Inn at Little Washington featured in LIFE book on ‘Dream Destinations’–world’s best vacation spots
The Inn at Little Washington is among 100 of the world’s best vacation spots featured in a new book published by LIFE Books. The Rappahannock County destination is listed among exotic locales in Europe, Asia, the Caribbean, North America and elsewhere.
Dream Destinations: 100 of the World’s Best Vacations, is a 144-page hardcover coffee-table book filled with photos and text about 100 memorable vacation spots around the world. It goes on sale Thursday, May 1.
“We are thrilled and delighted to be included in the book,” said Rachel Hayden, marketing manager of the Inn in Washington, VA. She had not yet seen the book and was slightly less thrilled and delighted when read the text of the copy about the Inn, which included several errors. “It is a bit garbled,” she admitted. “Oh, well.”
Chef Patrick O’Connell’s famous Inn is described in the book as being “nestled between the Blue Ridge Mountains and the Shenandoah Valley,” a geographical impossibility. “Not much has changed in this region,” the book states, since George Washington “surveyed the countryside.”
“In 1899, a local carpenter built a handsome white house, and that renovated building is now part of the celebrated country inn,” the book declares. Actually, the main Inn building was originally an auto-service garage on the corner of Main and Middle Streets in the Town of Washington; the 1899 house referred to is the Claiborne house, one of the auxiliary accommodations in town used as additional lodging beyond the Inn’s 18 guest rooms.
“There isn’t a lot to do in Little Washington but relax, renew, have a cocktail, and above all, partake of possibly the best meal you’ve ever had,” it says. “The Inn’s grace notes come with a price tag, but for a special romantic occasion, nothing can top a stay here.”
LIFE Books is an offshoot of the famous photojournalism magazine founded in 1936 by Time Magazine editor Henry Luce, which published until 1972 and intermittently thereafter before ceasing again last year. In its day, the magazine was known for journalistic excellence and accuracy.
-- James P. Gannon
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