty on the axis of San Francisco. The hotel’s facade doesn’t exactly give away what it had gone through since its rebuilt in 1909, shortly after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. The Garden Court, which used to be a carriage entrance back in the early 1900s, is now converted into a dining room and serves as the focal point of the hotel. The Victorian-inspired embellishments remind me of the opulent lifestyle and the glorious days of the Gold Rush, which made the hotel popular among elite travelers as well. Without a doubt, this hotel was one of the most beautiful hotels in the early development years of San Francisco, as Andrew Carnegie aptly eulogized in his ‘Round the World diary:

There is no other hotel building in the world equal to this. The court of the Grand at Paris is poor compared to that of the Palace. Its general effect at night, when brilliantly lighted, is superb; its furniture, rooms and appointments are all fine, but then it tells you all over it was built to “whip all creation,” and the millions of its lucky owner enabled him to triumph.

New Montgomery entrace to Palace Hotel

Palace Hotel has shelves of memorabilia on opposite sides of the Garden Court, near the entrance. The two shelves showcase copies of the hotel’s first menu book, photos of the hotel before the San Francisco earthquake, photos of the first chef, and the utensils used by Pres. Warren Harding during his last supper. (The not-so-popular president was allegedly poisoned and later died at the penthouse of this hotel.)

The first Palace Hotel menu book

Palace Hotel, San Francisco - Early 1900s wine list

The silverware used by Pres. Harding the night before he died

This hotel is worthy of a visit if you want to see ‘remnants’ of San Francisco history. Other notable historic events at this hotel include:

1891: The last King of Hawaii died at the old Palace hotel

1919: Woodrow Wilson gave speeches in the Garden Court in support of the Treaty of Versailles and the League of Nations

1923: Warren Harding died on the eight floor suite overlooking Market Street

1945: Palace Hotel hosted a banquet to mark the opening session of the United Nations.

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