Inns of Aurora Resort & Spa — Hotel in Town of Ledyard

Am I the only one who has stayed at the Inns of Aurora and felt like I was unwillingly placed in an episode of the Twilight Zone?

Just a really weird place and feel…

The entire town including Inns of Aurora is owned directly or indirectly by Pleasant Rowland. ( Even her name sounds suspect.)

My husband and I stayed there for the first time last night.

When we arrived we were directed to a general guest building that is not connected to any of the Inns. We were an hour early for 3 pm check in so we asked where we could have lunch .

We were given two options: The 1833 grill across the Street or the more casual place next door.

We quickly realized that both were owned by the Inn.

There are NO other places to eat in the entire Town.

Oh wait, if we wanted to purchase grab and go or any other items for that matter- souvenirs, beer, baked goods we could buy all at the Village Market.

Guess what? The Village Market is also owned by the Inns of Aurora.

This was getting more weird by the minute.

Once we checked in , we were the told that we were “fortunate” to have been booked in Wallcourt Hall. We learned there are several options of where to stay. When I inquired if that was a nice building , the staff looked sheepishly away. When I inquired further , I was told that this was the former Dormitory building for Wells college but that it had a “nice parlour and free coffee” .

Granted, I had done no research. I received a $300 voucher as a gift and thought we were staying at the Aurora Inn!

The cost for one night in the dorm was $452. I asked if we could stay at the Inn , and Eric said sure but the cost was $718! What the ?? ?

We agreed to stay in the dorm and shlepped our stuff over there.

The building has been updated, but it is a dorm. Nothing overly special.

On the way over to our sleeping quarters we checked out our other options: The Inn looked nice, Rowland House was fancy with a beautiful wrap around porch and Morgan had a great patio. Ours was definitely the worst.

We decided to tour the rest of the town including the Inn’s Spa. You can’t walk there. It’s at the top of a hill miles away- no sidewalks. Unless you have booked a service at the spa, (cheapest one was $260) you can’t use the amenities like the plunge pools unless you pay $150 each!

We drove a few miles to the MacKenzie Childs store. This was indeed NOT owned by Pleasant- but guess what? It used to be. She sold it to a private equity firm and it appears to have been run in the typical fashion of off site owners. The property has been neglected and the inventory looked stale.

We returned to our dorm, bought some cheese and crackers from the onsite snack store and then went to the 1833 restaurant for dinner. What choice did we have ? None!

On a positive note, the scenery in Aurora is gorgeous. The homes are to die for. The residents are welcoming and kind.

Regretfully, Pleasant Rowland , an alum of the recently defunct Wells College, and a billionaire has bought up the entire town and now has her talons in the remaining buildings at the Wells College Campus .

When will it end?

I feel for the good people of the Town of Aurora who have sadly lost the charm of their village established over centuries in the name of...

We visited the Inns of Aurora for President's weekend. It was great winter getaway. The staff was amazing, food was great, rooms beautiful and spa was devine. There was a cozy fireplace nearly everytime we turned around, including the lounge of each inn, and every room at the spa. All of the inns have been updated, each with their own style, but with modern convenience like USB plugs on the night stands and coordinating decor. I cant explain how impecable the interior design is at each property. A guided tour of the inns is a must. I wasn't feeling much like a tour that morning, but I'm glad we went. Molly led our tour and personalized the experience to all of our questions and spending more time in places that interested us and less in the other spots. She also led a Spirit Card reading. It sounded kind of silly, but it was a fun thing to try out. We also did the Wood Carving activity. If you do this, you'll make a wooden spoon (the kind your mom might threaten you to behave with). Dan was a fun and very knowledgable instructor.  A veteran and avid wood carving enthusiast, he shared many entertaining stories. Also, plan at least 3 hours, not 2. We also had fantastic service from Dana at our first meal, which was filled with top notch foods for adult pallettes. We spent a whole day at the spa. This was pure heaven. You can easily stay from open to close there. We had 10am massage appointments. Cate worked magic on my tight muscles. She got through knots that many therapists hadn't even made a dent. Afterwards, we spent some time by the fire in the upstairs lounge relaxing the super zen room. We stopped in the cafe (included with your appointment) for lunch (soup & salad). Then headed to the hydrotherapy pools for the rest of the afternoon. We tried the indoor hot & cold pools first. Then we moved outside, and despite it being very cold that day, it was much preferred to being indoors. There's a fun waterfall feature in the warm pool to relaxing under. We also tried the outdoor and inside dry saunas and the indoor wet sauna. They were all a great experience. We appreciated the spacious design of the showers and the shampoo/conditioner/body wash since we didnt bring any. Dale also made our stay excellent. He wrote a personal note that was in our room upon check in with a bottle of champagne. Later during pur stay, he went out of his way to provide gluten free options in our inn. He also humored us in taking group pictures and couldn't be stumped when we asked about the craziest detail about the inns. (P.s. The carpet in the Zabrkskie House parlors is due to damage the previous carpet installers made when they cut through the original wood floors.) Overall, our stay was fun and relaxing- excellent for a romantic getaway or a...

The location itself was gorgeous, as was the building and room. All the interiors were new, tasteful and immaculate. The restaurant had great service and well-executed food. However the front desk and management did a terrible job from booking to check-out. We booked a three-night stay first in the EB Morgan house after much research on the room type, view, etc. About a week before the trip we were informed via a curt late-afternoon phone call that the entire building has been bought out by someone else for our week, so we'd have to be relocated to the Aurora Inn. They didn't offer anything as compensation for the inconvenience--it was a take-it or leave-it sort of thing. We almost cancelled, but decided to give the second building a try. Again after more research we picked a room, view etc. We called back to book (and add a fourth night) and were told we could stay the first night in the Aurora Inn then switch to the EB Morgan house--that seemed needlessly complicated so we declined and they booked us the Aurora Inn seemingly for the full stay. However we never received an emailed itinerary for our new stay. When we checked in, the woman on staff took a credit card but gave us no paperwork and did not confirm the length of our stay. It was only when my fiancé checked his credit card statement that he realized he'd been charged the remainder of the stay a day early for what we had booked. He went down to the front desk at 2 AM, worried we had the wrong checkout date. We did in fact--and the room had been booked to someone else for the next night. He was told to come back to speak to the day staff to work something out at 7 AM. We both barely slept, but he returned to the desk at 7 AM, 8 AM, and 9 AM only to be eventually told the best they could do was move us to another room with a smaller bed. Needless to say at that point we declined. We were rushed out by the cleaning staff looking to turn over the room to the next guests. I left in tears past a front desk that didn't even acknowledge us. The entire trip felt ruined. We were upset and exhausted during our 5 hour drive home in icy weather. In sum, an absolutely disgraceful performance by a purported four-star hotel. I wish I'd followed my instinct and cancelled after that...