Where to Stay in Citrus Country

There is a particular pleasure to waking in citrus country with the windows open. The air carries something the rest of Southern California has largely paved over — orange blossom in spring, the green-pith tang of fruit on the trees in winter, the dry mineral smell of the San Bernardino foothills at first light. The places worth staying here understand that smell is half the reason you came, and they build the rest of the experience around it.

The belt rewards a slow itinerary. Base yourself in downtown Riverside for arched colonnades and walkable history; in Redlands for brick, jacaranda, and a preserved Victorian-and-Craftsman streetscape; or out toward Highland, where the groves still run in working rows and a cottage among the trees is a real possibility rather than a marketing line. What follows are three composite portraits of the kinds of stays the region does best — grand, boutique, and grove-side — each chosen for how completely it lets the landscape into the room.