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HAVENS
A Spot Where Home Buyers Are
Swayed by the Stomach
Marty Katz for The New
York Times
Heidi Eastham and her dairy
goats.
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By ANNE
GLUSKER
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Marty
Katz
for
The
New
York
Times
Eric
Plaksin
and
Rachel
Bynum
pick
peppers
in
nearby
Sperryville.
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 E
see it happen three or four times
every night," said Patrick O'Connell,
the chef and a co-owner of the
ultra-luxurious Inn at Little
Washington in tiny Washington, Va.
"They come, they eat dinner, they ask
us where the nearest local Realtor
is."
This, apparently, is how a trend
gets its start. Vacationers come to a
place that occupies a rarefied spot
in the culinary pantheon in this
case, the inn, located in
Rappahannock County, in the gently
rolling foothills of the Blue Ridge
Mountains, less than an hour and a
half from Washington, D.C. They
wallow in a fixed-price dinner (up to
$148 a person) that features the
bounty of a historically rich
agricultural area local hams, local
cheeses, local rabbit, local fruits
and vegetables, local wines. They
look around, maybe explore the hiking
trails in nearby Shenandoah National
Park, or, in the fall, do some
leaf-peeping on Skyline Drive. And
then they say to themselves, "Hey, I
could live here."
Thus has Rappahannock County
started to emerge as a second-home
paradise for foodies. Drawn by
organic farms, artisan cheesemakers,
abundant produce stands and the
presence of Mr. O'Connell,
culinary-minded home buyers have
started to snap up weekend properties
in the area, doubling real estate
prices in the last five years.
"A house that might have cost
$425,000 earlier this summer is now
up to $525,000," said Mitzie Young,
of Real Estate III. "Land is now
getting up to $10,000 an acre it's
the highest I've ever seen it." (Five
years ago, property in the most
desirable locations was selling for
about $5,000 an acre.) Recent sales,
Ms. Young said, have included "a
great old Victorian" with a pool, set
on 40 acres in the town of
Washington, that sold for $1.5
million.
Kent Brownridge, general manager
of Wenner Media, is a refugee from
the New York country house scene. He
gets on the Acela high-speed train
nearly every Friday night from New
York to head for the Rappahannock
County farm he bought two years ago
in Sperryville. "I looked in Greene,
Ulster, Columbia and Dutchess
Counties," he said. "I came close a
couple of times, but I never quite
found the piece of property that was
right. Now I have this wonderful farm
with seven horses and four dogs."
This part of Virginia has always
been popular for homeowners, many of
whom came for the tranquillity, the
views, or the proximity to Civil War
sites. But now everyone in the county
old-timer or newcomer seems to
have a gastronomic tidbit they just
can't wait to share: a favorite
orchard, a pet cheesemaker, a guy
over the mountain who has incredible
rabbit, the place to pick asparagus
or jostaberries. And tomorrow, the
fifth annual Taste of Rappahannock,
featuring locally produced wines,
meats and vegetables, will be held in
Sperryville, with tickets going for
$125. But anyone planning a
last-minute drop-by should forget it;
the event is already sold out.
John Fox Sullivan, the publisher
of The Atlantic Monthly and The
National Journal, and his wife,
Beverly Sullivan, have had a farm in
Flint Hill, north of Washington, for
18 years, and they recently bought a
second place two small cabins
joined together in Washington
itself. "The county has been getting
more attention in the last three or
four years," Mr. Sullivan said.
"Rappahannock is becoming chic. It's
a little bit like Sonoma County in
California."
Mr. Sullivan, like others in the
area, gives much of the credit for
the county's heightened image to the
Inn at Little Washington. The inn,
during its 25 years of operation, has
struck up relationships with farmers
and purveyors, encouraging them to
raise or produce items, from
shiitakes to candied grapefruit rind,
that they might have never dreamed of
or made only for family tables.
"The people the farmers and
growers were here before Patrick,
but he was the only one who tapped
into them," said Carol Joynt, owner
of the Georgetown restaurant
Nathan's, who recently bought and
restored a tiny house in Washington.
"Patrick gave fuel to that culture.
Some critics of the inn would say
that its impact on the county has
been overwhelming, but to me, it's
always had perfect pitch."
