Category Archives: Inn on Main Street

Be Our Bed and Breakfast Valentine

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There’s nothing like an icy day to make you appreciate a warming fireplace and a snuggle session with the one you love. Bed and breakfasts were made for Valentine’s Day, and Inn on Main Street is doing its part to help lovers everywhere discover Asheville and each other.

Through the end of March, we are offering our winter Snuggle Up special. If you stay two nights in a premium room, you’ll get the second night half price, or you’ll get a pair of two-day tickets to the Biltmore Estate with a free audio tour, or you’ll get a third night free, a savings of up to $179.

This deal becomes especially good when you consider that many Asheville independent restaurants are offering Valentine dinner specials, and the music and arts calendar is particularly vibrant for this time of year.

Baby, it's cold outside

Baby, it's cold outside

Online reviews guide future guests

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All the pundits tell us we should ask our guests to write online reviews, since so many of us read reviews before we commit to buying something. That seems especially pertinent when you are making plans for a very special event like a romantic getaway or a once-in-a-lifetime visit to the Biltmore Estate. Many of our innkeeping comrades in the Asheville area have clearly taken that to heart, racking up hundreds of reviews on TripAdvisor, bedandbreakfast.com, yelp, iloveinns.com,  bnbfinder.com, findbedandbreakfast.com and other sites. Most folks now realize that the content of the reviews is much more important than the number, but that doesn’t keep businesses from chasing after that No. 1 rating, based mostly on the number of reviews submitted.

Operating a bed and breakfast is a very personal endeavor, which makes fishing for compliments feel a bit unseemly. We appreciate very much when we get a nice review; we just don’t like asking for them. So rather than ask on our own behalf, I suggest that you offer a nice review any time you enjoy a stay anywhere, and write the owner or manager if you didn’t. We have done both, and in both cases I like to think that future travelers benefited from our feedback.

B&B visits get easier this winter

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We’ve just added some specials for the winter at Inn on Main Street, and extended the one we’re offering now through New Year’s Eve. They’re going on the web site, but we want our blog buddies to be the first to know.

Winter Getaway

Stay two nights in a king/twins or cottage room between now and New Year’s Day, and get a third night free. Combine this special with our discounts on Biltmore daytime and Candlelight Christmas tickets.

Snuggle Up

Stay two nights in a king/twins or cottage room during February or March and get a third night free, or two free Biltmore tickets, or half off your second night. Combine this special with any of our packages. Not valid Feb. 11, 12, 18 or 19.

Valentine roses are free

Stay two nights in a king/twins or cottage room on either weekend surrounding Valentine’s Day, and we’ll add a dozen red roses in an arrangement for your sweetie at no cost. Mention this special at the time of booking. Combine this with any of our packages.

Weaverville is a sweet place to be in the winter. Our local cafes may shorten their hours a tad, but they stay open and still offer top-notch food and entertainment. Here, as well as in Asheville, you don’t need restaurant reservations, traffic is mild, the Biltmore Estate tour is a bargain and the club scene stays vibrant. And just a few minutes away, you can be on the slopes at Wolf Laurel. Bring another couple along, and we’ll send you all to the tubs at Hot Springs.

Christmas season returns to Asheville

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OK, so nobody wants to be overwhelmed by Christmas come-ons in early November. But our Inn on Main Street guests apparently are eager to feel the seasonal glow.

We’ve helped about a dozen couples obtain tickets to the Biltmore Estate Candlelight Christmas tours, and the season just started last weekend. The tickets we sell are a bargain, just $70 combined with a daytime pass good for two days. The Biltmore folks have made the tour extra fun this year by continuing the Tiffany exhibit through the end of the year. Our guests have been marveling over the work of the famed artist best know for his stained glass.

This week, the Grove Park Inn also begins its annual National Christmas Gingerbread House competition.  Our guests can see the entries Sunday through Thursday. The inn is offering guided tours this year as well.

Many of our guests do their Christmas shopping at on of our Weaverville galleries, the Folk Art Center or at local studio strolls. In a world flooded with trendy electronics and flimsy foreign-made gift items, it’s refreshing to get a mug or bowl or watercolor crafted by an Appalachian artist.

And sometimes getting away is a great gift to ourselves. There’s nothing like a comfy bed, beautiful mountain views and a great breakfast cooked by someone else. We’ll leave the light on for you.

Weaverville’s arts and crafts hunt

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Weaverville Art SafariOddly enough, we still have Inn on Main Street rooms left for the weekend of Weaverville Art Safari’s fall studio tour Oct. 28-30.

The Friday preview party is one of the best deals around. Still only $10, it includes fantastic appetizers, a chance to participate in a silent auction for great artwork, plus a chance at one of dozens of raffle prizes.

On Saturday and Sunday, take your map and head out in search of something to make your surroundings a bit more beautiful. Or pick up some handmade creations for Christmas presents. This year the tour has moved to the last week of October from it’s usual November spot. A bonus is that we’re on schedule to have some brilliant leaf color remaining at the end of October. Colors have yet to peak at our elevation, but colors on the Blue Ridge Parkway suggest it will be quite a show here.

SmartTravel.com, USA Today Travel, and Travel and Leisure gave us a plug as the place to stay near Asheville during the leaf season. Aw, gee, we’re turning red.

