The Lady K: cafe by day, tavern by night

The question gave Majka pause. Coffee shops do coffee, brew pubs do beer. The place offered three meals a day, and beer, but had no particular focus. After some thought, Majka figured out his niche.

"We do vacations," he says. A customer's escape in this Western Mass. spot might last five minutes or two hours, but however long, the owner wants his cafe to feel like a break. What surrounds the cafe helps make that possible. You can hear the rushing Sawmill River in the dining area and see it through the tall windows set into the 200-year-old former mill. There's no traffic outside and the only shopping in the area is the giant Book Mill, which shares the building and has the slogan "Books you don't need in a place you can't find." The Lady K, as locals call it, caffeinates customers in the morning; they arrive on skis or bikes, depending on the weather. By day you'll find students and strollers, by night couples and groups of friends.

Majka thinks that part of Lady Killigrew's appeal is the inconvenient location. The Lady K is located at the intersection of Greenfield and Turners Falls roads, about a 15-minute drive from Amherst. Make the effort to get there, Majka's thinking goes, and you're rewarded with a spell of relative serenity - unless you come during a Red Sox playoff game, about the only time the cafe's TV is on. Rosanne Daryl Thomas lives just a half-mile away and considers the cafe her home away from home, she says. She likes the food, the coffee, the environment. "This is just really fortuitously located," says Thomas. "It's like a psychological vacation."

When Majka took the helm (his business card calls him "captain"), Thomas says he did the best thing he could for an already well-loved spot. "He was smart enough not to be radical," she says.

One thing he did do was increase operating hours, forcing him to find ways to be a breakfast spot and a nighttime watering hole. Big windows let the daylight flow in, emphasizing the exquisite view of the river. At night, he dims the overhead lights and sets out candles to create a different ambience. "We play a lot of tricks with that," he says. He expanded the outdoor seating area to 70 seats, adding to the 32 inside.

To be both local tavern and destination cafe, he has to mix up the offerings. Beers on the chalkboard range from the $2 Narragansett in a bottle ("We didn't want to price people out," Majka says) to the $8 Southern Tier Gemini on tap. The ample warm brown rice salad is hearty with a variety of textures and colors. Grilled sandwiches include tofu with peanut-ginger sauce and Asian cabbage or curried chicken with cheddar. The menu stays the same all day.

Sam Fayyaz of Northampton comes in two or three times a week. "This is the best place in the area," he says.

Lady Killigrew Cafe, 140 Greenfield Road, Montague, 413-367-9666, www.theladykilligrew.com