How Green is Your Valley?
If you are the type that likes sleek chrome-and-glass midcentury minimalism, this inn probably isn’t for you. Every room — from the lobby to the guestrooms to the restaurant — is decorated in florals, ginghams and stripes, and many of the beds are covered with patchwork quilts.
The welcoming scent of apples and cinnamon greets guests arriving at Apple Farm Inn, a California institution just off Highway 101 in San Luis Obispo (the town Oprah proclaimed “the happiest place in the USA. The effect is a unique country charm, and it radiates from each of the 104 guestrooms. It provides the kind of comfortable feeling you’d get when visiting your much-beloved grandma out on the farm.
The King and Queen Specialty Rooms have been recently refurbished in warm shades of cobalt blue, apple green and tawny beige, with fewer competing patterns. They still have that Apple Farm style but are more relaxed and restful. The beds, some of them big four-posters, are very inviting. On a recent visit we turned on the gas fireplace, pulled up the throw that was folded at the bottom of the bed, mounded the pillows behind us and curled up with a book (and not the Kindle kind of books either). Except for the sound of the fire, it was perfectly quiet.
The country charm starts in the inn's lobby, where cookies are served every evening. The lobby sitting-room has the cutest checkerboards — with small green and red apples instead of the usual checkers. You can buy these boards and lot more (candles, soaps, apple butter) in the well-stocked gift shop and the nearby Millhouse store. That mill shtick isn’t made up: The old gristmill building remains, but it’s now used to churn all the ice cream for the restaurant. Stop in to sample some as its being made.
There’s not so much a spa on-site as there is a “Massage Center,” and one afternoon our editors enjoyed the signature massage — apple cider and shea butter — with a face wrap that smelled good enough to eat. We’d most definitely recommend it if you need to work out some kinks from a long road trip. Don’t miss the early evening wine receptions, which are a great time to taste local wines and chat with some of the other guests while sitting outside soaking in the California sunshine.
If you like simple, well-prepared food and lots of it, you’ll love the restaurant. For lunch one of our editors ordered a turkey potpie with a side of Apple Farm salad and we all washed it down with unfiltered apple cider. Yum. And for dinner? Country pot roast with a hot apple dumpling à la mode for dessert, of course. Alas, the portions were all too big to finish…and we all had that back-at-Grandma’s-farmhouse feeling again.
We love this place for its carbon-neutral footprint and with just a touch of all-American kitsch — along with a toasty fireplace. Do as the locals do and stop in at the restaurant and bakery, cherished for its home-cooked treats, especially the — what else? — hot apple dumpling
