STAYCATION PARADISE

Tony and Peggy show that sometimes there really is no place like home

TONY BARTHEL AND HIS WIFE, Peggy, own the Featherbed Railroad Bed and Breakfast Resort in Nice, California. Nestled in Northern California’s wine country, the Featherbed Railroad is a collection of nine restored cabooses for rent on a five-acre wooded property on the banks of the Clear Lake.

Each caboose that sits among the resort’s centuries-old bay laurel trees has a unique theme.

La Loose Caboose is decked out in the lurid neon reds of a New Orleans bordello. The sign upon entering warns you to “Beware pickpockets and loose women.”

Over in the Easy Rider caboose, the queen-size bed boasts a headboard made with motorcycle handlebars. Everywhere you look are the iconic orange, black, and chrome colors of Harley-Davidson.

Moving from Hog heads to Parrotheads, the TropiCaboose is decked out with a coconut color scheme, wicker furniture, and the music of Jimmy Buffett wafting in as if on a gentle breeze.

Many of the cabooses have in-room Jacuzzis and second-story cupola seating for two. The Featherbed takes its unique name from the genuine goose-down bedding that comes standard in all accommodations.

It’s a great place for a staycation—if you happen to live in neighboring communities like Santa Rosa, Mendocino, Healdsburg, Calistoga, Ukiah, and Willits, or farther-flung cities like San Francisco and Sacramento.

But I decided to include Tony in this book because he had some solid tips for staycationers, based on his experience as a B&B owner, that he was willing to share.

The first thing Tony recommends is asking innkeepers if they have a “locals” mailing list that you can subscribe to for spur-of-the moment kinds of deals.

“Many lodging properties are more inclined to offer a discount last minute than they are for a reservation made months in advance. . . . At our place we have our mailing list divided up into several segments, including ‘super locals.’ These are people who can make a buying decision and be here within a very short period of time.”

In addition, many properties make special deals available for their Facebook and Twitter fans. Tony recommends liking the page of your favorites to get in on the action.

“We also post specials [on social media sites] for last-minute getaways. . . . Obviously if you’re planning a business trip months in advance, you can’t get this, but if you’re in the next neighborhood a deal happening this weekend is a good thing that one can, potentially, take advantage of.”

Tony is even toying with the idea of taking the promotions one step further.

“I’ve also been considering setting up a text messaging system to send out messages for last-minute deals. A prospect or guest could ask the property if they’ve got a text messaging deal system in place. Apparently this is the wave of the future.”

Another thing some staycationers forget to take advantage of is coupon books offered at properties. But that’s a mistake. In fact, Tony says those kinds of coupons can work better for staycationers than for out-of-towners.

“Nobody can dine at ten restaurants while they’re here for a couple of days, but they certainly can enjoy these coupons if they have stayed with us and live in the area. They can parlay these coupons into deals over time and, done right, completely work out the price of the room by savings on local products and services.”

Even if the property you’re staying at doesn’t have a coupon book, many local businesses will offer discounts to guests of certain properties.

“So if someone goes out to eat or rents a boat or whatever, they should ask if there are discounts for guests of XYZ property,” Tony says. “Oftentimes there will be, and they only have to show their key to take advantage of these.”

Of course, one of the greatest things about staycations is the money you save on fuel when you’re staying close to home!

Tony is a car enthusiast who once single-handedly self-syndicated his own newspaper column about automobiles to more than two hundred newspapers. Nowadays he does Curbside TV, an automotive blog and car show calendar that he lovingly refers to as “the pothole on the information superhighway.”

He also wrote a book in 2007 called Wedding Horror Stories (And How to Avoid Them) that drew on his twenty-two years of firsthand experience as a mobile DJ in Southern California.

His wife, Peggy, meanwhile, has a master’s degree in geology and once worked for a geotechnical construction services company while cleaning up Edwards Air Force Base. She did her master’s thesis on the source of the groundwater in Zzyzx, California, at the Desert Studies Center in the Mojave Desert. (Rhyming with “Isaacs,” this former spa settlement is the last word, literally, in the tally of names of places done by the United States Board on Geographic Names!)

Tony and Peggy became owners of the Featherbed five years ago. The Barthels had just sold their house in El Segundo, California, when they decided they wanted to build a B&B rather than wait to realize the retirement dream of owning one.

It was 2008 and they went under contract on a piece of property where they would construct their dream B&B. But fate intervened.

“We were in escrow on an avocado ranch and the whole thing burned down,” Tony says.

Later at an innkeepers’ conference, they learned it’s better to buy than to build. So when Peggy saw the Featherbed for sale online, they visited—after convincing Tony to leave his beloved Southern California.

“We bought it in 2008 right at the worst time to buy a place,” Tony concedes. “It had sat on the market for two years with no bids.”

The rest is history. Today, their dogs Zora and Ginger roam the property barking at squirrels. And there’s even Pippin, a resident desert tortoise named after one of the Hobbits in the J. R. R. Tolkien fantasy novel The Lord of the Rings, on the grounds!

Tony offered quite a few tips for staycationers. What else should you keep in mind if you’re doing a staycation?

Take all the vacation you have coming.

• A new survey from Harris Interactive showed that the average American left nine days of vacation on the table in 2012. That’s almost unbelievable. Compared to the Europeans, we get almost no vacation at all. And here we have people forfeiting almost two full work weeks!
• We went through a phase where people were working themselves silly because they thought they’d be laid off if they took a vacation. While that might have been true in some cases, that trend has now mostly reversed, and people should be availing themselves of what’s called “paid time off” (PTO) at many companies.
• I take a good amount of vacation. I believe it makes me a better employee. I’m just fresher for the next six weeks or so when I come back from vacation.

Don’t overlook free attractions in metro areas.

• I know money still remains tight for many. Yet you can find a way to get away without having to break the bank or remain tethered to your home or apartment during a staycation. Popular options include going to state parks, renting a cabin, or even staying at an inexpensive motel.
• I recently spent a weekend in Boston with my seven-year-old son, Grant. He had the best time ever. At the monument at Bunker Hill, Grant ran all three hundred steps up to the top while all of us adults were huffing and puffing. The cost of Bunker Hill? Free.
• We also went to the USS Constitution for free. We walked the Freedom Trail and went to Boston Commons for free. The cost of the carousel at Boston Commons and souvenirs: $3 and $15, respectively. My point is there’s something to do for either free or very cheap wherever you are.

Social media can help score a deal.

• As Tony points out, social media has become the “go to” way for travel providers to give out deals and for customers to get them. Particularly if you’re flying U.S. full-fare airlines or discounters, you want to look at buying an airline ticket using social media. More and more specials are posted for those who friend or like an airline on Twitter or Facebook—not through the traditional outlets. That same holds true for vacation properties and rental car companies.

Use an app to save money on last-minute accommodations.

• If you’re far from being someone who plans in advance, there’s a new feature as part of Priceline’s app for Android and iOS that could save you up to 35 percent on hotel bookings that same night.
• The new Tonight-Only Deals feature is the latest addition to the free Priceline Negotiator app. Unlike the way Priceline normally works, you know the name of the hotel before you book. You can book anytime from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. in more than thirty U.S. cities with a maximum stay of four nights.
• Another app that offers similar last-minute booking deals is called HotelTonight. Visit HotelTonight.com for more details.