bedandbreakfast

Top 10 Luxurious Adventures of 2010 -- And How to Perfect 'Em in 2011

When people ask me for luxury travel advice, usually along the lines of "I want to plan a perfect trip to XYZ," I have two responses: a) there ain't no such thing as perfect in this world, no matter how much money you spend; and, b) you always know exactly how to make a trip as perfect as possible after you get home.

Still, the following trips I made in 2010 pleased me greatly, which is basically what I count as sublime perfection -- and should you plan to follow in my footsteps in 2011, note the tips I've added for making terrific travel even better.

Tags: australia, BedAndBreakfast, bestof2010, chicago, cruise, FrenchPolynesia, melbourne, montreal, Morocco, NovaScotia, ontario, PaulGauguin, PuertoRico, shakespeare, sonoma, tasmania

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A New "Vintage" at Sonoma's Applewood Inn

by Alison Wellner (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels, Wine

Wine country can be something of a scene these days, with enthusiasts trying fit in as many wineries as possible, swirling, spitting, purchasing -- realizing they've bought too many bottles to fit in their suitcase, frantically figuring out how to ship wine home, which sometimes requires an alcohol-soaked brain to figure out complicated interstate wine shipment regulations....

Really, it can cause more of a headache than a hangover.

One remedy for all of this is Applewood Inn in Guerneville, California -- which is in the midst of its first season under new ownership.

When you look at Sonoma County, Guerneville isn't really in the middle of it all. This chic-shabby town lies to the west of the where most of the county's wine action is, heading out towards Sonoma's (largely unappreciated) Pacific coast. Applewood is set among young redwood trees, and its award-winning restaurant and its 19 guest rooms are mostly arranged around a peaceful courtyard, complete with a fountain that trickles merrily.

Room décor is also not striving to be in the middle of anything like a current design trend, although there are flat-screen TVs, fireplaces, and so on. Think cozy country motifs, cabbage rose bed spreads, Tuscan stripe upholstered chairs, gleaming wood throughout. Indeed, new owners Carlos Pippa and Sylvia Ranyak envision something of a Tuscan theme for the property.

You'll get to know Carlos and Sylvia as they're gracious on-site managers as well as owners. Running an inn and a restaurant turns out to be their idea of retirement -- Carlos owned a business in Texas that sold parts related to industrial painting. Upon retiring, he and Sylvia loaded up their RV with motorcycles and went on a multiple-month adventure from Mexico to Rio de Janeiro. It was in the rural portions of this journey that they realized they wanted to be in a more bucolic environment than Plano. The Applewood Inn is their next act. Be sure to ask them about their South American sojourn if you go.

Gallery: Applewood Inn, Guerneville, California

Applewood's Peaceful Setting Among Young Redwood Trees

Tags: applewood inn, BedAndBreakfast, california, guerneville, sonoma, sonoma county, wine country, wine tasting, WineCountry

A Cowboy's Dream, A New Nevada Retreat

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels

A woman's memorial to her late husband is a new bed and breakfast in Alamo, Nevada. A Cowboy's Dream is a both a bed and breakfast as well as a corporate retreat destination. It was created by Phyllis Frias to honor her husband the late Charlie Frias. The resort has the simple motto: enter as strangers, leave as friends.

The hotel is located 90 miles north of Las Vegas in a small town that attracts visitors with an interest in wildlife because it is near the Pahranagat National Wildlife Refuge. It is just the fourth hotel in town. The eight-suite B&B offers custom bedding, natural rain showerheads, custom-made bath products and private balconies. The great room serves as a central gathering area and the resort offers home-cooked meals and chartered excursions. The 18,997 square-foot house has vast views of surrounding mountains. Rooms are $499 a night.

