Mill Falls Resort Collection at the Lake — Hotel in Meredith

Overall: Mill Falls at the Lake (in our case the Chase House) is nice, but certainly less nice than you'd expect for the price. Decor and furnishings were dated and vaguely shabby. Staff are wonderful, friendly and helpful, but the town of Meredith and is really what lets this location down. There is a total lack of pedestrian infrastructure, a huge downside when the complex is so spread out along a busy road. The loud, busy Route 3 ruined any enjoyment the balcony could give, and getting most places requires crossing the road and navigating narrow sidewalks where you feel like a car mirror going 50mph is going to take out your arm at any moment.

Detailed review: My wife and I booked Mill Falls at the Lake as a location for a 10th anniversary weekend getaway. We aimed to hit peak foliage (though we missed it, not the hotel's fault) and really just wanted somewhere we could relax, enjoy each other's company, see beautiful scenery, and feel a bit pampered. We succeeded in two out of four of those.

We stayed in the Chase House, so this review will speak mostly of that. First, the rooms and lobbies are definitely a bit less nice than I was expecting. All the carpeting and furniture look to date from the 90's and it's all just pretty worn and tatty looking. The room was a nice size, everything was comfortable, but for what we spent (nearly $2,000 for three nights) I expected quite a bit more in the feeling of luxury, which was definitely not present.

We sprung for a room with a balcony and a view of the lake, envisioning mornings of coffee on the balcony, enjoying the chilly fall air and beautiful views.

When we opened the curtains the first thing we noticed was the windows were grimy and unwashed. I know it's late in the season (mid-October) and some attrition is expected, but it somewhat ruins the effect of looking out over the lake.

The balcony itself was nice enough, but here the problems with the town of Meredith and the overall location come up. The balcony of our room looked out over...a parking lot. Past that was another parking lot. Past that was the busy Route 3, running right in front of our hotel, with loud traffic. Oh, then another parking lot. THEN the lake! We tried sitting on the balcony, but even in the evening the road noise is so loud we could hardly speak to each other over it.

Part of the draw of Mill Falls is the sort of complex it's part of. Restaurants, spas, pools and hot tubs are spread among the various locations. We thought walking around and exploring would be fun. However, moving between them is not an enjoyable experience. It requires navigating numerous parking lots with few sidewalks or even clear ways for pedestrians to transition from one parking lot to another safely. Half of the locations are on the other side of the highway and require crossing the road, which can be harrowing (lots of large trucks and traffic moving fast).

We tried to walk out to a nature trail near the hotel. Again, this required crossing the road, and we ended up on a sidewalk that honestly I didn't even feel safe on. Cars were passing us doing 50+mph literally inches away. On the SIDEWALK, less than a quarter mile from the hotel.

We went to sit out by the lake (again requiring crossing the road). The traffic noise ruined any peaceful feeling.

By this point I think the point is made. If you want a relaxing feeling of nature, you will be disappointed. If you want luxury and a posh vibe, you will also be disappointed.

Again, staff were wonderful. The food was great. We went on a scenic train ride and a sunset cruise. They were lovely. Overall we enjoyed our time. However, it was tempered with the disappointments. Some of those were within the hotel's control. Many were not. In any case we do not plan to come back...

Hello, I want to share my recent experience at Church Landing in Meredith New Hampshire, so I am hoping my email finds its way to the correct people at this organization.

My family and I are returning guests at this hotel and have always enjoyed our stays and experiences here, until this most recent time. We called to book a room and, in the past, have reserved one of the cottages due to the fact that it was pet friendly. We were told that the cottages are now no longer pet friendly and that there were only certain rooms that were (none were available at the time). Understandably we booked a regular room and figured we would check back for cancellations. A few days before our stay my husband called the resort to see if any pet friendly rooms opened up, and we were told by another worker that we were able to bring our dog but that we just had to pay an extra $50 per night for a pet fee. My husband asked them to please make sure that was the case since this is not what we were told in the first place and she assured him that it was correct.

