Inn for a Real Treat : County B&Bs; let you escape without venturing far from home. The settings are pastoral, accommodations elegant to cozy. And all offer a big dose of charm.

So you want to get away from it all. Just for a night or two. No cooking, no cleaning, no kids, no chaos.

No time.

No time to drive to that little getaway four hours up the coast. No time to fight the Los Angeles traffic and fly to that little getaway. What to do?

Stay right here in Ventura County. Book yourself a room at a bed and breakfast inn. There are at least seven operating in the county, including the two newest ones in Santa Paula.

Feeling romantic? How about the Madame Pompadour room at La Mer in Ventura. Along with the elegant French decor, you get an ocean view, wood-burning stove, balcony and private entrance.

Feeling sultry? Check out the Casablanca room at the Fern Oaks Inn in Santa Paula, where the canopied wicker bed lends a tropical feel, and you can watch the moon rise over the mountains from a private veranda.

Bed and breakfast retreats are on the rise in California. But they’re not the casual European-style bargain spots they were once patterned after. Now they are somewhere between cute and elegant, and the prices are up there with the nicer hotels.

In California alone there are 760 B&B;’s (more than 500 north of Monterey), with a burst of new ones in the last five years, according to the California Assn. of Bed and Breakfast Inns.

Why the popularity? People can no longer afford to take the traditional two-week vacation, so they scout out spots they can get away to for two days, according to Cheryl Eigenhuis, owner of the Fern Oaks Inn.

“They don’t want to spend all their time on the road,” said Eigenhuis, whose clientele is mostly from the Los Angeles area, but with a surprising number from Ventura County.

One local was Mary Doll of Santa Paula, who splurged on her 40th birthday and spent the night there with her husband, Dan. That would have been special enough, but the couple also invited friends to stay overnight and enjoy a catered dinner Eigenhuis prepared for the occasion.

“We all had breakfast in the morning,” Doll said. “I had all my friends around me. It was a great birthday.”

If you decide to try out a B&B;, here’s what you’ll need to know:

* Expect to pay an average of $120 a night, according to the association’s state-wide estimate. In Ventura County, the cost ranges from a low of $50 for a room with a shared bathroom, up to $155.

* Most inns now provide rooms with private bathrooms. The owners agree that people are more hesitant these days to share a bathroom with strangers.

* Although some places will serve you breakfast in bed, be prepared for the communal breakfast, which brings you face to face with strangers over coffee cake and Belgian waffles. “People make friends--they exchange addresses,” said Gisela Baida, who owns La Mer with her husband, Mike.

* Expect a cozier ambience than a hotel, a historical flavor, antiques and collectibles, complimentary wine or tea in the afternoon, distinctive rooms, better quality linens, libraries and usually a congenial owner on the premises.

* Don’t expect a television or telephone in the room, swimming pool, fax machine, gift shop or someone to carry your luggage to your room, which often is up a flight of stairs.

* In older inns (and most of them are) be prepared for thin walls. This was a drawback for a Ventura couple whose stay at a local B&B; was crimped by the chatty couple in the next room.

There may be other pitfalls. Dave and Terri Slone, who celebrated their 15th anniversary recently at La Mer, will tell you about the B&B; they once stayed in along the central coast. “It was at the on-ramp to the 101,” Terri Slone said, “and the 18-wheelers. . . .”

Bed and breakfast inns have transformed over the last 10 or 20 years, according to Sandy LaRuffa, director of the state association, based near Santa Cruz.

What was then a sideline for someone with a big house and a spare bedroom or two is now a full-blown business. “It’s moved from being a hobby to the professional arena. They’ve upgraded tremendously.”

Here is what you can find in Ventura County:

SANTA PAULA

Fern Oaks Inn: Owner Cheryl Eigenhuis bought this rambling 1929 Spanish-style home and turned it into an elegant four-bedroom B&B; three years ago.

Located at the edge of Santa Paula on the road to Ojai, it’s impossible to miss. It’s a peach-colored stately two-story house, canopied by giant oak trees and surrounded by rose gardens and fruit trees.

The house, which was for years the residence of a doctor, has a large living room and the formal dining room is fitted with an eight-place table where guests eat together. Or they can eat in the cozier kitchen nook.

Eigenhuis prepares a full gourmet breakfast. Here’s a sampling: New Orleans-style French toast baked in carmel with strawberries and whipped cream, or maybe eggs Oscar. She bakes her own buttermilk biscuits and cinnamon rolls.

Throughout the day, guests can help themselves to hot apple cider, homemade cookies and fruit. In the afternoon she offers sherry, and each room has chocolates and flowers.

Eigenhuis, an interior designer, has given each of the upstairs bedrooms a theme, such as the “Williamsburg Room,” with its four-poster bed.

With the Oriental rugs and decorator touches, the elegant feel is pleasantly offset by Eigenhuis’ dog, Sam, a Pomeranian who charms guests with his snoring.

Details: Rooms, all with private baths, range from $95 to $110. The only television is in the living room. Grounds include pool-patio area. For information, call 525-7747.