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Tags: a cowboys dream, ACowboysDream, alamo, bed and breakfast, BedAndBreakfast, http:www.fws.govdesertcomplexpahranagat, inn, nevada

Vermont Bed and Breakfast Offers Free Getaways For The Uninsured

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels

We've seen an inn in Vermont offer getaways for the unemployed. Now a different inn is offering a free getaway for the uninsured. Tim and Amy Brady, the owners of Forty Putney Road Bed and Breakfast in Brattleboro, Vermont know firsthand the challenges of being without health insurance. In 2007, when they left their corporate jobs to start the bed and breakfast they struggled to find a healthcare coverage option that would be affordable and not exclude existing conditions. Now they hope to provide a healthy getaway to those who may be facing the same struggle with their own health care coverage by giving away one healthy getaway each month, complete with an apple a day , to an uninsured couple in need of some stress relief. Each month until a National Health Care Reform Bill is passed Forty Putney Road Bed and Breakfast will award one deserving couple with a two-night stay that includes a healthy breakfast. Visit the Forty Putney Road Bed and Breakfast website for more details.

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Tags: bed and breakfast, BedAndBreakfast, forty putney road, FortyPutneyRoad, getaway, uninsured, vermont

"Pink Slip Getaways" at Rabbit Hill Inn Extended Through 2010

by Alison Wellner (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels

I was having lunch with the colleague the other day, discussing the latest round of media layoffs. We both agreed that given a healthy savings account, the most sensible way to deal with a job loss in this economy is to wait it out, and the best way to do that is to travel.

Of course the economy wouldn't be in this mess in the first place if we all had healthy savings accounts, and so if you find yourself without a job and with a sadly diminished travel budget, the lovely Rabbit Hill Inn in Lower Waterford, Vermont has good news: its popular "Pink Slip Getaway" contest, which will go on hiatus for Fall foliage season, will continue through April 2010. Send your job loss story -- one page or less -- to Rabbit Hill by the new deadline of January 15th, 2010, and make it a good one. If your story is among the one a month selected, you'll get a two night stay with breakfast, one dinner and a rabbit's foot for good luck.

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Tags: bedandbreakfast, economic crisis, EconomicCrisis, economy, vermont

"Road Show" Package at Litchfield Hill's Rock Hall

by Alison Wellner (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels

It's promising to be an early foliage this year in New England -- the leaves are already starting to turn -- so it's the perfect time to take advantage of a special at Rock Hall, an Addison Mizner designed bed and breakfast in Colebrook, Connecticut.

The "Road Show" package includes a horse-drawn carriage ride, during which you can toast the landscape with a split of champagne, a 25% discount for dinner at charming restaurant Pastorale in Lakeville, CT, and a second night's stay at the B&B at half-price. (Weekend rates $480-$600/night.) The special runs through November 25th, 2009.

Tags: bedandbreakfast, bedandbreakfasts, hoteldeals, new england, NewEngland

The Nines Hotel and The Question of Design Moxie

by Alison Wellner (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Decor, Luxury Travel & Hotels

The night before I stayed at the Nines, in Portland, Oregon, I spent the night at the White House in Yakima, a bed and breakfast. It's actually a couple of bedrooms that are available to let on the second floor of the White House Café, which serves an amazingly delicious breakfast. But the rooms themselves weren't to my personal taste -- an exuberant bride/doily/doll meets shabby chic theme. I know that many people, particularly those who, say, enjoy weddings (I don't) would be charmed, but that's the chance you take when you stay at a B&B -- you are really immersed in a particular taste.

I've also had the experience of staying in a smaller hotel that was more to my taste, but my travel companion was non-plussed by it -- I'm thinking of Le Quartier Français in Franschoek, South Africa, where the Four Quarters suite is a cream and brown palette punched up with accents of bright hot orange and pink. I loved it, although I could see why it wouldn't be for everyone. Human variability in taste is why most hotels resort to the kind of utter blandness that has you calling the front desk in the morning to find out what city you're in.

So when I walked into the Nines -- a 331 room Starwood-owned hotel occupying the top floors of the former Meier & Frank department store in downtown Portland -- and one that's known for its distinctive interiors, I was really thinking about décor and what a challenge it is for a large hotel, to create rooms with some consistency that have a distinct yet relatively universally appealing personality.

