Happy Trails BnB — Hotel in Tropic

This review will be one of few, 2-star reviews, but I want to warn people about the ‘little blue house’ off to the side of the main Bed & Breakfast at Happy Trails. This is where my husband and I stayed for one night. Leading up to our stay the communication was excellent. We were told that we could park in the carport since our lodging would be in the “little blue house with a white patio just to the left of the carport.” We had a passcode to get inside and noticed the updated amenities in the living room and bedroom area. The kitchen was something from yesterday – quite small and the freezer was unusable. (See picture.) The bed was VERY comfortable.||After we had unloaded, we wanted to get down to planning our next day’s travel, so we fired up the laptop….and looked for a placard in the unit mentioning the Wi-Fi name or password. I called the owner and was told that he was out getting supplies, but he was able to send me the information via text, telling me ‘Don’t use the password we sent you in the email yesterday; it’s wrong.’ We tried on the laptop – nothing. We tried on the iPad – nothing. We tried on BOTH of our phones – NOTHING! For each of our attempts, we kept getting a message ‘Unable to join network ‘Bryce Point Internet.’” After 30 minutes of trying the password provided, along with other variations of what it could be, i.e., B and B, B&B, B & B, BnB, I called the owner back. He said he would send his cleaning person out to help since he wasn't in the area. When she first came in, she immediately said, “Oh yeah, I have trouble getting internet out here all the time when I am cleaning.” She made several attempts, but the same error message came up. I asked her if the little blue house had its own router, and she said no. I asked where the router for Bryce Point Internet is, and she told me ‘In the house.’ With at least three other guest rooms, and a 30-foot distance across a driveway/carport to the little blue house, surely this was the problem – the signal was not strong enough to connect. I texted the owner but never heard back.||We decided to move on and went to find something to eat. After dinner, I went into the main house to get an extra blanket. There was NO ONE to be found, anywhere. Frustrated, we called it a night. ||In the morning I went to take a shower. When I pulled the handle to start the flow of water, it came out the spigot as expected. When I went to pull the knob for the shower to engage – NOTHING. I turned it off, turned it on, and still the shower did not work. I called my husband in to help. He has 40 years of HVAC experience, and even he could not get the shower to work. I opted for a bath, and, when trying to get the stopper to work, we learned that it wasn’t even attached. ||In our frustration, we decided to pack up and leave, foregoing the amazing breakfast that everyone raves about, for fear that that too would be a dismal disappointment.||I did get a text after notifying the owner that we left. “Thank you for letting us know this information, we will be having our maintenance guy look at these issues today before our next guest comes through. Sorry for the inconvenience of the internet not working. This is the first we have heard about this; we will get a hold of our internet provider out there today as well. (Funny, that is not what the cleaning person mentioned to us.) ||It strikes me as odd that we never saw anyone ‘managing’ the property the whole time we were there. Many reviews talk about the hosts for this property, and we were kind of looking forward to that engagement, but instead were left with a sterile, fend-for-yourself atmosphere.||There are MANY raving reviews about Happy Trails BnB, and that is what drew me to book this location. None of the reviews mention the little blue house, so I wonder if it is a newer addition and IMO not ready for...

Disappointments Keep Coming This review will be one of few, 2-star reviews, but I want to warn people about the ‘little blue house’ off to the side of the main Bed & Breakfast at Happy Trails. This is where my husband and I stayed for one night. Leading up to our stay the communication was excellent. We were told that we could park in the carport since our lodging would be in the “little blue house with a white patio just to the left of the carport.” We had a passcode to get inside and noticed the updated amenities in the living room and bedroom area. The kitchen was something from yesterday – quite small and the freezer was unusable. The bed was VERY comfortable.

