As we drove down the long drive way to the Hosteria La Cienega Mauro our guide asked “Is it familiar?”. Carole thought what you mean like that horror movie where everybody goes to the big mansion and DIES???? This was not what Mauro meant, he was referring to the eucalyptus trees and them being familiar to Carole who is from Australia.

This was our start at what Carole and I dubbed the “Stephen King Hotel”. We we dropped off and left to our own devices. After checking in there didn’t seem to be any other people around, we were wondering where the guests were. We ventured out to tour the gardens and look around, the garden was beautiful except for devil child. A little girl who seemed to be alone wandering in the garden. We tried to get her to talk saying “Hola” and pointing at flowers and saying “Pretty”, we waved at her and she would not reply or even really acknowledge us. We dubbed her devil child and decided to leave her in the garden and go for a walk.

Upon leaving the place and walking down the long drive we heard cracking and breaking, a very large chunk of one of the eucalyptus trees had broken off and fell right by us. This did nothing to alleviate our concerns about the place.

There is nothing around the place except houses and farms. Ladies walking cows, locals looking at us like “What are you doing here?”

Then coming back we ran into some demon dogs who didn’t like us so close to their property, which scared the bejeezus out of us. We didn’t get a picture of the demon dogs because they don’t pose for pictures. Also we noticed walking along there is quite a bit of trash in the ditches and we kept seeing single shoes, never a pair. We decided they were from past victims of the Stephen King hotel. Heading back we passed what seemed to be the two leaders of the demon dogs, large scruffy dogs and they watched us walk by and then made sure we were continuing on our way.

By the time we got back it was getting dark and we were REALLY unsure about the place. Wandering inside there was this room:

It was the creepiest room and seriously had cold spots, something about it gave us chills. Carole said we had to leave now. As we left the room Carole squealed and grabbed my arm, I in turn squealed and looked back at the glass door at the end of the hall expecting to see devil child leaning her face against it or demon dogs about to come crashing through. It was neither. Carole explained that the plant had moved without either of us touching it. We were still holding onto each other and Carole took a step back and hit a loose floor board which moved the table the plant was on and in turn moved the plant. Mystery solved but it still didn’t make us feel that much better.

There was actually a possibility that Carole and I would sleep in the same room, that’s how creepy the place was. It had certainly succeeded in bonding Carole and I, now friends for life brought together by fear. The dinner in the evening turned out very nice and we ended up in our own rooms. The next morning Mauro picked us up and laughed when we said the place was creepy. He assured us the place was haunted and he himself had experienced strange happenings while staying there.

Although stressful at the time it has actually turned into one of my favourite stories to tell from the trip, I mean creepy old hotel, cold spots, devil child and demon dogs?? There is totally a great movie in there somewhere.