Check out the photo gallery and let me know what you think, but I think the Nines manages to strike the right balance. The décor is described as "nostalgic modern", and the rooms are done out in rich brown, charcoal gray, creamy white and a Tiffany turquoise. There are a few fun frou-frou touches -- a beaded light fixture, for instance -- but nothing that should make a buttoned up business man feel uncomfortable (I assume, not being a business man or a man for that matter.) It also felt very Portland-elegant to me, if I were going to an affair in PDX, I'd hit a vintage shop over a department store. Beyond that, there's also a good sense of the local community, as the hotel commissioned some 400 original art pieces to display throughout the hotel, a library on the hotel's main level is stocked with a selection of books from Powell's, Portland's incredibly amazing book store, and Urban Farmer, the hotel's restaurant, works with local purveyors.

Gallery: The Nines in Portland

Tags: bed and breakfast, BedAndBreakfast, hotels, portland, portland oregon, PortlandOregon, southafrica, starwood

Byzantia: Jewelry by Stella Flame

by Alison Wellner (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Jewelry, Luxury Travel & Hotels

While I was checking out Rock Hall, the new Connecticut B&B I told you about last week, I noticed that the proprietress, Stella Flame, had simply gorgeous jewelery: pieces that were big, bold and yet totally tasteful.

I asked her about it, and it turns out that she's a jewelry designer, represented by Sola Showroom in Manhattan. Her inspiration is Istanbul, a city that she loves, and she aims to bring a modern twist to the feel of ancient Mediterranean designs. (This is a common theme with her bed & breakfast, a Mediterranean style estate in the heart of Connecticut.) Stella designs the pieces, which are crafted in Istanbul, using jewels set into a signature combination of oxidized silver and 24 karat gold. On the day of my visit, Stella was just about to fly out to Istanbul to confer with her master jewelers.

These pieces retail in the neigborhood of $1,500 to about $3,000, depending on the stones that are used, contact Sola showroom for prices.

Gallery: Byzantia Jewelry by Stella Flame

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Tags: bedandbreakfast, istanbul, jeweler, jewelery

Rock Hall, a New B&B in Connecticut's Litchfield County

by Alison Wellner (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Estates, Luxury Travel & Hotels

Rock Hall, a four-room B&B in Colebrook, CT, is now open for its first summer season, and it's a great New England getaway for fans of Florida, architecture, or just an unusual story.

Rock Hall was built in 1912 by Addison Mizner, the architect whose Mediterranean Revival style was behind the development of Boca Raton as a resort community. Mizner built this 10,000 square foot home some six years before he went to Florida -- where he'd eventually go bankrupt and die.

But before all that, in Connecticut's Litchfield Hills, Mizner received this commission for Jerome Alexandre, a bond trader. Alexandre was heir to the Alexandre Steam Ship Lines fortune, a company which once sailed between New York and Mexico -- perhaps explaining Alexandre's taste for Spanish-style architecture?

Anyway, fast forward to present times, Rock Hall was bought as a country home by another bond trader, Michael Somers, managing director of Dillon Read and Company (most recently a part of UBS) and his wife Stella, a designer. Let's just say that investment banking isn't what it once was, and so late last winter, Michael became an innkeeper. The Somers transformed their country manor into a B&B and have repaired to an apartment on the top floor of the home. (Their former master suite, now Chamber #2, would be the room to reserve.) Stella is a delightful hostess, and Michael has channeled his energies into his long-time hobby, cooking -- he makes a mean house-cured gravlax.

Tags: architecture, bedandbreakfast, boca raton, BocaRaton, connecticut, florida, investmentbanking

Nora Roberts Opens Boutique Hotel

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Nora Roberts isn't the first author with her own hotel but she may be one of the most prolific. The popular romance novelist is, with her husband Bruce Wilder, the proud owner of the Inn BoonsBoro in Maryland. The couple bought the old in in 2007 and began fixing it up. But they ran into a snag when the hotel burst in flames in 2008 after a propane tank explosion. Like one of her indomitable heroines, Roberts was not so easily dissuaded from her dream. The hotel has opened this year offering rooms named after fictional couples and decorated in varying styles.

