Ancient Lore Village — Hotel in Knoxville

I’ve seen this place on Facebook so many times and so when we were planning a vacation a few months ago, I knew I wanted to stay here. We booked a couple nights at a rate of $299/night. We didn’t do anything like the archery or the axe throwing because it’s an extra $25 per person for each activity. Meals can be booked but they are also extra. That must also be arranged 48 hours in advance according to their website.

The staff for the most part was great. However, my husband and I both have been made to feel unwelcome by the younger staff members multiple times during our stay. They seem impatient with guests and give short seemingly agitated responses. The older (30+) staff members we interacted with however have all been chipper, informative, and very helpful.

There are no TVs in any of the rooms. They even mention in their brochure that the only TVs on the premises is one in the bar area outside and one in a common area. Just a note for anyone expecting a tv for entertainment in their room.

The first day we wandered around the area, which is truly beautiful. The grounds themselves are very lush and picturesque. But you do not get much privacy though. The best way to explain it is that you have basically a cluster of buildings connected in a row with common areas directly outside your door. It’s all connected and very open. To get to your room you must go through everything. I say this because if anyone is outside by the fire pit or playing games or in the bar, you will have to walk past them/interact with them. So, there are constantly people right outside your door. There is no back way into the rooms. I say all this to say that on our second day there was a wedding booked. We had not been made aware of this and knowing what we know now, I wish I could have cancelled our stay. The common area had been set up for a reception the night before and was basically unusable the entirety of our stay. Wedding guests were roaming outside the rooms the whole second day, so we felt as if we were intruding into their wedding by walking around and enjoying the grounds. Every time we stepped out of our room the entire wedding party would turn to look. It was honestly an awkward situation, because again, you have to go past everyone and everything to even leave your room. We just felt like we were in the way, but we paid good $ to be here so we wanted to roam. And because we weren’t part of the wedding and seemingly interrupting, several of the wedding guests would give us dirty looks when we left our room or if we were out walking around on the grounds amongst them. It’s all very close, much closer together than it appears online. So, if you’re expecting a beautiful hobbit town retreat with privacy and seclusion, you will be disappointed. It’s all very open and connected and the only privacy to be found is off on the trails or in your room.

Nothing was included with the stay. No meals, no drinks, not even the trial shampoos or body washes. Everything that you used would be charged to your card upon checking out. Anything taken from the fridge or any snacks provided were extra, and quite pricey. You’d think for the price you’d get more than a bed and a bathroom. I feel that for $299/night it wasn’t worth it. One of those days we planned to spend the whole day at the village but ended up leaving for a majority of it because of the wedding which lasted several hours past closing time for the main park. I truly do believe that visiting for a day trip would be worth it to see the village and take pictures, but staying the night is not worth the money. There’s isn’t much to do unless you pay extra for the archery and axe throwing. Otherwise just hope that your neighbors are more welcoming than ours were and try to enjoy the common outdoors areas together by the fire or playing the outdoor games (Jenga, connect 4, and corn hole.) I think that a pool or a hot tub would add value to the overnight stay but as is, it’s lacking. Save your money, stay the night somewhere else and just visit during the day for...

We made a short getaway up here as an anniversary trip. We love LOTR, WOT, and were really expecting a rather cheesy time. However I’d say it was overall a bit of a letdown.

1. The rooms are beautiful. But the A/C is not adjustable, and the beds do not sleep well. The coffee bar in room is nice though. Hot showers and lots of designer details in the rooms. Very clean and beautifully designed. For reference, we stayed in the orc house.

2. The “village” is just the rooms (not open to the public) and some outdoor spaces. The garden is attached to the village, not separate, and while the grounds around the rooms are picturesque, thats it. The only public areas are a small shaded sitting area, a game area with connect 4 and jenga, and a tower where there are some games and tables inside. The board games must have been a new addition as they still had their yard sale price stickers on them… It feels like there’s supposed to be more to do, but there really isn’t, unless you pay additionally for archery and axe throwing.

3)There is a trail area that’s okay but not very well maintained (several big trees down). At first I thought it might have been on purpose to add to a fae aesthetic, but then it was pretty clear that no, they’ve just not gone back here in a while. The map given doesn’t show the trail loop — there are markers but it doesn’t say what goes where. Ended up on someone else’s property in their backyard. The ponds are not well maintained and lack the attention to detail seen in the village.

