By Andrea Sachs
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, April 6, 2008; P08

All aboard the hotel room.

In truth, my "cabin" at the Fulton Steamboat Inn wasn't departing from the dock anytime soon, nor were my accommodations at the Red Caboose Motel ever going to pull out from the depot. Yet, with a little imagination, I easily could have imagined a flurry of confetti and a wave of hands from well-wishers as I embarked on a great journey in Lancaster County, Pa.

A hotel room doesn't have to be as utilitarian as bed, television, extra roll of toilet paper. Overnight accommodations can become destinations worth REM deprivation. Disney and Las Vegas, of course, perfected the idea of theme hotels, indulging guests who wish to role-play as pirates, New Yorkers or pre-feminism princesses. But you don't have to go Mickey or broke to find such fantasyland beds: Pennsylvania Dutch country, of all places, boasts two hotels that capture the romance of travel in rooms built for sleep.

"We tell everyone we're going on a cruise . . . to Lancaster," said Francine Davio of Clarksburg, who was attending the Knights of Columbus's weekend reunion at the Fulton Steamboat Inn, the third visit for the group of 34. "It's always smooth sailing."

From Route 30, the hotel looms up like a ship tossed inland by a tidal wave. The 97-room property mirrors the design of the 19th-century steamship created by Robert Fulton, who was born in a farmhouse only miles away. The shipshape hotel has two black smokestacks that compete for air space with silos on nearby Amish farms, a red paddle wheel above the entrance and a moat that gives the impression of being at sea. (Unfortunately, ducks stand in for seagulls, koi for sharks.)

The nautical theme continues indoors as well. Each floor is named after a deck (Promenade, Observation and Sun), and the lobby decor is Victorian-era Love Boat, with gilded mirrors, ladies-in-waiting velvet couches and old-fashioned boat prints. Music perfect for a costume ball or tea party is piped into the hallways and elevator. Better than a loop of Celine Dion's "Titanic" theme song.

The 18-year-old hotel is in the midst of a major renovation that will make the rooms even more seaworthy. (Due to a busy holiday weekend, I was assigned a room that in a past life was an office, hence the expansive Staples-style desk and Murphy bed -- for late work nights?) The 25 refurbished nautical rooms -- the others are in a stagey Victorian style -- will feature an oversize steering wheel on the wall or the bed's headboard, gold and blue linens and carpeting, gold-striped wallpaper that evokes wood planks and patterned curtains that swish like waves. "It's like Disneyland," said general manager Peter J. Chiccarine. "It's in costume."

And it's not so hard to stay in character. While relaxing by the indoor pool in the glass-walled bow, I spotted a silvery shark fin slicing through the water. I left before I could fully see what lay beneath (I assume a kid in a "Jaws" bathing cap).

* * *

For my second day in Lancaster, I tested my sleeping-car skills on the Strasburg Rail Road before moving into the Red Caboose Motel for the night.

The property's overnight digs include two baggage cars and 38 cabooses. (For those not raised on model train sets, a caboose is a freight train's tail, which provides the conductor with office space and simple shelter.) By comparison, the tourist Strasburg train was a coal-powered steam locomotive with Victorian flourishes. During the 45-minute ride, I fake-dozed comfortably in my velvet seat, stockinged feet up, head bent toward an unadulterated agrarian landscape.

The cabooses were much more austere but a million times more fun. As soon as I arrived, I ran around the rows of cars painted in bright LifeSavers colors and displaying the names of their former lines. The downside was that I experienced train envy. My rust-brown caboose from Pennsylvania paled beside the cherry-red Florida East Coast Railway model and the screaming-orange Illinois Central train.

That was the critical adult in me; the wide-eyed kid was full of glee. I had a whole car to myself, which included two rooms, each with a bed; a small table overlooking farmland; a microwave and fridge; and a bathroom with all the necessary plumbing. The cupola's high windows let in light and a natural fresco of sky and treetops. I could also sit on a back porch and look into other guest's cabooses, unless they closed their Thomas the Tank Engine curtains.

"It definitely brings out the kid in you," said Lori Zuba, whose three children and husband were touring the property before driving back to New Jersey. "This to me would be a photographic memory."

Before the cabooses hosted visitors, they were orphaned workhorses that Don Denlinger bought as a joke at a 1969 auction. Denlinger, a local developer who also built the Fulton Steamboat Inn, started with 19 cars, then expanded to the current number, which also includes two dining cars (the trains date from the 1900s through the 1950s). In 2005, Larry DeMarco bought the dilapidated property with the goal of restoring its former glory and innocence. "I am trying to take you back to old-time family fun," said the 48-year-old Philadelphian, a father of two.

Guests can play with goats, sheep and Lucy the pony in the petting zoo out back; watch films projected on the outside of a barn; take in the view from atop a silo; and bump down country roads in an Amish buggy. (Activities are seasonal.) The dining car serves three meals a day, and if you eat your broccoli, you can press a button at the hostess station to make the car shake as if you were really on the rails.

The motel sits beside the Strasburg Rail Road tracks, and the next morning, I waited on my caboose porch for the locomotive to arrive. I heard the whistle first, then spotted the plumes of white smoke. I walked the few steps to the tracks, sat on a bench, then felt the blast of motion fluff my hair. I waved at children pressed up against windows and returned the twinkle in the conductor's eye. Then I returned to my caboose. Who had train envy now?