A Jane and Rochester room offers a canopy bed, the Nick and Nora suite is a nod to Art Deco. The rooms are not elaborately tricked out in themes, the decor is more of a subtle acknowledgment of the time period being evoked and you still get a flatscreen television in each room. Each room includes a copy of the book that inspired it and even the bathroom amenities are matched to the couple (for example, Miss Bennett and Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice are represented with the scent of English lavender). As you might expect there is also an ample library. The inn has six rooms and two suites and rates start at $220 including breakfast for two.

Gallery: Famous Lover Rooms At The Inn Boonsboro

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Tags: bed and breakfast, BedAndBreakfast, inn, Maryland, nora roberts, NoraRoberts

Ch�teau du Sureau For Sale

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels, Real Estate Developments

Many people might not be thinking of buying a restaurant or hotel right now but Château du Sureau is a pretty tempting package. The hotel, also known as the Estate by the Elderberries is located in Oakhurst, California at the Sierra Mountain foothills just miles from the southern gate of Yosemite National Park, 4 hours from LA, 3.5 hours from San Francisco. The manor-style 10-room hotel has a grand staircase, leaded glass windows and rooms with antiques, canopy beds, fireplaces, tapestries, and large soaking tubs. The grounds include a pool, pond, bocce court, gazebo, and a giant chessboard. A two-bedroom, French-style villa is at the far end of the estate. The property includes the Elderberry House restaurant which has hand-stenciled beamed cathedral ceilings and a fireplace and the Spa du Sureau which is an art-deco style retreat. The luxury retreat is known for being an expensive (rates start around $400 a night) yet charming place to stay. You can continue the legacy for $12 million.

Gallery: The Estate by the Elderberries

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Tags: bed and breakfast, BedAndBreakfast, chateau du sureau, ChateauDuSureau, estate by the elderberries, EstateByTheElderberries, inn for sale, InnForSale

The Kimber Modern, A New Type of Bed and Breakfast in Austin

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels

The soon-to-open Kimber Modern in Austin, Texas eschews the typically quaint look of the standard bed and breakfast. Kimber Cavendish and Vicki Faust shared a dream of launching a unique hotel in the hip Soco area of Austin. Architect Burton Baldridge has created an angular retreat that offers six rooms, a tranquil courtyard and a light-filled common area that includes a multi-level deck. Breakfast is self-serve and available from 7 to 11 a.m. The Kimber Modern opens to guests on October 10 and is now taking reservations. Standard rooms are $295-$320 a night, suites, which include a seating area with a custom couch designed by Burton Baldrige are $350 to $395 per night.

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Tags: architecture, austin, bed and breakfast, BedAndBreakfast, hotel, kimber modern, KimberModern, modern, texas

Live in a Castle Like Royalty, with Royalty

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels

So what if you didn't just go visit a castle somewhere, or even just stayed in a castle-turned-hotel somewhere, but actually stayed in a castle with the royalty who owned it? Now that would be an experience. It's basically a different spin on the "bed and breakfast" idea, where you get to stay in a real castle with servants and butlers, walk in the gardens, eat in the main hall, admire the ancient portraits of royals gone before, and then on top you get to have tea and visit with the lord, knight, or princess that happens to live there too.

The only part that bothers me about all this is the idea that most of these people are opening their homes not because they want to share their history, or because they enjoy mingling with "commoners," (although maybe they do) but mostly because it just costs so much to keep those massive castles running. Maybe that makes the experience that much more genuine though -- amidst the luxury and royal treatment an underlying air of haughtiness from the nobles would definitely fit in with history!

(Ahem, I'm sure they're all very nice, really).

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Tags: bed and breakfast, BedAndBreakfast, castle, castles, hotel, palace, royalty, travel