Glendeven Inn, Mendocino

For about 25 years now Rick and I have been saying "we really should go to Mendocino for the weekend…" and finally, in honor of a milestone birthday (his), we did. 

And we did it spectacularly. 

After hours of on-line searching, weighing the various merits of various inns, I decided on the Glendeven Inn in Little River, CA (about 2 miles south of Mendocino).  I am a sucker for reviews and there was no shortage of great ones for this particular B&B.

I'm not sure if it was the view or the llamas that pushed me over the edge.  Maybe both.

This was the view from our bedroom.  The Inn is situated on eight acres of gardens and farmland.  There are six llamas that live on the property along with 40 or so chickens.   The Inn consists of a main farmhouse (where we stayed) and several other building including a Wine Bar(n) that serves appetizers and wine every evening. 

We stayed in the Bay View room which has a certain notoriety because Bill & Hillary stayed there in 1985.  Yes, that Bill & Hillary.  The owner, John, even showed us the entry they left in the room's guest book.  When I booked the room I figured if it was good enough for an ex-president and a senator then it was probably good enough for us. 

Oh yes.  I think that view will do.

From where we live, just east of Sacramento, the drive to Mendocino is fabulous.  After a brief trip down 80 we hit highway 12 through Napa Valley, a short hop on 101 then meander through the Anderson Valley on highway 128.  It ends at highway 1, just a few miles south of the Inn. 

We arrived around 4:00 in the afternoon on Friday and after checking in we tossed our bags into our room (after admiring the bottle of champagne they left for us in honor of Rick's birthday) we quickly strolled the grounds before it got too dark.

There's the Wine Bar(n) above.  They rent out the two upper floors as a vacation rental for bigger parties (sleeps six or so, I think). 

The whole place was just gorgeous and just the type of dream home and garden both Rick and I would love to have.  We briefly considered just not leaving on Sunday.  Just refuse to check out.  What could they do?  

We've never stayed at a Bed & Breakfast before.  I really didn't have any preconceived notions except maybe some awkward conversations down in the drawing room with complete strangers.  That didn't happen.  The staff was very unobtrusive.  We ran into one of the owners when we were prowling the grounds and he was very gracious and welcoming.  He told us a little bit about the llamas and invited us to come out later in the evening at feeding time so we could get to know them a little bit better.

My next house is going to have a bank of windows, overlooking the garden, just like that.

On Saturday afternoon, after a day of sightseeing, Rick and I sat in the downstairs sitting room with our wine and beer and played a game of scrabble.  We sat at that round table in the window.  While we were sitting there I told Rick to quit jiggling the table.  He said he wasn't touching it.  Then we noticed the hanging plants in the room swaying back and forth.  A little earthquake to enliven our peaceful afternoon (Note:  A 6.5 earthquake hit the Eureka, CA area at 4:26pm 1/09/10 – about 125 miles north of us).

Each morning, at 9:00am, we were greeted with a knock on our door and a laden breakfast tray.  Eggs courtesy of the Inn's chickens and a print-out of what the Mendocino area had to offer that day. 

Tomorrow I'll post some pictures of the sightseeing we did in Fort Bragg and Mendocino.  Poor Rick probably felt like he was driving Miss Daisy.  I kept ordering him to pull over so I could take pictures.   

It was a perfect weekend.  I'm only sorry it took us 25 years to get around to it.

(Our room was on the right, on the second story.  The three windows were all part of our bedroom.  I'm not kidding – the view was amazing.)