Best Places to Stay: New England: Bed & Breakfasts, Country Inns, and Other Recommended Getaways -- Eighth Edition [Paperback]

Christina Tree (Author), Kimberly Grant (Author)

Book Description

Series: Best Places to Stay | Publication Date: June 6, 2000

For long weekends, romantic getaways, and family vacations, the BEST PLACES TO STAY series describes an array of distinctive accommodations for discriminating travelers. The authors personally visit and evaluate each establishment, compiling accurate, reliable, up-to-date, and unbiased information for anyone who insists on nothing but the best. Country Inns; Bed & Breakfasts; Lodges, Spas; Resorts; Romantic Hideaways; Guest Farms; Grand Old Resorts. Describes more than 350 accommodation choices in Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

New England is a remarkably compact region of the country, yet even within those six tightly knit states there's an incredible amount of diversity and variety of terrain, scenery, and atmosphere. Therefore, in planning a vacation getaway, location is usually the first priority, and accommodations are the next, since where you stay provides the flavor and tone that colors your trip, and it will be the hub from which you branch out and explore. In fact, depending on the sort of holiday you have in mind, where you lodge may assume prime importance, because a charming country bed-and-breakfast or village inn can become the destination itself. So for a weekend ramble, a romantic tryst, a family reunion, ski-lodge experience, a spa splurge, business excursion, island escape, bed-and-breakfast retreat, or resort indulgence, what you chiefly need is a guide to lodgings, and that's what Christina Tree and Kimberly Grant provide. They visited and tirelessly researched more than 1,000 accommodations across New England, and from that vast pool selected 350 places to stay that appeal to various tastes, preferences, and budgets. There's the Whalewalk Inn on Cape Cod, a tranquil and romantic retreat on 3.5 acres of an isolated 1830s estate. In Sugar Hill, New Hampshire, is Sunset Hill House--a country inn atop a 1,700-foot ridge in the White Mountains, with full country breakfasts, mountain-range views, fireplaces, a luxurious pool and golf/ski facilities, plus hiking, biking, or horse-drawn sleigh rides, depending on the season. Or there's Quisisana in Center Lovell, Maine, a resort for music lovers with one-, two-, and three-bedroom cottages on one of Maine's deepest lakes. Founded in 1917 as a place where musicians could play together for their own entertainment, the 47-acre compound features more than 70 conservatory students who cook and serve food by day, and perform chamber music, operas, and concert arias by night. Browsing through Best Places to Stay is a pleasure, surpassed only by the actual vacation it may launch. --Stephanie Gold --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Dealing exclusively with country inns in New England, this guide provides a fresh approach by organizing the inns into 23 categories of interest, e.g., lakeside, beach, farm, village, etc. Indexes guide the user to choose inn by sport or by location. The authors describe the inns in leisurely, colorful detail. The pertinent data on owners, addresses, rates, credit cards, children, and pets is provided. This is an inexpensive, well-researched and -written, and uniquely useful guide to the inns and bed and breakfasts of New England. A worthwhile purchase. Norma Allenbach, Amherst P.L., N.Y.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 704 pages
• Publisher: Mariner Books; Eighth Edition edition (June 6, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0618005315
• ISBN-13: 978-0618005314
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5 x 2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,458,441 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A must-have if you are looking for gracious hosts, June 30, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Best Places to Stay in New England, Seventh Edition (The Best Places to Stay Series) (Paperback)

This book has been an invaluable source for my business - New England B&B Reservation Services. What I like most is that many of the places I have called out of this book have been gracious and professional. I have to make a lot of "cold calls" in this business when I get requests for areas outside of my listings. It is nice to know that my call will be received well. We only carry those hosts who offer exceptional hospitality, so if I don't have a good conversation with the bed & breakfasts and country inns, then I cannot recommend them to my clients. The descriptions set forth in this book are generally true and honest. When I visit the places personally, I already know what to expect.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Should be two editions, October 10, 2004

By 

B. Ericson (Cambridge, MA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Best Places to Stay: New England: Bed & Breakfasts, Country Inns, and Other Recommended Getaways -- Eighth Edition (Paperback)

This is a really decent book for getting the big picture on many places to stay in New England. While it's a really impressive undertaking, it might be too much for one book -- I would find this book much more manageable were it in two editions -- northern and southern. My binding on this book separated in several places very quickly.

2.0 out of 5 stars Praises too many hotels to be plausible, May 27, 2000

By 

Mike Christie (Austin, TX USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Best Places to Stay in New England, Seventh Edition (The Best Places to Stay Series) (Paperback)

I used this book to pick out a couple of places to stay in Vermont, and regretted it. I should have been tipped off by the fact that every single review in the book is glowingly positive; a dead giveaway that the book is not independent. It seems very likely to me that this is one of those guides where the inns and hotels pay to be included, and may even write their own reviews.

The book is divided up by types of place, so there's a "Country B&B" section, a "Romantic Getaway" section, a "Lakeside" section, and so on. We booked one of the "Gourmet Getaways" and one of the "Farms"; the former was a disaster, but the latter was OK. The gourmet place, a fancy inn in Ludlow, was described as providing "sumptuous feasts" for breakfast, with "excellently trained and most personable" staff, and the option of picking up a "sophisticated picnic lunch". It's hard to imagine the editors actually ate at this place: the staff clearly hated the management and were close-mouthed and unfriendly (and we overheard the owner loudly berating one of the waitresses); the cooking was very good, but not extraordinary, and the picnic was ridiculous--for $25 a head we each got a nice little ash bucket with a quarter bottle of very cheap champagne, a chunk of cheese, and a hunk of bread.

The farm was described a little more accurately--the views were truly incredible, and the cooking was home-cooking, wisely not praised in the guide book.

At the gourmet place, in Ludlow, we met up with a couple of friends from Britain. They'd booked on our recommendations, but had bought a guide book anyway, and we were alarmed to discover a much harsher evaluation of where we were about to stay. In the end, we enjoyed ourselves enough--good company and Vermont scenery can overcome most ills. When we shop for a vacation now, though, we always look for a guide book that seems willing to criticize.