White Gables Inn: If you want a homier feel, try the 100-year-old home of Bob and Ellen Smith. It’s a three-story Victorian house on a historic residential block.

The Smiths remodeled it into a B&B; three years ago, after they retired from jobs with Southern California Edison. Avid antique lovers, they have crammed the house with their finds--furniture, dolls, lamps, claw-foot bathtubs.

One of the three bedrooms has an elegant antique wood bed with a massive intricately carved headboard. Another, called the “Bear Room,” is furnished with antiques and the couple’s teddy bear collection. A third room takes up the entire third floor and is a favorite with honeymooners.

The house is certified as a historic landmark and was used as a rest home and boarding house. It has a front porch where guests can sit to enjoy the feeling of the old residential neighborhood with its tall trees.

In the dining room, guests sit together at a big table for a formal breakfast. Waffles--Belgian or maybe macadamia nut--are frequent entrees, with Bob Smith, chairman of Santa Paula’s planning commission, at the waffle iron. Coffee cake, made from Ellen Smith’s mother’s recipe, is another staple. They also offer sherry to guests.

The comfortable inn feels like someone’s home, especially with the piano in the living room, books, personal knickknacks and family pictures throughout. The Smiths acknowledge it is their home first, which makes the place all the more appealing.

Details: The rooms, all with private baths, range from $85 to $115. Television in the living room. For information, call 933-3041.

OJAI

Theodore Woolsey House: Who is Theodore Woolsey? He was the dean of international law at Yale University in Connecticut before he built this 5,000-square-foot New England-style home off Ojai Avenue in 1887.

His wife was ailing with tuberculosis, according to local history, and Woolsey thought the hot spring spa, then located across the road, would be helpful. The couple lived in the two-story stone and clapboard house with their two sons, Heathcut and Salisbury.

Today the rambling house is owned by Ana and Phil Cross, who bought it in 1983 and, after extensive remodeling, opened it as a B&B; in 1987. It’s set on seven acres with a big lawn, pool, towering trees, a rose trellis at the entrance and a long shaded veranda.

The large living room has a comfortable rustic feel--hardwood floors, a stone fireplace, loaded bookcases and an ivy plant with vines that run the length of the room. Besides a piano, there is a 1950s Wurlitzer jukebox full of oldies.

The six rooms are furnished with antiques in keeping with the period of the home. (One is done in a French decor.) Some have fireplaces and televisions. Most have full bathrooms but for one, it’s a short trek down the hall to a shared bathroom with a brick chimney in the middle and an old-fashioned pull-chain toilet.

In the dining room, there are four tables where guests can eat alone or with others. The Crosses serve a buffet-style breakfast they call expanded continental. They set out coffee cakes, breads, croissants, bagels, cereal, yogurt and fruit.

Be sure to take a look at the oak tea cart that holds the breakfast goodies. It’s an old gynecologist table--complete with stirrups--that the couple picked up at a flea market.

Details: The rooms, most with private baths, range from $50 to $110. On the weekend there is a two-night minimum. For information, call 646-9779.

Ojai Manor Hotel: This venerable two-story building, with its big front porch, is Ojai’s oldest structure. Built as a schoolhouse in 1874, it later served as a hotel and rooming house until Mary Nelson opened it as a B&B; 10 years ago.

It’s downtown, one block off Ojai Avenue, making it easy to traverse the town on foot. With its clean, simple lines and hardwood floors, the hotel reflects its schoolhouse period. You won’t find flowery wallpaper and decorator glitz. Instead the feel is tasteful simplicity.

All six rooms are along an upstairs hallway and there are three bathrooms at the end of the hall. Two of the rooms have balconies, and one, called the treehouse room, overlooks a sprawling oak.

Nelson is always on the lookout for unique finds at flea markets, swap meets and antique stores. In one of the rooms, the large headboard for the queen-size bed is made of decorated tin. In another, the quilt is a rare design. And in the living room, she displays her collection of sculpted hands.

Nelson serves a buffet-style continental breakfast in the dining room where the table seats eight. Guests can pick from apple cake, breads, cheeses, cereal and fruit. Nearby is a wood-burning stove that provides heat during chilly months.

She keeps sherry and other beverages on hand for guests who can relax in the garden or in big chairs on the front porch. There is no television.

Nelson grew up in Ojai and her family bought the hotel in 1955. In the 10 years she has run the place, she has seen people spend their honeymoons there and then return for their anniversaries.

Details: Rooms, with shared bathrooms, range from $90 to $100. For information, call 646-0961.

Casa de La Luna: This is the house the Scott family built. Doris Scott and her late husband Bud built the 5,000-square-foot Spanish-style home themselves in 1968, modeling it after a Colonial hacienda they had seen in a village in northern Mexico.

It was the 1984 Summer Olympics that drew them into the bed and breakfast business. When the call went out for Ojai Valley residents to open their homes to athletes, the Scotts did exactly that.

Afterward, they expanded the guest quarters. Now there are seven rooms--three in the main house, two in a converted caretaker’s home, and two others on the grounds.

The buildings are part of a seven-acre estate they call the Gardens of Perpetual Spring, so named for the 2,000 flowers, shrubs and trees the family has planted. Ancient oak trees envelop the long driveway leading to the main house, lending to the secluded feel of the place.

