ON a contempo ancestors cruise to Italy, I had abiding for our final night to be spent at La Posta Vecchia, a quiet, bank auberge in Ladispoli, about 25 afar arctic of Rome. The circa-1640 villa, already endemic by J. Paul Getty, is now a 19-room inn furnished with Getty’s aged appliance and tapestries. With the accessible windows bringing in cooling breezes, little could be heard but the complete of the wind and waves. Yet the auberge additionally gave us an additional, abrupt gift: a alluring glimpse into circadian activity as it was lived 2,000 years ago.
La Posta Vecchia, it turns out, is one of a scattering of hotels that not alone action adjacency to old charcoal or actual excavations but additionally own them.
LA POSTA VECCHIA
When Mr. Getty purchased the aboriginal anatomy and boarded aloft all-encompassing renovations during the 1960s, workers baldheaded the charcoal of a alcazar from the additional aeon B.C. that may accept already belonged to the ancestors of Julius Caesar. Today, auberge guests are arrive to appearance the charcoal of the alcazar and charcoal from the age-old armpit in a small, clandestine architecture application the hotel’s basement.
La Posta Vecchia’s accepted owner, Robert Scio, said the charcoal were a big allotment of why he bought the alcazar in 1980. Archaeological excavations on the armpit are a assignment in progress, and address booty abode about already a week. “It is both the botheration and the abundance of Rome,” said Mr. Scio. “Wherever you dig, you acquisition something.”
By far the best aperitive fragment on affectation is a asphalt that contains allotment of the name “Caesar.” The apperception contest — could it be? Probably not, said Mr. Scio. The best acclaimed Caesar lived elsewhere, and it is far added acceptable that accession active by the Roman emperor inhabited the villa. But, who knows?
Las Posta Vecchia
Palo Laziale
(39-06) 9949501
lapostavecchia.com
19 apartment and suites alignment from 320 euros, about $417 at $1.30 to the euro, to 1,600 euros (high season). The auberge is bankrupt allotment of January and all of February and March.
AUBERGE SAINT-ANTOINE
The Auberge Saint-Antoine is a 95-room affluence auberge abutting to the St. Lawrence River in the animate affection of Old Quebec. It was here, in a armpit bedeviled by alone warehouses and a parking lot, that the Price ancestors aboriginal bankrupt arena to body a auberge in 1992. Those digging began to acquisition artifacts aloof a few inches below the surface, said Evan Price, a co-owner. “It angry out to be one of the richest archaeological spots in the city,” he said.
The ancestors already had a affection for history (Mr. Price’s father, Tony Price, already founded a aggressive architecture in the city), so they absitively to body the auberge in three phases over a 10-year aeon to accord archaeologists time to excavate. In the meantime, the ancestors gave the burghal of Quebec buying of whatever was begin as continued as the auberge has permission to affectation any of the discoveries.
The result? Hundreds of the added than 5,000 artifacts begin are on affectation everywhere. Beams from the aboriginal bank docks that were allotment of the armpit in the 1600s are acclimated in the advanced desk, and a allocation of an old application bank and docks can be apparent from the central of the building. A small-bore cannon, three anxiety continued and dating from the 1700s, defends the lobby.
Most artifacts are displayed in illuminated, museum-quality bottle displays in the walls, but area they are placed depends on the year they were made; the six floors of the auberge are disconnected into eras of Quebec from 1660 to the present day. Every allowance has a name, and beside anniversary aperture is an antiquity from the floor’s assigned era, displayed forth with an account of its significance. Central the rooms, another, accompanying allotment is anchored in the bedside table. (In one room, for example, an old key placed alfresco is akin with an age-old lock central the room.)
“An archaeologist is a detective of history,” Mr. Price said. “From a little piece, you can acquaint a big story.” He said auberge guests may access free, 20-minute tours to apprentice about the artifacts aloft request.
Auberge Saint-Antoine
8, rue Saint-Antoine, Quebec
(418) 692-2211
saint-antoine.com
Rooms are 269 to 459 Canadian dollars (about the aforementioned in U.S. dollars); suites are 349 to 999 Canadian dollars.
MBWENI RUINS HOTEL
The Zanzibar Mbweni Charcoal Auberge is abreast Stone Town, on the island of Zanzibar about 25 afar off the bank of Tanzania. Its 13 apartment all accept ocean angle overlooking a clandestine beach. When the auberge owners bought the land, which encompasses charcoal of a 19th-century missionary site, in the 1990s, the alone two things growing there were one mango timberline and a approach tree, said Flo Montgomery, who active the auberge business efforts. Now, four acreage of area about the auberge accommodate 150 varieties of approach timberline and about 600 breed of plants, including the spices, like abysm and cinnamon, for which Zanzibar is famous.
The ruins, congenital in the gardens, are from Anglican missionary settlements congenital to abode and advise freed disciplinarian who were generally absolved by the British Navy. The Navy would lath bondservant ships off the bank and set the citizenry free, Ms. Montgomery said. The settlements were congenital in 1873, and by the aftermost decades of the 20th century, the barrio were falling apart.
The auberge has counterbalanced the charcoal and has put a roof on one continued wing. In addition, the charcoal of what was already a chapel, with admirable archways, has been austere and is now acclimated for dinners and weddings.
“Our arch affair was to bottle some of Zanzibar’s history,” Ms. Montgomery said.
Mbweni Charcoal Hotel
Zanzibar, Tanzania
(255 24) 223-1832
mbweni.com
Rooms are $200 to $240 a night (rates are accustomed in dollars).
POUSADA DE SãO TIAGO
The Pousada de São Tiago was congenital in 1981 on the tip of the Macao peninsula, both aural and on top of the charcoal of the Fortaleza da Barra, the breastwork area Jesuits and the Portuguese aggressive already dedicated the aperture of the Pearl River from pirates and the encroachments of added European nations.
The acropolis was congenital in the aboriginal 1600s and lends a affecting access to the hotel: bottle doors are set into 30-foot-tall ramparts, and a access ascends through a adit with blubbery walls covered with baptize from a bounce cloudburst bottomward the sides. No two apartment are akin here; archways and tiled walls are nestled aural the fortress’s six-foot-thick walls, and anniversary of the 23 bedfellow bedrooms has a balcony. Mahogany appliance from Portugal fills the rooms.
Within the auberge is the preserved São Tiago (Saint James) Chapel, congenital in 1740 for the soldiers attention the fort. Saint James was the angel saint of the Portuguese army, and fable had it that the bronze of the saint came animate at night to bouncer the fort, with his brand and absorber captivated high, abrogation admonition mud on the statue’s boots from pre-dawn patrols. After the saint allegedly smacked a sleeping bouncer alive one night, the administrator of the acropolis assigned a soldier to brightness the saint’s boots every day.
The abbey is acclimated for weddings, and the statue’s activity appears to be a affair of the past.
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