Silver Birches — Hotel in Greene Township

First, I'd like to start by saying that my partner and I stood at this hotel in March of 2022 and another time just recently - May of 2023. When we stood here last year, we really enjoyed our stay which is why we decided to book again after a failed attempt of booking in Lake Placid this year. We figured we already knew the hotel and felt comfortable booking again. We still enjoyed our stay this year but we did want to note a few things this time:

Room: The room we stood in was the Deluxe King Room in the sunset building. It's the exact same room we stood in last year so we knew what to expect already. We loved our room and found it to be very cozy! The bathroom has a more modern feel compared to the actual room which I didn't mind at all. The bathroom had a wonderful rain shower with great pressure and hot temperatures and the room itself has a jetted whirlpool tub which I absolutely loved!

Now here's to the downside of room - our room was on the second floor with a beautiful view of the lake. It's an old building so you hear absolutely everything. As soon as someone opens the main door to the building, our room door would shake and rattle. Our next door neighbors are also extremely close and you may hear conversations. This is something to just keep in mind. The most disappointing part of our stay was the fact that we were woken up at 5am two days in a row due to intense banging/stomping. We at first thought it was coming from downstairs since no one was above us but when we went down to listen, we couldn't figure out where it was coming from. It sounded like stomping aimlessly back and forth or a consistent banging that would stop and then start again a few minutes later. It shook the whole building. You could feel the vibration everywhere in the room. Pretty upsetting especially to experience 2 nights in a row as we thought maybe it would be a one time occurrence. We didn't get much sleep that weekend and were tired for mos

Service: Service is incredible. We didn't even want to complain about the noise we were hearing because everyone was so nice and we felt so bad. We are not big complainers. We usually keep things to ourselves and decided to spare the hotel staff with any complaints because everyone really was so warm and welcoming and lovely and we didn't want to be a bother.

Breakfast: Last year during our stay we had breakfast at The Dock each morning of our stay. It was amazing. So many options, a very big hot breakfast that really helped us save on cash since we didn't have to eat out every the morning. I guess as of recent The Dock is no longer serving breakfast and instead, the hotel staff offers a continental breakfast consisting of oats, plain yogurt, apples, oranges, orange juice, some muffins and boiled eggs. While the effort is extremely appreciated, it just didn't compare to the hot breakfast we once had there. We still found ourselves going out for breakfast and spending more than we were expecting. I wish I would have asked about the breakfast prior to booking but I assumed it would be the same as last year. We feel we definitely lost out in that department.

Overall, we still had a great time! Being by the lake is so peaceful. We always look for the positive even though something might not be the best. The hotel does offer champagne toasts every night and occasional fun get togethers like a cheese board in the library. If you are someone looking for a cozy room with a beautiful view, I would give this place a shot! The staff are some of the friendliest hotel staff we've ever encountered and it doesn't go unnoticed. We are thankful to everyone who worked hard to try and make our stay...

Just... quite lacking. We booked rooms at Silver Birches about a year ahead of time for my grandparents 60th wedding anniversary as they honeymooned on Lake Wallenpaupack years ago. A few months before the trip, they told us they had to cancel our reservation because the rooms became unavailable. They shucked half of our family over to the Retreats at Millbrook Cove 5 miles away. Still with access to the grounds. The Retreats have a nice view, plenty of room, a good layout, and nicely powerful A.C. Appears no renovations have been done since 1970s. Deteriorated bathroom vanity drawers were covered with paper, which fell off in places, other times very visible glue was smeared about to hold the paper in place. I think my state college dorm room decor was nicer. Either red nail polish or blood speckled the large bathtub. Just so odd. The rooms at Silver Birches were nothing to write home about, but better in comparison. Large balconies. Thankfully my grandparents had a room there.

More concerning was the general vibe of the Silver Birches. Yes kayak and paddle boards were included to rent with the rooms, however they are in poor condition and only available to use after 9AM. Now, this is a very crowded lake. Many powerboats and jetskis after 9AM. Say goodbye to your thoughts of a peaceful 7AM kayak. The "activities center" = a folding table with a young man attending... was not open until 9AM to help us rent. We offered to bring the kayaks down to the water ourselves if they would point us in the right direction, but they said no. Had to sign a waiver to use a kayak. Hmm, never had to sign a waiver to rent a kayak in my life.