4. we paid additionally for the romance package. It was expensive for some mini hersheys bars, pre-wrapped caramels, 4 chocolate covered strawberries and a bag of popcorn, and chocolate bark. The bark was nice but overall I’d say to skip, even with the bottle of Prosecco, wasn’t worth it.

5. we also paid for dinner on site. Chefs selection. Food was good portion, but overall a little bland and lacking charm and pizazz. Glad I didn’t have any dietary concerns as no one asked and the people who did ask were told that everything was already prepared (!!). Salad, basic chicken parm, and cheesecake. All were good, but not great. Definitely not “award winning chef”. Needs more flavor, better presentation, and a better drink service. No one was really taking care of the tables except to bring them food and take away plates. Would have been nice to have been offered other beverages or even refills on the one carafe of water. Even some direction of “hey if you don’t want water, there’s a bar inside” would have been okay.

Outdoor seating with large fans in +90 degree weather is not the best. Also there’s a large tree in the way of the view of the mountains.

6. Continental breakfast was supposed to be in the fridge but was not (dunno what it was supposed to be but nothing resembling breakfast was in the mini fridge). We were told instead we could have a hot breakfast.. for an additional $17 pp.

This place wants to be a resort/airbnb/wedding venue, and isn’t really doing any of the three very well. Pick one. If it’s a resort or a hotel, someone should be on site or on call 24/7, and make a restaurant and bar with hours and a menu. Maybe a spa. If it’s an Airbnb, take away all of the extras, put some Adirondack chairs out and make it a great place to drink a coffee or beer and look at the view (no sitting area near the hotel rooms with a view, gotta climb stairs). If it’s an all inclusive wedding venue, then just close up shop during the week!

It’s pretty clear they’re still trying to find their footing, and whoever did this doesn’t understand their target market. I don’t...

I really wanted to love this place as it is very cute and close to Knoxville; however, the Easter Brunch we attended today for $50 a head (for only that, nothing else) was an insult to say the least. They tell you to arrive promptly because service starts at 11:00, but there's only one small area of food and you have to wait for your table to be called to get the food. There's around 10 tables, maybe 12 that seat 8-10 so that's a lot of people. Unfortunately service did not start until 11:20 ( because of the back up at the bar, which I will go into later) and since we were the last table to be called, we didn't get our food until after noon. Oh before I forget unless you have a big party, you will be sat with other people. I don't mind that but some do and I don't believe they mention this on their website.

I truly do not understand where all the 5 star reviews are coming from (for brunch) because if you see the amount of food we were given (you can't serve yourself), you would laugh like we did! I've seen pics of the their regular Sunday brunches on google reviews and it is exactly the same on Easter, but apparently about $20 more! I was beyond disappointed. I would say it's about Cracker Barrell level, except CB is better! They give you 1 bottle of water per table to fill your glasses, about 8 people per table and it was about enough to fill 4 glasses. They also give you about 4 ounces of OJ. No one ever came back around to offer more water and there was no one around to ask! I felt bad for the people at my table who arrived after we did because the 3 of us used all the water.

I am still astonished at the food. I don't know if it was because we were the last table, but they literally gave me 1 piece of bacon. The rest consisted of 1 biscuit, a very tiny quiche that was cold, (sausage, ham, which I don't eat) potatoes (which were very good but you get about 5 and they are very small). You also get a little fruit , they had deviled eggs, muffins except by the time we got there, they only had 4 left, and cinnamon rolls. I'm not saying it wasn't enough food for me, but it was far from $50 worth especially considering the quality. Oh they also had small little balls of what they called crab cakes that tasted like something out of the freezer from Walmart.

Now for the bar area. I hate to be so critical but I still can't get over it. So there was a bar set up if you wanted drinks. Problem is there were probably 80 or so people who had to stand in line and there was ONE bartender. Almost everyone I saw leaving with their drinks had this yummy mimosa flight thing that looked great so I was excited about that. However as I am waiting, I over hear people ordering about 4-5 places ahead of me and they were told they were already out of Champagne 😲. So I had stood in line at that point about 30 min and when I heard that I just turned around and went back to my table. I felt really bad for the bartender. She was amazing but she had to keep telling people they were out of this and that. They also ran out of cranberry juice, like really. One poor guy was getting a cup of coffee (they did provide that at the bar) but when he asked if they had any sugar packets, the look on the bartenders face was so sad. Yes of course they were out of sugar for the COFFEE!!

If you want to visit, go. It will take you about 10-15 minutes to see the whole place. But do not eat the food unless of course they have some special special discount lol! I feel completely ripped off and will never go back. It's such shame because they could do so much more with...