Madrone Kitchen & Wine Tavern, Shady Cove, Oregon

Madrone Kitchen is located in quaint little Shady Cove, right on the Rogue River.  From our dining table we had a magnificent view of the Rogue right outside the wall of picture windows.  Madrone Kitchen has a minimal dining selection but the meals were good...maybe a little overpriced.  The wine was really good.  The beer must not have been bad either since Van had 3...but who's counting?  The Madrone Kitchen is a very old house converted into a restaurant.  It looks like an addition has been made to the building to house the bar area.  The dining area is in the original section facing the river.  The restroom closest to the dining area was the one I located first.  

Either someone forgot to turn the light on or the bulb needed changed because the hallway leading to the bathroom was dark & a little eerie.  Especially in a 100 year old house..in October.  The bathroom doesn't look like it has had any type of updating since the 1970's.  It is fairly clean but come on, a public restroom can only get so clean looking after 40 years of public use.  It was pretty dingey. 

Here you can see the dimly lit basin area next to the dusty fake fern on brass plant stand...very retro.  Next is the cleaning supplies closet.  Not much to see here.  Now we come to the wall decor.  There is serious evidence that these wall hangings have been here, unmolested, since 1977.   I mean, who needs faux finishes when your decorations predate history anyway?  As you can see one wall hanging looks like it is trying to take flight.  The others were dusty & faded and had some water stains here and there on the matting.  The stall was okay as far as size but there was no place really to put your purse or jacket except the toilet tank(ew) or the floor(NOT gonna happen)

As you can see the handle area on the stall door is just...I mean...well, I have no words.  Except...blechhh.  The floors are grubby in corners and the lighting above the basin mirror is cobwebby.  This restroom is crying out for help!  To be fair, however, I also visited the restroom in the newer section of the building.  It is cleaner and more aesthetically pleasing.  I'm not sure about the comfort level because I forgot to really check that part out.

This is the first place I've visited that I will be giving a review on more than one bathroom.  The first older restroom I give 1/8 for cleanliness, 1/8 for style and 1/8 for comfort.  That is 3/4 out of 3 full rolls.  For the newer bathroom I give 3/4 for cleanliness, 1/2 for style and 1 full roll for comfort(by default).  That is 2 1/4 rolls.  I would highly recommend  Madrone Kitchen for outdoor dining during the warm weather months.  They have seating on decks right on the river.  Maybe by next summer the bathrooms will be better quality to match the restaurants other fine qualities!  

El Arriero, Medford Oregon

The best thing about El Arriero (aka The Areola) was that we all got to celebrate Dannielle's birthday!  We had a minor glitch in the beginning in that our reservation had somehow disappear from the planet but the hostess quickly pulled some tables together & had our party of 13 seated in no time.  The service for the rest of the evening was great and the food and drinks were average for a family style Mexican restaurant in the Rogue Valley area.  For some reason Southern Oregon is NOT known for its delicious, authentic Mexican restaurants.  We have many lovely features that we are very proud of here in Southern Oregon but we definitely got left out of the Mexican cuisine department.  Es no bueno.  However, El Arriero has a very relaxed, welcoming atmosphere & we managed to have a great time.  Of course, our group kind of brings the party wherever we go.  We should be paid, really.  We are to restaurants what canned laughter is to studio audiences.  Anyway, about the bathroom....as you can see, a lot of thought was given to the initial painting & decorating of  

this restroom.  It is colorfully tiled and painted.  It is rather unexceptional other than that.  Not particularly clean but acceptable.  The papertowel dispenser was empty as you can see in this next photo.  There were toilet seat covers laying on the tank in the small stall.  There are 2 stalls- one HUGE ass stall that you really could fit a cot, fridge & cook stove in and basically live in and  another tiny narrow stall that the door hits the toilet so you have to squeeze in one side to get the door opened or closed.  That must be for the human contortionist customers.   The best thing about this bathroom was that I ran into an old friend.  Recon Roy was hanging out on the counter between the 2 lovely, hand painted basins!  What a coinky-dink! 

So, other than running into a dirty little soldier in this banio, there wasn't anything special to report.  I give it 1/2 a roll for cleanliness, 1/4 roll for comfort & 1/2 roll for style.  1 and 1/4 rolls out of 3.  Arriba Areola!