The huge wooden front doors open to a spacious entryway with a high, beamed ceiling. Doris Scott and her daughter, Carol Barr, are artists and the house is filled with their work. Together they painted an exquisitely rendered rose on the dining room ceiling. Bud Scott, who was a retired dentist, carved the long dining room table.

A different entree is served for breakfast each day. It might be Belgian waffles and scrambled eggs one day, or eggs and hash brown potatoes topped off with an English muffin on another. The orange juice is squeezed from oranges grown on the property.

When you take a seat at the breakfast table, be sure to face the window. You’ll look out on an aviary where two dozen or so canaries and other birds flutter about.

Details: Rooms, all with private baths, range from $80 to $95. On weekends there is a two-night minimum. For information, call 646-4528.

VENTURA

La Mer: If you want a taste of Europe, come to La Mer. The place has many continental touches, from the flags flying out front to the German heritage of owner Gisela Baida.

Each of the five rooms is decorated with a different country in mind--France, Germany, Austria, Norway and England. The “Peter Paul Rubens” room has a European bed more than 200 years old. The “Captain’s Coje” has a Norwegian nautical theme with a custom-designed ship’s bed and maps. All but one of the rooms has a private entrance.

Gisela Baida and her husband, Mike Baida, bought the 1890 Cape Cod-style Victorian house and converted it into a B&B; nine years ago. The house, which sits on a hillside overlooking downtown Ventura and the ocean, was originally owned by Robert Brakey who, in the city’s early days, operated a house moving business.

Guests enjoy breakfast with an ocean view at two tables in a rustic nook off the small parlor. There they can dig into Bavarian fare that includes cakes, breads, cheeses, fruit, croissants, muesli (made by Gisela Baida) and black forest ham. She collects fresh eggs from the tidy little chicken coop adjacent to the house. Guests may request a soft-boiled egg, which arrives topped with a crocheted covering in the shape of a hen.

The couple provide some other nice touches: a complimentary bottle of wine, champagne or sparkling cider, European chocolate bars and bed sheets that are hand-pressed. The rooms have old-fashion radios that play tapes of vintage radio mysteries.

Details: Rooms, all with private baths, range from $105 to $155. Two-night minimum on the weekends. The only television is in the parlor. For information, call 643-3600.

Bella Maggiore Inn: This bed and breakfast inn has more of a hotel feel to it than the others, perhaps because it has 24 rooms and it’s wedged into a downtown business block.

Named for Lake Maggiore in northern Italy, the inn has a European ambience that visitors experience as soon as they see the carved stone on the front of the building and the window awnings.

Inside, the lobby has an impressive Italian chandelier, grand piano, artwork and a fireplace. But the inn’s most stunning feature is the large ivy-covered courtyard where guests eat breakfast at private tables. Nearby a fountain spews water, and the trees overhead filter the sunlight.

Here guests get a full breakfast--omelets, French toast or maybe Greek-style eggs--along with a cold buffet of fruit, bagels and muffins, cereal and yogurt. Recently the inn opened its courtyard dining to the public too.

Upstairs, the rooms all have telephones and televisions. They are not decorated with antiques and collectibles but they do have some charming touches, such as the hand-painted scrollwork on the walls.

Another charming, not to mention historical, touch is a ghost named Sylvia, who, as legend has it, was a prostitute during the 1940s. She fell on hard times and hanged herself, the story goes. Now believers say her presence is felt in the aroma of cheap rose perfume.

The building was renovated in 1984, and has been managed by owners Tom and Cyndi Wood since then. In the 1920s and 1930s, it was “El Nido Hotel.” The building was designed by Albert C. Martin, who also designed Ventura’s City Hall and Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Los Angeles.

Details: Rooms range from $75 to $150 on the weekend. For information, call 652-0277.

Details

* FYI: For information on bed and breakfast spots in the state, you can call the California Assn. of Bed & Breakfast Inns, located near Santa Cruz, (408) 464-8159. They make referrals.

* GUIDEBOOK: The association put out a guidebook this year that includes more than 200 listings with descriptions, prices and phone numbers. The guidebook is available free from the state. To request one, call 800-862-2543, but it may take a couple of weeks to arrive.

* UP THE COAST: There are also 16 bed and breakfast inns in the Santa Barbara area, including two in Summerland. One, the Simpson House, located in downtown Santa Barbara, was recently awarded the American Automobile Assn.’s highest rating. Many of these places have a two-night minimum requirement on the weekends. For information, call 800-676-1266.

* OUT TO SEA: Smuggler’s Ranch is your kind of B&B; if you really like to get away. A 105-year-old, two-story adobe building with two-foot-thick walls, the ranch is on Santa Cruz Island, 25 miles across the Santa Barbara Channel. It has been open for business for several years, but accommodations were primitive. Recent renovations, however, restored the building and added hot showers and flush toilets. Meals include native Santa Cruz Island leg of lamb. Fly in to a private airstrip. Friday and Saturday night, with flight and meals included: $315 per person; Saturday night: $235 per person. Reservations: 310-430-2544.