What is the worst bathroom you have ever been to in a restaurant? My worst experiences come from any of the restrooms in Asia. To boot, you had to pay something like 50 cents for admission and an extra 50 cents for ONE lousy toilet paper.

Worst, Tanga strip club in Tampa circa 1990, mail it in cuz the room was so foul. How about best though? Oceanaire Restaurant Seattle. Only restroom I ever wanted to hang in. I'm serious it was that cool. Toiletries (all you could imagine), sinks and faucets were perfect I can't remember the rest cuz I didn't hang, but I would rather think of that restroom over the Tanga. The Tanga did have an upside though...

Do you really want the specifics on why it was so foul?? Think broken.. and 100 beer swilled guys on a Friday nite.

Restroom in a cafe in Paris...it was unisex...but mainly just a drain in the floor with two foot petals...for balance, I guess. I walked in, saw it, turned around and walked out. The ramifications of tipping over were just too steep.

You know, the men's in the Oceannaire in Seattle IS pretty nice.

Worst would have to be the rusted, foul-smelling pee troughs one sometimes encounters in English country pubs. Eurgh.

I can't remember the name of the restaurant, but it was in Milan. It was a really cute upscale coffee shop, yet when I went to the bathroom it was literally a hole in the ground.... I was HORRIFIED... I walked in the bathroom and then out and then in and out ... I couldn't believe my eyes...

I can't beat your stories of bad bathrooms per se, but, I can beat you on bad bathroom etiquette. I was in a bar/restaurant/nightclub/poolhall in a rural area of the south when nature called. The women were lined up around the wall, waiting for the single bathroom. As I got closer, the woman in front of me said, "You want to go in with me? It's a one-holer, but, we use the sink for a trough." Needless to say, I didn't wash my hands.

You do get around! Given the height of the average restroom sink, I hope one of you had very long legs!
Closest I�ve come to that experience was at a Nathan�s in Manhattan with an out-of-order mens� room. The (sadistic) manager tried to convince me and another patron that we were �out-of-luck�; that guy�s girlfriend took charge by ascertaining that the womens� room was empty then standing guard outside so we could go.
My favorite line on this subject comes from �Colloquial Spanish� by A. Bryson Gerrard under the listing for �ba�o�:
�If you really get far out, e.g. in some of the wilder parts of Colombia, then ladies are simply not catered for and the �Gents� needs no title since it is in the corner for all to see. In such a desperate contingency ladies should try to have a word with the lady of the house; she well may be serving behind the bar, though a female friend who tried this was told: No hay ba�o, hay campo.�

oh man what a subject. no names come to mind, but when i see a dirty bathroom, i always find a way to stick my head into the kitchen. guess what, they almost always go hand in hand imho.

Yup. One of the worst bathrooms I've seen was at Bugaloo in San Francisco. Great food, lively place, but the positively grimy unisex bathroom is in the kitchen and there is NO SINK! I can deal with that, but where does the kitchen and wait staff lave sus manos? Guess it's like the cook who exited while I was outside waiting, just wipe your hands on your apron. Arggghhh.

The Asian and European, hole in the floor, or more upscale porcelain hole in the floor aren't nasty, just difficult for Westerners to use. They are very common in Milan and Paris in traditional cafes as noted. There are no toilet seats in Milan either. I don't know who has them all, but there is not a single one in the city. Maybe just as well. McDonald's near the Duomo in Milan has a pretty nasty facility, you're better off with the underground public restrooms across the plaza (except there are no toilet seats.)

Personally, when I need a bathroom I have no pride, I'm just thankful anything is available.

Worst? Before or after I used it






my personal worst was a beachfront cafe in Albania 5 years ago. The beach was called "Miami Beach" just a few miles south of Durres on the Adriatic. The "hole in the ground" had two spots for your feet outlined. Unfortunately others had missed the hole ahead of me.

geesh. sorry.
Rita

Those used to be very common in Italy, and you still find them... a porcelain surround in the floor with two footprints cast in it. We just discussed this in Miles Buzz under a thread about wood grain patterned floors in new Song planes.

The worst I saw was behind a very good trattoria which I used to frequent. You'd go though the kitchen, out the back, and to the bathroom in a cement out-building. It combined that floor hole with a shower. The shower head was directly above the hole, it leaked and dripped, and the water dripping on you was rusty. So you could stand in the footprints and shower, or squat in them and shower

For a couple months in 1977 I rented a room in the pensione above the restaurant, so I'd just go upstairs. Of course, there it was one bathroom per floor, and the 2 gallon shower tank had enough hot water to last about 38 seconds.

Come to think of it.... I was in a McDonald's restroom in Metrotown, Burnaby
thinking hey, if this was a McDonald's, then it'd be pretty ok, right? I was
wrong!

The restroom was so small and crap, disgusting pee everywhere! To top
it off, there was this young school kids trying to make out in that horrible
facility! I couldn't believe my eyes. Walked off immediately. Lost my appetite, couldn't eat at that McDonalds any more.

If you can class it as a restaurant, visiting the McDonalds on the USA/Mexico border in Tijuana a few years ago, I didn't enjoy having a chalk outlined from the previous nights homicide deterring me from the sesspool of filth that was a bathroom.

Most seasoned travellers will tell you that no matter where you are in the world, if you find a McDonalds you've found a working clean toilet to trust - and I believed them up until that moment.

I just saw a really bad one in a seedy bar in Beijing a couple of nights ago. I've seen some horrors in Africa too.

But the best I recall is the mens room at the top floor club at the Peninsula in HKG.

Honorary mention for the lobby mens room at the Barkely in London.

you could see them prepping food through the cracks in washroom floor, prep area was downstairs...mmmmm ..appetizing...place is still there feel fee to check it out