New England's crown jewel: the White Mountains of New Hampshire: condominiums and townhouses provide the perfect home base for a fabuluous family getaway in the lush forests of the Northeast - Going Places

USA Today (Society for the Advancement of Education), May, 2003 by Wayne M. Barrett

We weren't inside our Bretton Woods Townhome but a few minutes when Margaret proclaimed she was ready to sell our house on Long Island and make a bid on our new digs. (The look in her eye told me she was almost serious.) It was that perfect, from the large, stone-laden fireplace to the wonderful natural woodwork that seemed to accentuate every room. The kitchen was big, beautiful, and immaculate, while the dining room flowed seamlessly into the warm and cozy living room. There was a substantial wooden deck (with a large outdoor gas grill perched in the corner) off the dining area, and the woods on the side and in back hovered nearby. At the front entrance was a huge enclosed porch complemented by a sturdy bench for taking off shoes--just the sort of ultra-mudroom we've been dreaming about for our home for years. There was one bedroom (queen-size bed) and bathroom downstairs and two of each upstairs. One bedroom had a queen and the other, two twins. Unlike the Cape we have now (or the one I grew up in, for that matter), the landing area upstairs was substantial, forming a wide balcony outside the rooms with a dark-wood railing and banister completing the look.

During our last stay at Bretton Woods, we had bedded down in the Grand Hotel, a masterpiece of Spanish Renaissance architecture which rests at the foot of Mt. Washington, the tallest in the Northeast and the crown jewel of the Presidential Mountain Range. The hotel opened in 1902 and has been granted (deservedly so!) National Historic Landmark status. Also on the sprawling property, besides an A-1 golf course and tennis courts, are The Bretton Arms Country Inn, another National Historic Landmark, with 33 rooms; about 50 Townhomes, fully furnished, ranging from one- to five-bedroom units; and The Lodge at Bretton Woods, a contemporary inn in which all of the 50 rooms have a private patio or balcony overlooking the hotel and the mountain range.

Attached to The Lodge is Darby's Diner, a retro-style eatery that serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We ordered ourselves a veritable feast of take-out shortly after checking in, and brought our bounty back to the Townhome for a massive dinner before baths and bedtime. Following our meal, Margaret discovered a journal left by the owners of the house, the idea being for guests to write about their experiences during their stay. An entrant from the previous spring told how a family of foxes with four cubs had set up camp in the woods behind the condo. That brought howls of delight from the children, and we all vowed to be on the lookout for our furry neighbors the next morning. Then the journal entries got a little dicey, and Margaret kind of freaked. There was the tale of how a bat somehow got into the house and couldn't be gotten rid of. The clincher was when one family told how a squirrel had mn across the bed of the father, stepping on his bare feet along the way. "That's it!," Margi exclaimed. "The deal's off; we can't move. There are too many creatures living here." Let me tell you, though, when it came time to leave two mornings later, we sure hated to go.