Shepherdstown is easily the prettiest village in Panhandle West Virginia, built in the mid-1800s and thus a showplace for late-Federal architecture. Its shop-lined business district lies along German Street, where up a ways you’ll find the Thomas Shepherd Inn, named for the town’s founder. The innwas built in 1868 as a Lutheran parsonage and expanded in 1937. It’s a gracious place that would look at home in Colonial Williamsburg, with green molding, inset shutters, and a spacious courtyard garden in the rear. Though it’s been an inn since 1984, Margaret Perry, who loves to sew and cook, took over in 1989. Her breakfasts can be elaborate, featuring eggs Benedict with caviar and French toast made from brioches. All guest rooms have polished floors, Oriental rugs, and handsomely coordinated upholstery and spreads, but the favorite is Room 6 because ofits garden view, claw-foot tub, and four-poster bed. The inn has become a prime way station forbikers and hikers on the C&O Canal Towpath, and for people heading for Maryland’s Antietam Battlefield, 5 miles north. Harpers Ferry is 10 miles to the south.
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