After we had unloaded, we wanted to get down to planning our next day’s travel, so we fired up the laptop….and looked for a placard in the unit mentioning the Wi-Fi name or password. I called the owner and was told that he was out getting supplies, but he was able to send me the information via text, telling me ‘Don’t use the password we sent you in the email yesterday; it’s wrong.’ We tried on the laptop – nothing. We tried on the iPad – nothing. We tried on BOTH of our phones – NOTHING! For each of our attempts, we kept getting a message ‘Unable to join network ‘Bryce Point Internet.’” After 30 minutes of trying the password provided, along with other variations of what it could be, i.e., B and B, B&B, B & B, BnB, I called the owner back. He said he would send his cleaning person out to help since he wasn't in the area. When she first came in, she immediately said, “Oh yeah, I have trouble getting internet out here all the time when I am cleaning.” She made several attempts, but the same error message came up. I asked her if the little blue house had its own router, and she said no. I asked where the router for Bryce Point Internet is, and she told me ‘In the house.’ With at least three other guest rooms, and a 30-foot distance across a driveway/carport to the little blue house, surely this was the problem – the signal was not strong enough to connect. I texted the owner but never heard back.

We decided to move on and went to find something to eat. After dinner, I went into the main house to get an extra blanket. There was NO ONE to be found, anywhere. Frustrated, we called it a night.

In the morning I went to take a shower. When I pulled the handle to start the flow of water, it came out the spigot as expected. When I went to pull the knob for the shower to engage – NOTHING. I turned it off, turned it on, and still the shower did not work. I called my husband in to help. He has 40 years of HVAC experience, and even he could not get the shower to work. I opted for a bath, and, when trying to get the stopper to work, we learned that it wasn’t even attached.

In our frustration, we decided to pack up and leave, foregoing the amazing breakfast that everyone raves about, for fear that that too would be a dismal disappointment.

I did get a text after notifying the owner that we left. “Thank you for letting us know this information, we will be having our maintenance guy look at these issues today before our next guest comes through. Sorry for the inconvenience of the internet not working. This is the first we have heard about this; we will get a hold of our internet provider out there today as well. (Funny, that is not what the cleaning person mentioned to us.)

It strikes me as odd that we never saw anyone ‘managing’ the property the whole time we were there. Many reviews talk about the hosts for this property, and we were kind of looking forward to that engagement, but instead were left with a sterile, fend-for-yourself atmosphere.

There are MANY raving reviews about Happy Trails BnB, and that is what drew me to book this location. None of the reviews mention the little blue house, so I wonder if it is a newer addition and IMO not ready for...

The short: Happy Trails rented us two rooms but gave us the incorrect code for one. When tried to call them for the correct code they were unreachable. We had to sleep on the floor in the one room we had. Then the sink clogged. When we tried to get a refund, Happy Trails made bizarre excuses and only gave us ¼ of our money back despite the fact that we got half of what we paid for (one room instead of two). Then they made an unauthorized charge to take that small refund back. All throughout they have been extremely unresponsive if they can be reached at all. Instead of renting here, save yourself some time and light your money on fire, then sleep under a viaduct. You’d get the same result and curb inflation while you’re at it.|The long: When we arrived at Happy Trails after a long day of travelling, we were ready to finally rest. Unfortunately, the worst was yet to come. The code provided for one of our two rooms didn’t work. We tried to call the management, but they were unreachable, with their phone number automatically hanging up, going straight to voicemail, or returning a “disconnected phone number” message. After an hour or so of struggling to guess the right code, we gave up, leaving us to sleep five to a room with one bed. Of course, the sink in this room clogged almost immediately. After a night of restless sleep, most of us on floors and couches, we attempted to contact the management. None of the employees actually at the house could help. The management themselves continued to ignore our calls even during business hours. They responded to texts at a rate of about one message every two days. After a long back and forth they offered the pathetic compensation of a ¼ ($50) refund. Their excuse, that they gave us a discount on the rooms to begin with, makes me wonder if locking us out of the room was intentional. When we asked for the fair amount of a ½ ($100) refund for the one out of two rooms we couldn’t get into, they made an unauthorized charge to our credit card to take their refund back. After this, they stopped responding to our messages at all. |Overall, I could live with the overcharging. It’s the unresponsiveness, pettiness, and disrespect that truly distinguished Happy Trails BnB among bad lodging. If you’re still considering staying here, just know that the house could collapse on top of you and the most you’d get from the folks at Happy Trails is a one-word text message and fifty bucks for the GoFundMe. Oh, never mind, they just charged...