La Tourelle Inn and Spa on Danby Road in Ithaca is the best hotel in the Ithaca area and it's not a competition anyone else in that radius is really entering. Five stars for a property that understands what it is: a boutique inn on the south end of Ithaca, elevated above the gorges, with a spa and a restaurant and the specific quietness that comes from being two and a half miles from the Commons without being in the city's street noise.
The rooms are done correctly. The proportions are right, the bedding is the quality you expect when you're paying up, and the views facing the hills have the Ithaca landscape at its most composed. The Bistro at La Tourelle is attached to the property and operates at the same level — that review is its own entry, but the short version is that dinner there followed by a night in the inn is the argument for a Finger Lakes trip that doesn't require renting a cabin.
Ithaca by Firelight Camps is essentially on the same land, which is a different version of the same high-quality experience for people who want the outdoor format. La Tourelle is for the version where your accommodation involves a mattress that justifies talking about it afterward. Worth every cent of the rate.
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