SUNDAY, AUGUST 15, 2010
KLMNO BEDCHECK A B&B right where I belong The Rideouts are lifelong BY NANCY TREJOS There are twokinds of people
in Cambridge, Md., Skip Ride- out told me over breakfast: The “come heres” and the “from heres.” But everyone ends up a “belong here.” Skip, a “come here” who
opened the Mill Street Inn four years ago with his wife, Jennie, made sure that I felt like a “belong here” during my one- night stay at their adorable bed and breakfast in the sleepy but charming Eastern Shore town that most people bypass for Ocean City. Over Jennie’s scrumptious
ALBERTO PIZZOLI/AFP/GETTY IMAGES Rome served up on a plate rome from F1
food and wine alone — or rather, in her own company. The photography captures the
extraordinary aesthetic sense of Italians; evenanitem as simple as a fried artichoke becomes a thing of beauty. Somewhere between the car-
ciofi alla giudia and the gelato, Gilbert begins to lose her uptight New York ways. She grows. Liter- ally: She acquires a “muffin top” above her jeans, and she doesn’t care. Off she goes with a friend to buy bigger pants. “I’m just through with the
guilt” of calorie-counting, she cheerfully declares. The city featured in “Eat Pray
Love” is theRomeof every Ameri- can’s fondest holiday memories. The city is drenched in color: the golden wash of the sunlight, the ochres and pinks of the medieval buildings. The camera caresses the curves of the fountains in the Piazza Navona, conveys the inti- macy of the alleylike streets, the ancientmajestyoftheColosseum. There is no graffiti, no snarled
traffic, no cigarette butts on the streets—not evenmany tourists. The city’s beauty, of course,
truly is spellbinding, as Italians and tourists alike would admit. Still, this isalush,postcardRome, the antidote to Gilbert’s flavorless
CTMG
Top, Rome’s PiazzaNavona is a popular spot to enjoy an espresso. Above, Julia Roberts as Elizabeth Gilbert meets her Roman landlady, unfortunately played as a stereotype, in “Eat Pray Love.”
life inNewYork. Inthe realRome, it does occasionally rain. But the film, to its credit, also
captures something deeper about living amid such history-infused buildings. Suffering from a romantic
breakup, Gilbert finds consola- tion in an unexpected place: the mausoleum of the emperor Cae- sar Augustus. She picks her way with her friends through the ru- ined shell, now occupied by a few homeless men. Looking at the rubble, and
contemplating what the building witnessed, she begins to gain per- spective. “I was reassured,” she re-
counts. “Maybe my life hasn’t been so chaotic.” She hears a voice beyond the
hand-waving Italian of the streets and the melodic Italian of the trattorias. It’s the voice of a city that has also suffered, and sur- vived. For this former resident of the Eternal City, that’s where the movie truly struck a chord.
sheridanm@washpost.com
pecan waffles with fresh fruit (Skip had picked the pecans off one of their trees), the couple treated me more like a daughter returning home from college than an unknown woman trav- eling alone. I’ve stayed at many B&Bs,
and the innkeepers are almost always kind and welcoming. But the Rideouts took attentiveness to a new level. When I contem- plated my dinner options, Skip not onlyrecommendeda restau- rant but drove there so that I could follow him in my car. He even found me a parking space. And rather than let me eat breakfast alone, he sat across from me, chatting and sipping coffee, while Jennie served the food.
When you stay at the Mill
Street Inn, you really do feel as though you’re staying in some- one’s home. The living room is filled with pictures of the cou- ple’s two grown children. Their Labrador mix, Molly, scampers about. “If you hear footsteps at night, it’s just me taking Molly out,” Skip warned me. Sure enough, on my way to
bed, I ran into him in pajamas and robe, returning from a walk with Molly. I’d been admiring the book collection in the living room: lots of Mark Twain, Wil- liam Faulkner, JohnUpdike and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Skip didn’t seem to mind that I was snoop- ing around. “Turn the lights off when you’re done,” he said be- fore returning to bed, just asmy father does when I visit my parents inNewYork.
Marylanders, but they are Cam- bridge come heres from Rock- ville, where both were educators for many years. After they re- tired, they sold baked goods, jams and jellies at two local farmers markets. “I was the pie lady,” Jennie said. After falling in love with
Cambridge during a few visits, they decided to leave behind the hustle and bustle of suburban Washington. They bought and restored the 1894 Victorian, pouring all the earnings from theirMontgomery Countyhome into it, and opened for business in 2006.
Cambridge has been hit hard
by the economic downturn, and a couple of B&Bs have gone out
DETAILS
Mill Street Inn 114 Mill St. Cambridge, Md. 410-901-9144
www.millstinn.com Rates $175 to $225 April 1 to Nov. 30, $125 to $200 Dec. 1 to March 31.
of business, leaving the flashy and luxurious Hyatt Regency the major player in town. But the Rideouts are hanging on. They’ve got a lot to offer.
Located just half a block from the water, the house is spacious, with three large common areas, all with fireplaces, and a front porch where Jennie serves tea or wine in the evening. The living room has a table for chess play- ers. The TV is in the den, and there are DVDs available for guests who want to stay in. I could see why some guests
would want to do that.The three guest rooms all have their own bathroom. I slept in the Wini- fred, which is furnished in yel- low floral and has a comfortable sitting area next to large win- dows that make the room espe- cially sunny. The Rideouts left wine and chocolates for me to enjoy as I curled up with a book in the comfy armchair. The next morning, I awoke to
the sound of Molly barking and the smell of coffee and home- made apple muffins. And in that moment, I really did feel like a belong here.
trejosn@washpost.com
K EZ EE
F5
NANCY TREJOS/THE WASHINGTON POST
Close to the water, theMill Street Inn has three large common areas and three guest rooms.
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