HOT SPRINGS— After an absence of 30 years nearly to the day, my Good Wife and I have returned for a visit to The Homestead, the Commonwealth’s signature mountain vacation spot.
Since our last trip here, many changes have occurred. The property has gone through two transfers of ownership, in the last iteration becoming part of the complex of Omni resorts and hotels in 2013.
Omni has spent $170 million on a complete renovation and rejuvenation which shows at every turn, increasing the engaging ambience that has characterized the resort for two-and-a-half centuries. Driving here through the Allegheny Mountains, one passes by the venerable wooden spring houses of Warm Springs a short distance down Sam Snead Highway, before arriving at the rolling terrain from which the tower of The Homestead dominates the skyline.
San Snead, perhaps the greatest golfer of all time, was born nearby at Ashwood in 1912, and died at Hot Springs in 2012, four days short of his 90th birthday. His golfing legacy began as a seven-year-old caddying for players on The Homestead’s Old Course, and by 17 he was an assistant pro, before moving on to The Cascades Course. In these parts, his golfing accomplishments remain legendary.
On our second day here, the rains kept us from any outdoor activities, thereby enabling me to partake of what I consider to have been the highlight of our stay thus far, namely, the tour of the facility and its multitude of amenities. John Teller was the tour guide, a longtime employee of The Homestead, whose enthusiasm for his work was apparent in every sentence he uttered throughout the hour-and-a-half passage from one end of the main building to the other.
We began in the Jefferson Parlor, appropriately an octagonal room, with 16 panels recently painted by two Virginia artists, Lee Baskerville and Jacqui McBride. The murals begin with depictions of the prehistory of the area and follow through with the colonists’ discovery of the warm spring waters and the building of the first structure in 1766, making The Homestead America’s earliest resort.
The original buildings were frame and in 1902 a fire destroyed the main structure, leading to the construction of the brick complex as we know it today, with the iconic tower having been added in 1929.
John described each era, focusing on the evolution of the institution and many of the famous people who have visited it, including 23 American presidents and the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, who left without paying their bill, apparently thinking that their having stayed there more than compensated for whatever their charges might have been.
Today the resort offers a variety of dining options, from a carry-out, which has great ice cream, the highlight of which is Lemon Crunch, through the Tap Room to the formal Audubon Dining Room, the embodiment of elegance. Significantly, given their having stiffed the management on departure, the picture of the Windsors is in the carry-out, albeit along with photos of other notables as well, but the assumption is that the others had paid.
The app on my phone recorded that I walked 3.3 miles that day, all inside the building. Books abounded at every turn and the fireplaces were ablaze for those wishing to settle down for a good read. The landscaping was as delightful as the interior decoration. Speaking of decoration, for the forthcoming Christmas season, The Homestead has on display the largest gingerbread house I ever have seen, all of it being a model of the inn itself.
In 1863, when the western part of the Commonwealth broke off to form the new state of West Virginia, we lost The Greenbrier, barely across the border from Virginia, but fortuitously, we kept The Homestead, truly a prince of a resort.
