Ski Brule — Attraction in Stambaugh Township

Alright, usually I don’t write reviews like this but Ski Brule should legally not be able to provide lodging for future customers. My boyfriend and I are from southeast Wisconsin. We planned a snowmobiling and snowboarding trip a month prior to our stay at Ski Brule. (which we have never been) Very sadly enough, My little cousin was found dead in a Chicago hotel and due to the circumstances we were not able to head north for our vacation. I called Ski Brule to ask if they did partial refunds or any other accommodation like moving our vacation dates. They apologized and told me no. Fine. I get that. We then booked again two weeks later and paid full price for three night stay. We got there at 1pm in the afternoon. We were early but the place was DEAD, so we attempted to check in. The guy and lady in the office was very nice. Told us that they still had to do some cleaning and it would be an hour or two. Cool that’s alright, we figured we would go get drinks and food for lunch and check out what they had to offer. We went up stairs to the one lodge bar they had. There was one bartender, she was nice as well. Slow but nice. We got our drinks and ordered some Mac n cheese bites to munch on as we looked at the rest of the menu. As we settle in and are enjoying ourselves and our drinks, we are ready to order food. The bartender comes around with a paper plate with 6 Mac n cheese bites that are COLD also no side of ranch, ketchup, etc... and says I’m sorry but we’re actually closing the kitchen. But was very nice to give us the Mac n cheese bites that were sitting in the cafeteria all day. We did appreciate that because we were hungry. We spent probably a total of 45 minutes before we got a call from the office saying our chalet was ready.||||Our stay at Hell’s Window||||When we got to the cabin, we were very excited to get inside. It was a beautiful area and the house seemed to be beautiful as well. When we got inside, we knew right away that the place had not been updated in a long long time. We are clean people, maybe even overly but we were not impressed with the cleanliness whatsoever. Right away we could feel a breeze through the whole place so boyfriend made us a fire. There was no matches. No lighter. Small bundle of wet wood. No newspaper. And the fan worked only on one setting, high. But it didn’t work because the fan made loud banging noise as soon as it was switched to on. We got out of the house and went to get food since we couldn’t get it at Ski Brule. When we got back we made homemade meatloaf and hit the tub and watched tv. Small old old ANCIENT TV. We tried every bed to see what crappy bed we really wanted. We went with the downstairs by the bathroom. As we are falling asleep, we hear dripdripdrip drip drip drip to the right of the bed. Leaking roof. Cool. Catch the sleep we can, wake up in the morning to make breakfast and drink coffee like every other human. Such limited dishes in general but due to making meatloaf the night before I had to wash the dishes we used. There was an old, very old used dish scrubbie. And the only one available. Gross. Wash the dishes, make food, wash the dishes again and go to put them away. There is a DEAD MOUSE laying in the back of the cabinet used to store dishes! Seriously so gross and it smelled so it had to have been there for however long it takes for a dead mouse to stink terriblly. There was no rugs anywhere in the place which made it super slippery when using the hot tub or walking in from the snow. We got snow the day before and a lot of it. We had to go down to the office to get a shovel to shovel the walk way. On the last night of our interesting stay, we were sitting in front of the fire enjoying some tv. The wood stored outside was damp and didn’t have a tarp or anything to prevent the wood getting wet. When we finally got the fire going, it was going. Because no fan and wet wood, so we loaded that baby up. Doing that, not sure if the glass got too hot or if the wood just laid on it inncoerrecly but the glass cracked. We left the place a million times cleaner then when we arrived. And you Ski Brule people know that.||||Now listen to this.||||They had the audacity to charge $770 dollars to the credit card on file for damages. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA. $770 dollars. Where in the heck you get that number, there is something wrong with you. No receipt or justification for that amount of money. No email. Nothing. That fireplace wasn’t even worth $200. Explains a lot now. Ski Brule won’t exist much longer...for lodging that is. Disgusting. And I wasn’t even going to post a review but since you think you can take money that doesn’t belong to you. I will expose the true information and true experiences we lived. ||||We take many vacations together. And EVERY stay we have ever had we have great reviews about leaving the place as we found it if not better and they would love for us to stay again. We will never...

