A Rockport Massachusetts hotel, is Cape Ann's only historic grand hotel. Referred to by many as a "baby grand," this lovely Rockport inn is an historic gem. Thirty-six beautifully appointed rooms have been restored to reflect the quality of yesteryear with amenities that discerning travelers seek today, including private baths, spa tubs, private enclosed balconies, televisions, Wi-Fi, and telephones. Two vacation rental cottages adjacent to the Inn offer the ideal surroundings for family vacations and reunions or corporate retreats, with decks, ocean-view yards, and even a backyard BBQ.

Travelers' Reviews on BedandBreakfast.com

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What our Guests Say...

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My late Autumn stay at the Emerson

Having stayed in hundreds of modern hotels from San Diego to Maine, Seattle to Miami, none have given me the moment-to-moment feeling of being home in the old mansion house we rented when I was young, than the Emerson. Accented by the old creaking boards of the great stairway when descending to the living room, the array of colors from the carpet to the furniture and decorations, which greeted me each morning, was deepened and enhanced by the sunrise streaming through the ocean-side windows at dawn. Climbing these same stairs at the end of a long day brought peace of mind, as the absence of sunlight mellowed these colors and settled me for sleep.

Touring the hotel was like a small adventure as the irregularity of floors and differences in room decor linked by them again made one feel at home, where different rooms were occupied and evolved according to varying tastes by those who lived in them. I contrasted this ambience to recent hotels mass produced by economical cookie-cutter construction with repeated furnishings in room after room. I have – and many have often said – they would wake up in a hotel room and not remember in which the city they’d just slept. It couldn't happen at the Emerson.

In an interesting way, it makes one feel unique as an individual, makes you feel that your experience is important through that uniqueness, that you are not just another person experiencing the same room, the same elevators, the same décor, the same plastic rooms of a modern hotel. It actually matches a key message in Emerson’s essay Self-Reliance when he states “There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried. …” No one living each moment at the Emerson can – or should – escape this experience so well described by its namesake.

Modern hotels cannot reproduce the character of this experience, the sense of history and permanence, the feeling of uniqueness and individuality that I experienced at the Emerson. I imagine other historic hotels can produce a sense of uniqueness, but my experience at the Emerson will always be special, and I will always remember where I was in the world and how I felt moment to moment when I stayed there.

Thank you,

Bob D.