Great Roadside Motels

Sticking with the non-chain credo of Roadfood, I'd like to tell you about a couple of nice pleaces I stayed at recently, which are all on Route 11 because I'm just that darm unimaginative.

The Blue Ridge Inn sits on a hill north of New Market, VA. While the exterior might send you screaming away, the price - and what you get for it - is worth it. I paid 40 bucks for a very clean little room witha fridge and a big bed. The shower was tiled just like you see on old motel postcards. The owner is British and she has a lot of cats, but they don't go in the room. I spent the weekend trying to get a hige fluffy black and white cat to warm up to me, but it ignored my baby talk and smile. The Blue Ridge was also very quiet.

Further "down the Valley" is the Inn at Narrow Passage. It's more B&B than anything else, but it operates like a hotel - no bathroom sharing (thank God). It's pricey, but you get to stay in a piece of history and the rooms are very plush. It's romantic and restful and you can walk right down to the North Fork and fish or just laze around.

Here are the websites. No, I'm not affiliated with any of them.

Blue Ridge Inn (New Market, VA) www.blueridgeinn.com
Inn at Narrow Passage (Woodstock, VA) www.innatnarrowpassage.com

There are several Roadfood spots in the vicinity of each.
If you have a favorite locally owned spot, I'd love to hear about it.

I wish I had time to find places like that but my business travel is so scheduled that I usually need a place to go without looking for it.

I will have stayed 80 nights this year at a Marriott facility. Unfortunately most of them have been in Houston. I hope next year does not bring the same.

Paul E. Smith
Knoxville, TN

While we often stay at chain motels as the logistics of dog-travel and internet reservations make that-sometimes-more convenient, I would like to recommend one independent for this thread.

The DILLARD HOUSE in Dillard, Georgia is noted for its restaurant, but the motel complex at the same location is outstanding also. Check our trip report on our visits to Dillard and you will see the beautiful location and outstanding service and of course, great food, available at this institution!

http://www.roadfood.com/Forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=14597&SearchTerms=Dillard

Two great little motels I have stayed at:

The Wells River Motel in Wells River in Vermont has 11 rooms, each decorated with a different theme. The owner, obviously proud of all the work she put into it, was kind enough to show us each room. We ended up choosing the moose room, which has many moose painted all over the walls. The place is a real hoot!

Another I particularly enjoyed was The Masterpiece Motel in Morro Bay, California, near The Hearst Castle. Their slogan is "Every Room a Masterpiece". We stayed in the Frida Kahlo room, which had several prints of her paintings. A really nice experience.

I'm always looking for good old independent motels - hope this thread rustles up a lot!
The 1950-era Star Motel in Cave City, Kentucky (near Mammoth Caves) has been kept up nicely by its current owners - one of the old Wigwam Inns is nearby, so there's two cool motels at least...good food is not so easy to find though.
The Apple Valley Inn motel in Roanoke, Virginia is just off the Blue Ridge Parkway. 1960s-era place, comfortable, and a lot cheaper than all the corporate places up near the airport. The food court downtown is evidently the place to go, so is the Roanoker.

I'm on the road nearly every week, so I get tired of chain motels. Seen one, seen em all. Unfortunately, many of my co workers will not stay anywhere the sign doesn't say "Hampton" or "Holiday Inn" (I'm in the top 1% points-wise with them). When I travel by myself, I have a little more liberty, though.

I'm always on the lookout for good places. I used to go to the Stockport Mill Inn in Stockport, OH right on the Muskingum River. Really nice place with rooms right over the river. No good restaurants nearby, though.

I've found my share of dives, too. One of the best (or worst) was the Top Hat Motel in Uniontown, PA. I went to the front desk (which was also the bar) to complain about the smell in my room and the owner said "You'll want to close that bathroom door tonight. You don't know what's going to crawl out of the drain."

Hmmmmm.

I wonder if there's an organization that publishes guides to independent hotels like the chains put out directories of their own properties.

I'll be interested in hearing y'alls experiences and maybe try some of your suggestions.

JT1 - when I went to visit Fallingwater I stayed at the Hopwood Motel just east of Uniontown - it was a nicely-kept old place...the big imposing Summit Inn on the highway further east looks great, but pricey.