Fall color comes to the Asheville area

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Autumn at Inn on Main Street

Autumn at Inn on Main Street

The pundits are saying this will be a spectacular year for fall color in the Western North Carolina mountains. Our summer featured lots of rain followed by lots of heat and drought. We’ve had some early cold snaps. The entire process is the recipe for a decisive and bright leaf color change in October.

There aren’t a lot of color clues around Inn on Main Street bed and breakfast yet, but the dogwoods and sourwoods are changing to burgundy and orange. The maples can’t be far behind. Weaverville is at 2400 feet elevation, so we tend to see our best color the third week of October. On the Blue Ridge Parkway, some color is appearing at higher elevations and should peak in early October.

The timing of the fall color comes with some other perfect timing. UNC-TV is going to broadcast its segment about Weaverville on Oct. 6 at 8 p.m. We don’t think Inn on Main Street will be mentioned specifically, but we’re told that we’ll appear with the credits at the end.

Southern Highlands Craft Fair returns

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Craft FairOne of the most popular times to visit Asheville and Weaverville is during the Craft Fair of the Southern Highlands. The fair is held twice a year, and the next one is July 21-24.

Oddly enough, we still have three openings for that weekend here at Inn on Main Street bed and breakfast, at least as of this moment.

The Southern Highland Craft Guild, whose artists display their work at the fair, is one of the most selective guilds in the country. We know artists with MBAs and several years of commercial success who still are turned down for membership.

Several Weaverville artists, many of them regular exhibitors on the Weaverville Art Safari, are members of the guild and display their work at the fair. It’s a great opportunity to pick up some of the finest crafts in the nation in a single location.

Plus, July is a great time to be in the mountains. We wouldn’t pretend to claim it’s always cool and dry here, but compared to the rest of the sauna South, we are an oasis. Take a raft trip while you’re here and you’ll know what refreshing really means.

Stay three nights at Inn on Main Street and mention this post, and we’ll buy you a pair of tickets to the craft fair.

Something to celebrate

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Kim and Tom Holahan celebrated their anniversary with us

Kim and Tom Holahan celebrated their anniversary with us

We’ve decided that the best thing we have going for us at Inn on Main Street is a few thousand satisfied guests.

When we started innkeeping, we hadn’t fully comprehended what it would be like to have people visiting our home during some of the most sensitive times of their lives. They’re here for honeymoons, babymoons, engagements, their children’s weddings, and even to fulfill their bucket lists as time grows short. We’re moved to be bystanders and facilitators for these special occasions, and try to remind ourselves how important it is help our guests make their visit the best it can be.

One of the most common reasons for a romantic getaway is to celebrate an anniversary. Often the couple is in their 20′s and leaving a baby with the grandparents for the first time. Other times the anniversaries are milestones like 25 years, 40, 50 or more, monuments to a rock-solid commitment that has weathered years of changes. For those folks celebrating because they made the right choice in a mate, we’ve begun a gallery of anniversary pictures on our Facebook page. If you’ve celebrated your anniversary at Inn on Main Street, please send us your picture and we’ll post it on our new gallery.

And at our super son-in-law’s suggestion, we plan to create another gallery: Photos of babies who visited us en utero as their parents celebrated a babymoon, and also of babies conceived at Inn on Main Street. If only those walls could talk!

Weaverville’s shot at fame

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The boys of UNC-TV

The boys of UNC-TV: Mike Burke, David Hardy, Brian Hoffman, Mike Milstead, and D.G. Martin

The Weaverville Art Safari is a busy time around here. Downtown Weaverville is jammed with pedestrians and motorists getting from one studio to another. The tour last weekend was no exception.

Adding to the buzz this year was the presence of public broadcasting host D.G. Martin and the crew from UNC-TV, in town to film a segment on
Weaverville for the Our State program. D.G. is something of a North Carolina renaissance man. He’s a columnist for 40 newspapers, on-air personality and host of  North Carolina Bookwatch on UNC-TV, former secretary and vice president of the UNC system, a retired lawyer, and the guy who should have beat John Edwards in the 1998 Democratic primary for U.S. Senate. And he’s a hoot to have for a guest.

Our State producer David Hardy brought the whole project together. Photographer Mike Burke expected to shoot 40 hours of video to come up with a 10-minute segment for television. They also stayed at our B&B before to plan for this trip.  Expect to see the Weaverville segment in an October episode of Our State.

The Weaverville Art Safari was just one aspect of what they were filming, but was sure to supply some color. This time the preview party moved to the new facility at Claxton Farm, and pretty much filled the place. Hundreds were at the party, which always features a silent auction and fantastic door prizes. We were told the food was outstanding, but can’t say personally. Because of the turnout, it was gone before we arrived. Mark your calendar for the next tour, on Oct. 29 and 30. Inn on Main Street still has rooms available.

Better days for Asheville area B&Bs

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An article just came out in the Asheville Citizen-Times about the state of bed and breakfasts in the Asheville area, which includes Inn on Main Street in Weaverville.

Though all of us quoted in the article were caught off guard, we all expressed the same perception: Asheville is a bed-and-breakfast town, gas prices won’t stop folks from visiting the Biltmore Estate or staying at a B&B, and most of all, bed and breakfasts are the best way to get an insider’s view of our area. Why stay in a hotel when you can relax in a homelike environment and get the lowdown on the best restaurants, best events, best views and most memorable experiences to savor?

The writer also captured our optimism about B&Bs and travel to our mountains in general. We’re coming back from three years of a bad economy, and it’s time to enjoy life again. Come see what truly makes us a bed-and-breakfast destination.