ST. ANDREWS: The best for last, part I « are you gonna eat that?

I’m not one for superlatives but our time at the Rossmount Inn counts in my top 10 favourite stays of all-time. Not only for the location in idyllic St. Andrews-By-The-Sea, New Brunswick, but for the service, the value, and most of all, the restaurant.

You drive along the highway with nothing but trees and then suddenly, a yellow mansion rises up out of nowhere at the end of a long driveway.

The three-storey inn has 18 rooms, the dining room and a lounge/reading room with an antique piano. Graziella Aerni runs the front of the house (and a lot of other stuff too) and her husband Chris runs the kitchen. They bought the estate in 2001.

I first found the Rossmount Inn because of a killer package deal - two nights in a queen room, two breakfasts and one three-course dinner in the restaurant - for $252. Total. For both of us. TOTAL. We hit the low-season rate, but the same package in the high season is only $319.

The house is all 1920s class, with a grand chandelier in the lobby in front of a grand staircase. The wide hallways upstairs have reading areas and coffee tables full of magazines. The bedrooms are furnished with antiques and simple country quilts but have modern bathrooms - and no TVs.

A path next to the inn leads up to Chamcook Mountain, the highest point in Passamaquoddy Bay. Really, it’s an easy half-hour hike up a hill, but mountains in New Brunswick are different from mountains in Alberta. At the top is a pretty view of the fall colours and the bay.

The dinners we had in the inn’s restaurant deserve their own entries, so here’s a small taste. For breakfast (included in the package), we had oatmeal soaked overnight in milk with yogurt and fresh fruit, as well as eggs, bacon, potatoes, toast and coffee.

So what, you might be wondering. Well, I loathe oatmeal. Like cross my arms in front of my chest, clamp my mouth shut, and furiously shake my head type of loathe. And I was hoovering this oatmeal, cleaning my bowl in minutes. It was smooth and delicious and unlike any lumpy oats I’d had before.

We did a lot of eating at the Rossmount Inn. Stay tuned for part II.

Rossmount Inn, 4599 Route 127, St. Andrews, New Brunswick, (506) 529-3351.
More info here.