Hotels in Auburn, Maine.

Auburn is the smaller, quieter half of the Lewiston-Auburn metro. It sits on the west bank of the Androscoggin River with about 25,000 residents and a working-class history — shoes, textiles, granite, and a Franco-American community that arrived by rail in the 1880s and stayed.

For visitors, Auburn is the convenient base. Most of the hotels in the L/A area cluster along Center Street and Washington Street, exactly where Saffron Inn is. I-95 Exit 75 is 1.5 miles. Portland Jetport is 45 minutes. Lewiston — and Bates College, CMMC, and the downtown food scene — is two miles across the Peace Bridge.

Whether you are here for graduation, a hospital stay, a ski trip to Lost Valley, a college visit to CMCC or Bates, a contractor week, or a long balloon-festival weekend in August — Auburn is the side of the river that makes the rest of the visit easier.