We have a 4 year old Rhodesian Ridgeback and he is a great well behaved dog. He is very friendly and loves people and unfortunately has cancer. We try to take him with us as much as possible, so we were very excited to be able to include him in our time away. When we arrived at the hotel we discovered we were mis-informed but front desk was great and told us since we were given incorrect information the dog was welcome to stay in the room with us. Our Disappointing part of the stay didn't hit us until our encounter with the General Manager Barbara Beckwith.

My family, the dog and I were returning from a walk when we passed Barbara outside of what I assume was her office. She followed us down the hall and asked me if "that dog was staying in that room with us" and when I said yes her response was " Well does the front desk know this? I explained to her what our situation was and was immediately told that she has had "bad experiences" with dogs and is traumatized and in the past, there have been dogs with fleas and that I should never have been allowed to bring him into this room. "This is not a dog friendly room and now this room has to be put out of commission for 24 hours and it has to be fumigated, and it can't be rented again for another few days". There were a few annoyed sighs and eye rolls thrown in that mix as well. Then she also mentioned " and by the way do you know the dog policy is dogs under 40 lbs?" No I don't because no one ever told me and I don't work here.

She has every right to ask these questions however her first step should have been to talk to the front desk to find out if I did in fact sneak a dog in. If the front desk said they were unaware, then approach me. But her approaching me to first accuse me of sneaking a 105 lb dog in the hotel and then lecturing me on all the work she now has to do to bomb the room because my dog is a so-called flea bag wasn't the right way to go. I was disgusted and she ruined my time with my family. I felt uncomfortable the rest of the time there and could not believe someone in her position handled the situation that way. I am not her employee; I am a patron who paid for a hotel room and paid an extra $50 a night to have my dog with me. If sneaking past the front desk with a 105 lb dog bred for Lion hunting is possible then call me Houdini.

My assumption from my short visit with Ms. Beckwith is she isn't a fan of dogs, but there are a lot of people who consider them part of their family. I hope she does better next...

After having our wedding and honeymoon postponed due to the pandemic, my husband and I were looking for a local spot to spend a mini moon and Mills Falls came highly regarded. We were very excited for our stay in late June and followed up with the hotel to let them know it would be our honeymoon destination. We never received any response back from the hotel and they didn't say or do anything to help us celebrate this exciting occasion, which was disappointing. When we arrived at Chase House, the check in desk was vacant and had a sign saying to use a phone "behind you" to call for service and check in. The phone did not exist, we looked everywhere for it. My husband called the phone number for the hotel but the phone prompts lead to a dead end as it was after 6pm and they were no longer servicing the support line. After two attempts of calling and with all our belongings in tow, we ventured around the hotel looking for any signs of help for several minutes. After walking down a flight of stairs and going outside, we were able to find a host at the inn's restaurant, who also was unsure of the check in process but told us we may need to go to the main hotel's check in desk. This was across the road and down the street! It had begun to rain so we packed everything in the car again and went down the road to the other inn to check in. The front desk of this hotel said they were sorry for the misleading sign and that they would get it fixed. We passed the check in desk at our inn several times a day for 4 days and it was never staffed nor did the sign change with any information for guests to know how they were supposed to check in down the road. We understand that the pandemic means staff may be short, but please alert your guests of where to go or who to call so they can check in when they arrive at an un-staffed building. We finally got to our room, where the fridge did not work. When we tried calling the housekeeping line (which you need to call for anything as there is no housekeeping during the pandemic) and we were on hold for 6 minutes before we gave up, defeated by our experience that day. We retired to the deck, which we'd paid extra to enjoy, to find it covered with spiders. Dozens of them were nesting all over the railings. It had clearly not been cleaned in a very long time and this made it very difficult to enjoy as spiders were crawling all over the place. The next day, we went to find the beach, which photos had shown online during booking. There was only rocky shoreline and docks. So, while you are on the lake, there is no beach to sit at and enjoy the water. We also could not find the rentals shop which was advertised. We walked around the whole resort to no avail. Maybe it was closed too? The positives of Mills Falls is that it was located very centrally to many shops and a few restaurants. The staff at the restaurants were fantastic, we only wish there was the same report within the inn itself. For it being a more expensive place to stay, we had higher expectations than were met. I do not think we will be going back based on our experience and definitely will not be recommending it to others. Go to enjoy the restaurants like Lagos but don't stay here, it wasn't worth the higher cost compared to other...