FAQs & FineR Details

Do you serve afternoon tea?

We have high quality loose leaf teas and french pressed coffee available 24/7 in our drinks bar area, so tea time is whenever you want it! As per Wisconsin law, we are only legally allowed to serve you breakfast, so we cannot offer any kind of formal tea service or any other meal. Don’t worry, though, you will usually at least one kind of homemade baked good on the counter for you to nibble on and enjoy at other times during the day or night.

Was the house like this, was it a B&B?

Not at all! Before we acquired the property in May 2019, this was a family’s home. They had expanded it several times to keep up with their growing family (5 children!) but by the time we got on the scene, the home hadn’t been regularly lived in for almost a decade and there was a mountain of deferred maintenance necessary. Yes, we furnished the B&B completely. We’ve made many small modifications to the building, and will undertake a total reconstruction of the exterior deck starting in 2020.

Oh no, I’m allergic to dogs/cats! What now?

We hope you will take some comfort in knowing that Rita, our inside-outside cat, is forbidden from guest rooms and spends the majority of her inside time rotating between the living room and her favorite pink chair in the dining room. We vacuum very regularly, though if we need to we can also temporarily banish Rita to another area of the house that isn’t accessible to guests. Bogey the dog is a mountain breed of livestock guardian dog called a Maremma, and he never comes inside the main house. He’s not a big fan of buildings overall though he does loves cuddling with his furry friends in their house.

Outdoor seating

Fireplaces?

Air conditioning

Fragrances

Cots & extra people in rooms

Children

Can I rent the whole place out?

Trails?? Outside?

Did you grow this [insert here]?

Can you accommodate my [food restriction]? Can I just tell you what I want for breakfast?

What is there to do in the area?

When we were at [another B&B] they did [something else]. Why don’t you do [that]?

What a strange question! There are so many possible reasons we operate differently than another business elsewhere. Maybe what you’re asking is outside what we can legally offer. Maybe it runs contrary to our priorities of locally-focused food and ecologically minded stewardship. Maybe it’s an offering that doesn’t make sense for the majority of our guests or for the spaces we have. Maybe we just hadn’t thought of it! We enthusiastically acknowledge we aren’t offering the “traditional” B&B experience some travelers are looking for, but we have tried to communicate what we do provide as clearly as we can.

  • If you’re coming in from the east/Madison you’ll be driving west on 14. Swing a left on C (you’ll see signs for American Players Theatre, Tower Hill State Park, and Spring Valley Inn) and continue on C until you reach High Point Road, the first non-driveway street on your left. If you’re coming from from the east/Dodgeville, you will be turning right off of 23 right after the Frank Lloyd Wright Visitor’s Center but just before the long bridge over the Wisconsin River; this puts you on C from the other direction, and you’ll be taking a right on High Point Road this time. From High Point, take the second driveway on your left, which serves us (6901) and our neighbors (6903). Travel up the straight stretch of the driveway until you reach a split, then stay right. You will pass our vintage-camper-turned-chicken-coop on your right and the pasture on your left. Keep going, and the B&B is all the way on the top of the hill.

    We have Google pretty well trained now BUT you will want to make sure when you enter our address you put the town as ARENA, WI, not Spring Green. The limits of SG end only a few hundred yards from us but there is another High Point Road in Spring Green about 10 minutes away, and your GPS will take you to a non-existent address far out of your way if you miss this detail.

  • Our normal check-in window is from 3-8PM, and check out is 11AM. We leave this gap to allow us the time to turn over the rooms and clean up for the guests that are on their way, but if you need a check-in or check-out time outside this range, let us know ahead of time and we will do our best to make that happen.

  • That’s always our goal! But as we are a two-woman operation, with both of us working at least full time at our jobs outside the B&B there will be times we can’t be around to greet you as we all hope.

    If that is the case, we will have your check in materials ready for you on the teak desk just to the left of the main door. You will find your keys, and information about the Inn and about the peculiarities of your room. They are all different, after all!

  • We’ll leave the lights on for you! We only ask that you be mindful of our other guests by keeping quiet in the common areas and on the porch in the late evening and early morning. We have warm-colored safety lighting on the interior stairs to guide you up to bed, but if you don’t feel this is enough light for you, especially if it’s been raining outside, don’t trust your memory and do use the wall switches.

  • Part of our focus on local food production is eating seasonally! Our breakfast menu changes from day to day based on the availability of ingredients, and the considered needs of all current B&B guests. That said, we do strive to accommodate all reasonable food restrictions* (allergies, intolerances, etc.), but we need to know about them ahead of time. That’s why we ask about this when you book and we check again with you when you arrive, in case anything has changed in the meantime. It is your responsibility to supply us with this information so we can plan accordingly and provide you with a delicious home cooked breakfast.

    *An example of what we consider “unreasonable” is seeing what we have prepared fresh that day, deciding that you don’t like the offering, and trying to “order” a different breakfast or worse, entering the kitchen and rummaging through our supplies to try and make one yourself. DO NOT DO THIS.

  • For Saturday and Sunday mornings, 9:00AM. If you come by around 9:30 and we’ve been optimistically trying to keep your souffles warm, it is your fault they have overcooked.

    We offer different options for breakfast seating (dining room, sunroom as the weather allows, small tables within each suite…) so you may or may not be sitting together in a room with other parties. From our own travels, we understand that sometimes a quiet, private breakfast is what our guests are after, though we’re sorry to disappoint those who consider the communal meal a hallmark of the “B&B Experience”. You’re welcome to try and strike up conversations with fellow guests if you choose, of course. We’ve watched new friendships grow over the course of a weekend!

    On weekday mornings when we can’t offer our usual breakfast schedule, we will arrange an open breakfast buffet for you to enjoy on your own time, starting around 8AM.

  • NO. This is not a subject open to negotiation.

    Please DO NOT help yourself to the major appliances, including the main refrigerator, freezer, pantry, ovens, range, knife block, or the cookware. If you need utensils or extra dinnerware for food you brought into the B&B, we are happy to help you with whatever you need. We urge you to STAY OUT OF THE CENTRAL KITCHEN. We reserve the right to charge a $50 fee per person for each infraction of this rule.

    If you need another accommodation (like enough fridge space to fit a birthday cake!) please get in touch with us ahead of time.

  • Not exactly. We do all of the Birdhouse’s laundry on site but our laundry room is NOT for guest use and we would take no responsibility for any damage to your items. If you are traveling and need to wash your clothes, Spring Green has a laundromat.

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