Home away from home

If you’re looking for an at-home feel to your stay in the Shoals, a bed and breakfast facility might be more to your liking.

There are three bed and breakfasts in historic downtown Florence, all of which offer first-class service and down-home hospitality. Yet, each has a unique style.

All three are within walking-distance of numerous restaurants, retail shops, galleries and other attractions and the University of North Alabama. If you like, you can use a horse-drawn carriage as alternative transportation.

The Veranda on Walnut Bed and Breakfast, 414 N. Walnut St. (verandaonwalnut.com or 767-3929) allows you to take a step back in time. The stately veranda-style home dating to about 1915. The house is on the National Register of Historic Places.

As you arrive at the house, you enter a large covered porch. You’ll be greeted by owners Doris and Ron Ross and numerous antiques.

The owners believe in helping their guests relax – with terrycloth robes, home-baked cookies and toiletries such as mineral salts for a stress-free bath.

Guests enjoy the heat lights in the bathrooms and coffee makers and gourmet teas in the bedrooms as well as the gold-leaf dining-room ceiling and the red claw foot bathtub.

The three rooms are named for the Rosses’ children. The Amanda Suite includes a fireplace and sunroom, the Falena Room is cheerful in red and white toile and the Christopher Suite features a hand-carved California king bed and its own kitchen.

Guests awake to the smell of freshly ground coffee. A complete southern breakfast awaits, with eggs cooked to order and homemade jellies and jams. Fresh-squeezed juices are also available.

Carolyn Waterman, owner of The Limestone House Bed and Breakfast, 601 N. Wood Ave., (thelimestonehouse.com or 765-0365) tries to create an atmosphere that will have guests thinking about spending their entire stay at the house.

The Georgian Revival home was built in 1915 and is on the National Register of Historic Places.

The house, which was built with hand hewn local limestone and recently restored, counts Henry Ford and Thomas Edison among those who spent a night at the house. Ford and Edison were in town in 1921 to look over Wilson Dam, with the idea of building a giant automobile manufacturing facility. Instead, he built the operation in Detroit, Mich.

Downstairs, the living and dining rooms feature art and artifacts that Waterman and her husband have collected from around the world. Guests can retreat to a sunroom for reading or napping on one side of the house and eat breakfast in the sunroom on the other side. The Henry Ford Room and Thomas Edison Suite are upstairs.

Breakfasts include fresh-baked bread and fresh fruit and may feature strawberry waffles, omelets with spinach and feta cheese, breakfast casseroles or other treats.

Among the first lodging accommodations in Florence was Wood Avenue Inn (woodavenueinn.com or 766-8441).

The custom Victorian mansion was built in 1889 by Crossland-Karsner and has an unusual design for an inn. The mansion has been on the National Register of Historic Places since 1976 and became a bed and breakfast in 1992 after Alvern Greeley and her husband moved back to the area.

Guests from all 50 states as well as several European countries have visited Wood Avenue Inn. It’s near the downtown business district, with plenty of shops, restaurants and entertainment nearby as well as the University of North Alabama campus.

Innkeeper sisters Nancy Donatelli and Cathy Tarascou are carrying on the legacy of Southern hospitality that their mother started 15 years ago.

Their parents restored the home and filled it with an eclectic assortment of Victorian antiques, including lacy linens, delicate china and a collection of vintage hats.

It soon became a popular spot for business travelers, tourists and others, many of whom returned year after year.

Wood Avenue Inn has four rooms – Rose, Blue, Horace Greeley (with three twin beds) and the Cameo. Breakfast is served by candlelight, including the inn’s signature apple omelets.

An upstairs game room with a view of the oldest building on UNA’s campus also offers a TV and a card table.

Tea parties, gourmet dinners and other specialty menus are also part of the visit.