We have stayed in many B&B's through NSW, South Australia, Victoria and Tasmania and every year we still come back to Finches of Beechworth. Over the 6 years that we have returned to Finches we have grown to love the Beechworth area, Finches and the lovely Peter and Carol - our kind hosts and owners of Finches.
My wife will never forget when we first booked our weekend at Finches and she received a hand written letter from Carol confirming our booking and welcoming us to Finches. In our experience it is rare to find such genuinely lovely B&B hosts. Peter and Carol are also blessed to have the lovely Bronwyn to help out during the busy periods. Bronwyn is a treasure and such an asset to Peter and Carol's business.
We look forward every year to our annual trip to Beechworth, travelling all the way from Sydney. It is the only holiday that is always booked year to year with Peter and Carol. We initially came to stay at Finches to attend the Wangaratta Jazz Festival, and every year we spend less and less time at Wangaratta and more and more time sitting on the veranda at Finches having coffee and tea and carrying a conversation with Peter and Carol’s dogs – Miffy, Finbar and Bridie. Even more pleasant are the pre-dinner drinks on the veranda with the other guests.
We love having breakfast on the veranda, when the weather is warm enough, and if not breakfast inside with the open fire is simply wonderful. Dinners in Beechworth are a joy, and the Beechworth restaurants must be some of the best in country Victoria. My wife is on first name basis with all the shop owners in Beechworth, and one or two of them even know me by name – probably from the imprint of my well-worn credit card. We are so lucky to find Finches on our first stay in Beechworth, when Peter and Carol had just bought the business. We have found a home away from home, and made some lifelong friends along the way. As Julia Roberts said in Notting Hill – “Lucky Me”!

My wife and I have just returned from our 6th or 7th stay at Finches in Beechworth and had another immensely enjoyable weekend.

Beechworth itself is a wonderful town with much to do. Having been there so often I'm starting to feel like a local but every time that we are there we find something else to do that we hadn't yet discovered and the citizens of Beechworth and it's surrounds are so friendly that I wonder if there isn't something in the water.

But back to Finches Guest House. On EVERY occasion that we have stayed there we have been made to feel incredibly welcome by Carol and Peter O'Neill; the owners of Finches and your hosts. This is a couple who know how to do B&B. Always a tea or coffee and cake on arrival and sometimes a beer or champagne on the verandah. There is always an offer to book dinner at one of Beechworth's many fine restaurants (try Wardens, Gigi's, Provenance or tapas on the balcony of the Nicholas Hotel.). Always an effort to accommodate our room request. Always time for a friendly chat; Peter and Carol have both led professional lives before Finches and traveled widely themselves so there is never a shortage of things to talk about. Having said that though, please don't get the idea that you need to make small talk if you don't want to. Your hosts are very sensitive to the needs of their guests and if you're looking for peace and quiet and privacy both are happy to leave you to yourself and blend quietly into the background.

Finches has 7 or 8 guest rooms and we have stayed in a few of them. All are in keeping with the heritage of the building with top end furnishings, great linen, heating and cooling, magazines, extra blankets and each room has it's own bathroom so no queuing behind other guests in the morning. Rooms are cleaned daily. Of particular note is how quiet Finches is; no noise travels from other guest rooms.

Breakfast is a highlight. Carol takes the orders and Peter does the cooking. Always fresh fruit salad and yoghurt, fresh juice and a cooked to order hot breakfast. Think, eggs as you like them, excellent bacon, fresh bread, tomatoes, mushrooms etc. The majority of it is produced and sourced locally. Oh, and there is always a selection of newspapers for those who need their news fix in the morning.

Finches is a standout establishment to spend a couple of nights and too keep coming back to. A truly beautiful property with stunning gardens (I understand that there have been more than a few weddings and celebrations hosted in them), in a magnificent historic town with lovely hosts who truly know what they're doing and how to make their guests feel incredibly special. I cannot recommend Finches highly enough. Very few B&B's do it as well as Finches and none do it better!

My father and I did quite a bit of research before deciding on Finches. This was the perfect place to stay in Beechworth - a town that is gobsmackingly beautiful and a must for anyone in the area. The O'Neills are so friendly and went out of their way to ensure we had the right room and everything we needed.

They recommended a restaurant a short walk away for dinner, called Gigi's, which was truly excellent. The owner, Alan, was so knowledgeable and we had a degustation menu to die for, accompanied by beautiful wines.

I can't wait to go back to Beechworth, as one night wasn't enough. When I do, I'll definitely stay at Finches and look forward to chatting with Carol and Peter again. They are just lovely people. I can't recommend this B&B highly enough. Particularly if you like a homely atmosphere and love Scottie dogs!

We booked this guest house online for 2 nights for our 1st wedding anniversary. The room we booked was the one with the queen size bed and fireplace.

Upon arrival the guest house was picture perfect, just like in the photos. It's run by a husband and wife, and the wife greeted us, sat us in the lounge with the fireplace going, served us tea/coffee and biscuits, and with a wealth of information about the local restaurants she helped us choose a perfect restaurant for our anniversary.

When we were shown our room, my husband first noticed the bed looked a bit small for a queen, and she explained that it was an "antique" queen. She did offer us another room with a more modern queen size bed, but it had no fireplace and was nowhere near as pretty as what we'd booked, so we rejected the offer.

That night we hardly slept. My husband struggled with the shortness and narrowness of the bed and decided there's no way it was a queen size bed. Even if the bed itself is "antique queen", the more modern mattress could only be a double.

So that morning he went to ask if we could change rooms. The husband-manager was on duty and he protested that we had been offered the other room and had rejected it. He whined that because of us he would have to make the bed and clean the room.

We moved all our stuff to the other room, which did have an actual queen size bed, and on our way back out we saw him making the bed in the original room, went to thank him and he outright ignored us. We apologised and he outright ignored us. When we saw him later in the day, he continued to ignore us, except for a creepy look he gave us.

We were so shocked and felt so uncomfortable being there, that if we hadn't already booked that second night online, we would have left that morning and stayed at a motel anywhere instead. But we were stuck there and wondered whether he'd spit in our breakfast the next morning. Fortunately the wife was back on duty the next morning and she was lovely. The husband remained creepy.

I mean, come on, if your guest has a problem you just deal with it and be gracious about it. That's what customer service is about. If they'd (or, the husband-manager) dealt with it properly, gave us the other room with no complaints and no attitude, it would have been fine.

Also they need to describe that bedroom with the fireplace as having a DOUBLE not a QUEEN. That's false advertising and most people expecting a queen will be very uncomfortable on that bed.

Oh one more detail: the rooms didn't have any tea/coffee facilities or TV, which means you have to go out into the lounge room with the other guests for those, which isn't nice if you're still in your pyjamas!