If you’re looking for a place to stay in Austin, this is it. I first heard about the Hotel San Jose on the television show “Great Hotels,” and it looked, well, great! In fact, there’s more to this place than Samantha Brown told us.
It’s a perfect refuge from the hot, hot, hot Austin sun. The rooms — depending on what kind you choose — are small and minimal, with cement floors that keep everything ever so slightly chilled and are so nice to come back to after a hot day. What used to be an old motor court is now a trellised and pergola-ed graveled walkway, surrounding a patio that hops at night with people who come to socialize and have a glass of wine.
Thursday nights the hotel features a band in the parking lot, who then pick a movie to show after their gig, all behind the coolest coffee joint in Austin, Jo’s.
Last night when I got back to the room, I discovered that I had missed another event in the parking lot — the “U.S. Tour of Duty Public Forum”, a kind of symposium about foreign policy with what I assume was an anti-war bent judging from the guest list.
It’s not often that a hotel has such personality and it makes this place so completely different from faceless corporate hotels. It’s the second time I’ve stayed here, and it won’t be the last.
Oh, and free wi-fi everywhere!
Just for Kat: here’s what’s hanging in my room!