Alright, usually I don’t write reviews like this but Ski Brule should legally not be able to provide lodging for future customers. My boyfriend and I are from southeast Wisconsin. We planned a snowmobiling and snowboarding trip a month prior to our stay at Ski Brule. (which we have never been) Very sadly enough, My little cousin was found dead in a Chicago hotel and due to the circumstances we were not able to head north for our vacation. I called Ski Brule to ask if they did partial refunds or any other accommodation like moving our vacation dates. They apologized and told me no. Fine. I get that. We then booked again two weeks later and paid full price for three night stay. We got there at 1pm in the afternoon. We were early but the place was DEAD, so we attempted to check in. The guy and lady in the office was very nice. Told us that they still had to do some cleaning and it would be an hour or two. Cool that’s alright, we figured we would go get drinks and food for lunch and check out what they had to offer. We went up stairs to the one lodge bar they had. There was one bartender, she was nice as well. Slow but nice. We got our drinks and ordered some Mac n cheese bites to munch on as we looked at the rest of the menu. As we settle in and are enjoying ourselves and our drinks, we are ready to order food. The bartender comes around with a paper plate with 6 Mac n cheese bites that are COLD also no side of ranch, ketchup, etc... and says I’m sorry but we’re actually closing the kitchen. But was very nice to give us the Mac n cheese bites that were sitting in the cafeteria all day. We did appreciate that because we were hungry. We spent probably a total of 45 minutes before we got a call from the office saying our chalet was ready.||||Our stay at Hell’s Window||||When we got to the cabin, we were very excited to get inside. It was a beautiful area and the house seemed to be beautiful as well. When we got inside, we knew right away that the place had not been updated in a long long time. We are clean people, maybe even overly but we were not impressed with the cleanliness whatsoever. Right away we could feel a breeze through the whole place so boyfriend made us a fire. There was no matches. No lighter. Small bundle of wet wood. No newspaper. And the fan worked only on one setting, high. But it didn’t work because the fan made loud banging noise as soon as it was switched to on. We got out of the house and went to get food since we couldn’t get it at Ski Brule. When we got back we made homemade meatloaf and hit the tub and watched tv. Small old old ANCIENT TV. We tried every bed to see what crappy bed we really wanted. We went with the downstairs by the bathroom. As we are falling asleep, we hear dripdripdrip drip drip drip to the right of the bed. Leaking roof. Cool. Catch the sleep we can, wake up in the morning to make breakfast and drink coffee like every other human. Such limited dishes in general but due to making meatloaf the night before I had to wash the dishes we used. There was an old, very old used dish scrubbie. And the only one available. Gross. Wash the dishes, make food, wash the dishes again and go to put them away. There is a DEAD MOUSE laying in the back of the cabinet used to store dishes! Seriously so gross and it smelled so it had to have been there for however long it takes for a dead mouse to stink terriblly. There was no rugs anywhere in the place which made it super slippery when using the hot tub or walking in from the snow. We got snow the day before and a lot of it. We had to go down to the office to get a shovel to shovel the walk way. On the last night of our interesting stay, we were sitting in front of the fire enjoying some tv. The wood stored outside was damp and didn’t have a tarp or anything to prevent the wood getting wet. When we finally got the fire going, it was going. Because no fan and wet wood, so we loaded that baby up. Doing that, not sure if the glass got too hot or if the wood just laid on it inncoerrecly but the glass cracked. We left the place a million times cleaner then when we arrived. And you Ski Brule people know that.||||Now listen to this.||||They had the audacity to charge $770 dollars to the credit card on file for damages. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA. $770 dollars. Where in the heck you get that number, there is something wrong with you. No receipt or justification for that amount of money. No email. Nothing. That fireplace wasn’t even worth $200. Explains a lot now. Ski Brule won’t exist much longer...for lodging that is. Disgusting. And I wasn’t even going to post a review but since you think you can take money that doesn’t belong to you. I will expose the true information and true experiences we lived. ||||We take many vacations together. And EVERY stay we have ever had we have great reviews about leaving the place as we found it if not better and they would love for us to stay again. We will never...

The skiing here was as advertised. Worthy of a 5 star rating for sure. Not a huge mountain, but a great variety of trails with something for everyone in the family. They were in great condition and very nicely groomed. The lift operators were some of the nicest we have come across, very friendly and helpful. Our family of 5 skied for 3 days and the time just flew by. The only thing that would have been nice is if the trails were lit for night skiing and the chair lifts operated at night. What little bit is open after dark really isn't worth skiing, and the rope tows are not easy for everyone to use.

We stayed in the Pioneer Lodge. All I can say is that if you stay there, don't have any expectation above a warm place to sleep. The rooms are very outdated. Outside of a coat of paint and maybe a new refrigerator, not much has been done for a very long time. Walls and ceilings are stained in many places where water has leaked, floors were dirty, and walls are bare. The track of the sliding door was full of dead bugs...something we noticed in the first minute of walking in the room, so not sure how this is missed by housekeeping. There was a pile of seeds behind the bathroom door and it doesn't take much speculating as to how or who made that little stash. The hot water ran out after only one shower, but knowing this we could plan accordingly. There were plenty of pillows and blankets. The gas stove was a nice touch. The two fold down bunks are located in the hallway. There were also no rugs when you walked in the door or in the hallway. Considering this is a north woods ski resort and you are tracking in snow and slush, a rug would have been really helpful in keeping the rest of the floors in the room dry. Overall the room was very basic, but it was warm and dry. We brought all of our own food and the small fridge and freezer worked well for all of our food. The kitchen area, although small, had everything we needed for 3 days worth of meals for 5. The nice thing is that our kids are young enough that all 5 of us cuddling on one day bed in the living room watching movies and sleeping on fold down bunks in the hallway make for a great weekend!

Overall we also felt like the service wasn't the best. The lift operators were amazing and very friendly. The people in the lodging office, gift shop, and lodge cafeteria area all seemed very short and just not that friendly. On Sunday, we did observe two staff people going table to table in the lodge talking with people and just making sure everything was going well. Although we did not speak with them, that was really nice to see. When we checkout out they just took our keys and walked away. Didn't ask if we enjoyed our stay or if everything went well. Overall we just did not get that warm fuzzy feeling that made us want to make the 10 hour round trip to...