The old-timers who were supplying
the inn were joined in the 1970's and
80's by back-to-the-landers and
organic farmers like John Burns, who
has been raising organic produce at
his Goat Hill Farm in Washington
since 1988. In recent years, Mr.
Burns has been joined by a steady
trickle of idealistic confreres eager
to eke out a pesticide-free living on
a few acres.
Eric Plaksin and Rachel Bynum of
Waterpenny Farm in Sperryville
currently cultivate only 10 of the 25
acres they rent from a longtime
Rappahannock landowner. They run a
community-supported agriculture farm,
whereby people sign up and prepay
to receive a weekly allotment of
produce.
A very different kind of operation
is run by Heidi Eastham, of Rucker
Farm in Flint Hill. Mrs. Eastham
married into a family that had farmed
in the county for generations. While
her husband handled the cattle and
hay operations, Mrs. Eastham decided
to raise goats and produce cheese
from their milk. Her delicate, subtly
flavored chθvres are served at the
inn and sell out at Rucker Farm.
THE watershed event for the
county's farming resurgence came in
1996, when the former America Online
executive David Cole took his tech
millions and decided to invest them
in 600 acres devoted to sustainable
agriculture, whose goal is the
preservation of natural resources.
Mr. Cole and his team spent several
years revitalizing rundown Sunnyside
Farm in Washington, which now
produces everything from apples, once
the county's premier crop, to Kobe
beef. In 2001, Mr. Cole opened the
Sunnyside Farm Market, whose shining
wood shelves offer a range of
products, from wine and olive oil to
scones and pasta. Yet to come in
October is a combination
market-showplace in the center of
Sperryville, which Mr. Cole hopes to
use to spread the sustainable
philosophy to the hikers and
travelers headed to Shenandoah
National Park.
The fervor around food in
Rappahannock may approach the
religious, but there is a down-home
quality the come-heres (the local
term for newcomers) seem to catch
from the longtime residents that
keeps things from becoming
over-the-top precious.
"We love to be able to have a $130
meal at the inn, and then, right
across the street, a $2.30
cheeseburger at the Country Cafe,
with the best homemade cobblers and
pies," said Lynda Webster, who along
with her husband, William H. Webster,
the former head of the F.B.I. and the
C.I.A., has spent weekends on 75
acres just outside the town of
Washington for the last four years.
In the same breath, she speaks of the
nursery she loves, the orchard she
favors, the farmer whose herbs she
cannot do without and Burgers 'n'
Things in Sperryville, a roadside
stand whose menu highlights include a
vinegary barbecue and excellent
soft-serve ice cream cones. "That's
what's nice about Rappahannock," Ms.
Webster said.
The Websters had tried different
getaways before finding Rappahannock
spending time on the Eastern Shore
of Maryland and house-searching in
the hunt-country town of Middleburg,
Va. "In Middleburg, people dress up
every night," said Ms. Webster, who
runs a special events and
fund-raising firm. "We do that every
night in Washington. Why do we want
to do that in the country?"
A lack of property is a major
issue in Rappahannock. In 1986, the
county had the foresight to enact a
strict zoning policy requiring a
minimum lot size of 25 acres. The
environmentally conscious county also
encourages residents to put land into
scenic easements, thus preventing any
further development. Currently, 11
percent of county land is protected
by easements. Properties under 25
acres are rarities that were
grandfathered at the time the new
zoning regulations went into effect.
"At any one time," said Rick Kohler
of Real Estate III in Washington, "I
might have only 30 houses to show,
from the lowest priced to several
million." (The lower price being a
couple of hundred thousand dollars.)
Although the number of property
transfers in the county has risen 40
percent in the last 10 years to 590
in 2002 from 465 in 1997 and 420 in
1992 the actual number of annual
sales remains relatively low compared
with other popular second-home
destinations in the Northeast.
Beverly Atkins, the county's
commissioner of revenue, said that a
turning point was reached a few
months ago when a tract of 170 acres
with a 1970's house sold for $2.2
million, after going on the market
for $1.9 million. "We all said, `That
just can't be.' It was a well-built
house, but nothing special, not
elaborate. But several offers came in
on it. I guess the bidding wars have
filtered down to us."
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