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Five things to look for in a B&B

Here's how to find an inn you'll like.

Everyone looks for something different in a B&B. Some people just want to relax in fancy environs, and their search is relatively easy: Look for high-end inns and be willing to pay for them.

I'm always on the move when I stay at a B&B, so I look for one that's near whatever I plan to do — biking, hiking, touring. If the proprietor is reasonably friendly and the room clean and comfortable, I'm happy.

But I like inns best if they have a unique character and reflect their surroundings. When we stayed at the Silver Star Inn in Spring Green, Wis., last May, for example, the owner didn't lavish wine or chocolate on us. But the inn was filled with unusual art that reflected her interest in photography and days as a Madison art dealer, and we went home with dried morel mushrooms she and her family had gathered from the surrounding hillsides. Spring Green is a famous center of art and idiosyncrasy (House on the Rock, Frank Lloyd Wright), so that was perfect.

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A thousand times, go

With a new book, daydream believers get another life list to work on.

Patricia Schultz’s best-selling book “1,000 Places to See Before You Die’’ was grand entertainment for armchair travelers. It’s unlikely that many people read the book, then ran off to raft the Mangoky River in Madagascar or bask on the beaches of Bora Bora. But she let us dream about it.

The New York writer's current book, however, is about places to which people might actually go — and about places they know. It's called “1,000 Places to See in the U.S. and Canada Before You Die.''

She couldn’t visit every place she chose, so she relied on the help of friends and relatives, other travel writers, the Internet and tourism bureaus.

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Word of mouse

By posting reviews on vacation web sites, the public wields a lot of power.

If you're planning a vacation, remember this: The people have spoken.

They've spoken about the meals they ate, hotels they slept in, tours they took, attractions they visited and people they met. They've gone on and on about beaches and bars and bathrooms and what they had for breakfast.

It's the kind of thing that bores their friends to death — and yet strangers around the world are eating it up.

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