The pool complex was beautiful. I will give the resort credit here. However what was up with the $250 Cabana rentals? Taking up so much space, and we didn't see anybody renting them for that price. Nicer resorts have nicer cabanas included in their room rate. Also, only one of the three doors to the pool complex was open so that the "activity center" could monitor who was entering the pool zone. Making sure they had wristbands. Fine, but the slope of the property is so steep that my disabled grandparents could not get down to the pool area from that one door.

On that note, the entire property was quite inaccessible for my elderly grandparents. Uneven grounds, minimal walkways, crazy steep inclines. They had a volleyball net set up, and it appeared to be at at 45 degree angle. Was that a joke? I don't know. Don't bring anyone with disabilities or they will be essentially trapped in their living room/balcony. The grandparents did enjoy their daily breakfast at the restaurant, they happily braved the uneven terrain and risked a broken hip for the food.

Thank you to the young man who attended the activities center. He was busy lugging kayaks and paddleboards all day once he arrived at 9AM. Loading the clueless city-dwellers into the water. Very polite. Otherwise, the attitudes of the staff were poor. Generally unhelpful. Would say no without offering another option. Any request was a burden for them. No smiles. They were not pleased to help you. Acting like they are working at the Four Seasons.

Better off choosing a different resort, or renting a house. If you're looking for nature and peace, pick a different lake entirely. Lake Wallenpaupack is far from pristine. Crowded waterfronts, zooming boats, trashy people with loud music....

We just returned from a really disappointing stay at Silver Birches. We booked “the Big House” at a hefty price tag of $3,000 for 3 nights over Memorial Day weekend. The condition of the house left a lot to be desired. Several of the blinds were broken in the DOWN position so we could not see the lake (we used rubber bands to try to tie them up again). Many of the window cranks were broken so the windows didn’t open, and many of those that did open had missing or broken screens. (Why rent a lake house if you can’t see the lake or open the windows?). Stains on the carpet, water marks on the ceiling, not enough flatware in the house to accommodate the 10 people the house sleeps, closet doors that were off track, deck furniture dumped in a pile and not set up for us, a grill that was so dirty it caught on fire when I tried to make dinner, broken furniture, nametags still stuck on doors I guess indicating assigned rooms for the previous renters??... I could go on – but the most upsetting part was the response from senior management. The manager on duty (Rose) and the groundskeepers informed us that a group of college students had rented the house just before us and held a house party with more than 50 people sleeping over. They said the kids “destroyed” the house and Silver Birches wasn’t able to address all of the issues before our stay. I told them that I understood their predicament but that I didn’t think I should be expected to pay full price when the home was not in the condition it should be. The manager understood and called the CEO (COO?) to see what could be done. According to her, his response was, and I quote, “Absolutely not…things happen…there are no refunds or reimbursements.” She reminded him of the house party and he said, “I will not take that into consideration.” I’m sorry, what? Seriously?

Other notes – communication around the place is problematic. When you call the “front desk” you are first directed to a call center not on the property and then bounced to the main desk (where frequently no one answers). When we called about the scheduled live music we were alternately told “it’s happening outside now” (it wasn’t); “there is no music scheduled this weekend” (there was); “it was canceled” (it wasn’t); “it’s been moved to the restaurant” (bingo). The one and only restaurant reservation we could get mysteriously disappeared from their books and I had to beg them to accommodate us on our final night. The place is dog-friendly and not all guests pick up after their dog so in addition to all the geese poop there’s dog poop lying around too. If you are mobility-impaired and not staying at the Inn or the close-in cottages, you’ll have a lot of trouble navigating the extremely steep hill b/c there are no pathways. The place boasts a lot of activities but heads’ up that they own multiple properties and not all of the activities actually take place at Silver Birches. The sunset toast which was scheduled to happen never took place (I waited for it). Again, I could go on. It was just overall an (extremely costly) disappointment with a shockingly rude COO.

On the positive side – beds, sheets, and towels were comfy. Paddleboards and kayaks were fun. View from the bar area was stunning. Too bad we couldn’t really see it through the broken blinds from our overpriced...