Historic Palomar Inn Hotel in Temecula aims to again be a destination – Press Enterprise

When it opened in 1927, the Palomar Inn Hotel was considered Temecula’s first modern hotel.

Electricity had arrived in the town five years before and the inn featured indoor plumbing — quite the luxury then. Temecula was just a couple hundred folks, but the hotel represented a vision of the town becoming a destination and today more than 100,000 call the place home.

Temecula has realized that tourism goal and then some with its booming Old Town and the successful wine country and famous casino both nearby. It makes sense that the ancient hotel should once again be a destination, and a restoration of about $50,000 does the trick.

Gabrijela Stanze, who partnered with owner Carlos Palma on the project, will manage the hotel’s day-to-day affairs. The six rooms all still have their original sinks and coat racks, plus new painting, fixtures, mattresses, duvets and ceiling fans, and modern touches such as phone chargers and black-out curtains.

In one of the many acknowledgements of the past, each of the six rooms now features details about Temecula history.

There is the nod to Prohibition, the national law that outlawed alcohol when the inn first opened; another recognition of the inn’s haunted qualities (I’m not sharing); the times that Erle Stanley Gardner, creator of the legendary “Perry Mason” TV show, stayed at the inn; the filming of the first episode of the 1960s “Invaders” TV show that was done at the hotel; the spirit of Temecula’s past, and a honeymoon suite acknowledging all the newlyweds who’ve stayed there.

Part of the original flooring remains and it’s wobbly in parts, owing to its history. The original doors show etchings of days gone by, Stanze said.

Another room, the parlor where folks can watch the comings and goings of bustling Old Town Temecula, is the only space with a TV.

“Although we try to encourage you to really step back in time during your visit, we realize that may not be for all,” she said.

All of this is creative and historic for sure, and Stanze, 47, knows what she’s doing, considering her 25 years in the hospitality industry.

She’s known the Palma family 15 years and it was at the height of the pandemic and the hotel’s dwindling guest population that Stanze and Palma realized it would be a good time to upgrade the hotel.

Stanze met her husband, Mike, in front of the inn and they had their first date at a restaurant across the street, so the place means plenty to her.

“I wanted to help preserve the inn’s history and ensure others would get a chance to make the same wonderful memories as I did,” she said.

The hotel has been in the Palma family since 1954, when Bob Majeski, the first president of the Temecula Town Association, bought it. Palma is Majeski’s stepson.

The hotel and Swing Inn Café are the only two historic buildings in town that still contain the same type of business that existed when they were both built in 1927, said Norma Marlowe, public relations director for Visit Temecula Valley.

The hotel’s notable visitors include former heavyweight boxing champions Gene Tunney and Jack Sharkey, who worked out at a local gym built by Joe Winkels. Rumor has it that Clint Eastwood may have stayed at the hotel while filming an episode of the hit TV show “Rawhide,” Marlowe said.