I came across Red Boiling Spring in north-central Tennessee purely by chance. It used to be a big spa community, and still has three big old hotels that are remarkably cheap. I stayed at the Armour, run by a nice down-home family with a penchant for collecting and furnishing their rooms in 'themes' - I stayed in the John Deere room.

I'd sure like to find a good mom & pop motel site - I use motelguide.com which lists places by state/city, but it's simply a list with addresses and phone numbers...it's steered me to places that would creep out Charles Bukowski, which I can deal with if I'm travelling alone, but a bit more info going in would be nice.

It isn't exactly a motel, but a place I would really like to stay the next time I am in the area is the Shady Dell Trailer Park in Bisbee, Arizona. They have apparently restored some old mobile homes in really cool ways and they rent them for the night. I have a friend who stayed there and loved it.

As an added bonus, Dot's Diner next door was in the 1999 Eat Your Way Across The U.S.A. book.

http://www.theshadydell.com/index.html

Here are some lodgings for your consideration, JT1:

http://www.johnnyjet.com/All-Kinds-Of-Places-To-Sleep.html

quote:

Originally posted by Sundancer7

I wish I had time to find places like that but my business travel is so scheduled that I usually need a place to go without looking for it.

I will have stayed 80 nights this year at a Marriott facility. Unfortunately most of them have been in Houston. I hope next year does not bring the same.

Paul E. Smith
Knoxville, TN

Same here, except my nights are usually at Red Roof Inns or Best Westerns. But not in Houston.

My trouble is I'm female and travelling alone, and usually checking in fairly late at night. I'm not overly adventurous, because by far the majority of small, independent motels are a little too Bates-esque for my taste.

I will, however, definitely make notes of the ones recommended in this thread.

The best motel I ever stayed at was the Ghost Ranch in Tucson. It had a cactus garden, orange and lemon trees, 40's style motorcourt rooms, a free breakfast and a sign designrd by Georgia O'Keefe. Unfortunately, it is now condos.

We traveled a bit up and down the East Coast when I was a kid and my folks thought Holiday Inn and HoJo's were for rich folks (eventually they bought a trailer). So I have a fondness for old, independent motels.

One of my favorites in my adult travels is the Wisconsin Aire in Random Lake Wisconsin. If I recall, it has maybe 6 or 8 units, but it's next to a well-stocked gas and mini-mart and a terrific breakfast restaurant that is the hangout for the local farmers.

For many years, on the Maine coast my folks liked the Ledges in Camden. Great location on a cove. Last time I stayed there it was a little tired but clean.

One time when they were booked (lobster festival weekend) we got a room up the road at a place called the Lighthouse. Seems the place was originally a three-room wood frame cabin-style motel, then they built a larger motel, but being Yankees they saved the old one and perched it on top. Knowing a bit of the local language I managed to get an upstairs room, tiny, but with a common porch with a view all the way to Mt. Desert. Furniture was all from the state prison (anyone whose traveled the area knows that's just fine.) And in the morning the owner and his teenaged daughter served fresh blueberry pancakes in a parlor in their house/office.

BTW - I also prefer old hotels in cities that still maintain them and have had good experiences with several in San Francisco, including the York, the Empire Hotel of Hitchcock's "Vertigo."

quote:

Originally posted by felix4067

quote:

Originally posted by Sundancer7

I wish I had time to find places like that but my business travel is so scheduled that I usually need a place to go without looking for it.

I will have stayed 80 nights this year at a Marriott facility. Unfortunately most of them have been in Houston. I hope next year does not bring the same.

Paul E. Smith
Knoxville, TN

Same here, except my nights are usually at Red Roof Inns or Best Westerns. But not in Houston.

My trouble is I'm female and travelling alone, and usually checking in fairly late at night. I'm not overly adventurous, because by far the majority of small, independent motels are a little too Bates-esque for my taste.

I will, however, definitely make notes of the ones recommended in this thread.

I'll rent you a room, baby!! (My mother is gonna hate me for this!)

quote:

Originally posted by Poverty Pete
I'll rent you a room, baby!! (My mother is gonna hate me for this!)

ROFL! You seemed nice enough on the phone giving me directions to Dennis Hay's...that works for me!

Felix,
He seems a nice enough guy, but I don't think I would want my daughter to marry into the family.

The El Rey Inn in Santa Fe is roadworthy.

http://www.elreyinnsantafe.com/index.html