Holiday Inn Club Vacations Villages Resort at Lake Palestine, an IHG Hotel — Hotel in Tyler

Friday June 23rd we checked our room around 5:00pm and it was not thoroughly cleaned and had no garbage can. We asked them if they could send someone to clean the room and get a garbage can and they replied you can change rooms or they could send someone out to clean it. After a 4 hour flight and a 3 hour drive we asked them to clean the room. There were 6 people in our group with three kids. We went to eat dinner and grocery shop. We got back around 7pm there was a garbage can left in front of the door which we found odd, why not put it in the room. We thought the room had been cleaned but it had not. The table still had food crumbs on it along with the coffee table and chairs, the master tub had hair and the mirrors in the master bed room and bathroom was still dirty. While waiting for housekeeping we realized the sink was leaking and we noticed a puddle of water on the kitchen floor it was leaking from the use of the kitchen sink. We then had to put down towels to absorb the water since every time we used the sink it leaked. After 3 and ½ hours no one had come so my husband went down to talk to a manager, the front desk referred Laura and my husband he told her our situation. She apologized for the inconvenience and told him we could move to a different room at that time but the kids were tired and we just filled the fridge and cabinet with our weekly food. So she then replied when we wake up first thing in the morning they would have a room for us, and we could then move. Since the beds look clean and it was just one night we bit the bullet and stayed. As we were getting ready for bed we had to get the sofa bed ready we called down to the office with no luck no one answer after a few tries still nothing. I look into the pamphlet and it stated for sofa bed the linen in your closet. Was there linen in my closet take a guess the answer is no. So we called down again and still no answer mind you it was around 11pm now. So we said screw it, myself and my husband and our two kids one 6 and the other one 14 all slept in the master bedroom on the bed thank God it was a king and my friend and her kid slept in the other room at 11:15pm there was a knock on the door they just left a bag of towels outside with no word to us at all. Morning comes around, it was 9am my husband calls down and Jeffery answered the phone. My husband tells him the long story and Jeffery tells him there are no presidential units and there was nothing they could do(We had never asked to be upgraded). After going back and forth they finally said they would give us a room that matches our room now. It would be made a priority and they would contact us immediately once it was clean. Finally around 3pm my husband went into the office to find out why it was taking so long and Jeffery said they just got our room ready. What makes no sense to us is how there was a room ready so late that first night but nothing ready at 9am the next morning and the fact it took 6 hours to get a room ready. Our friends were only there from Friday night till 4pm on Sunday, during that time on Saturday while waiting for a new room we did not get to enjoy any of the amenities on the grounds and didn’t want to leave because we were expecting a room earlier rather than later. We basically lost Friday night and most of Saturday and only received what turned out to be a hollow apology. We have spoken to several people this week that were shocked by our experience and were surprised there was no type of compensation offered or anything to make up for our experience. Finally we move into building F room 622 and it was a much nicer and cleaner room. They have lots of activities for the kids and most of it was free and if it wasn’t free it was a good price. They had huge pools to choose from and a good size hot tub. They have a free laundry mat which helped a lot since housekeeping was not up to par.

After receiving our letter the GM offered us a free stay for the week with a 1 year timeline, he told me the manager would send the email to confirm. We have never...

Key take aways to keep in mind:

LOCATION I cannot stress how beautiful this location is. It is also a short drive into town, but my favorite part is that you cannot even tell that you're so close to town due to all of the natural and intentional folliage.

HOTEL CABIN We were told that the rooms we stayed were mid-level. They were connected horizontally with about 5 cabins. Stair are required to be climbed to enter. They were VERY nice with a full kitchen, complete with coffee maker, toaster, microwave oven above the electric stove and full convection oven, furnished with dishes, mugs, drinking glasses, wine glasses, silverware, blender, dishwasher, soap dishwashing tablets, unopened sponge, large baking sheet, grear quality stainless steel cookware and utensils, trash bag and paper towel refills. We were in a 2 bedroom, but were told that we were allowed a total of 10 people. Master bedroom had a very nice, full size luxury tub with water jets, however, the water jets were very weak and pointless. There are patios for each bedroom. The master bedroom patio has a metal picnic table and chaies. A BBQ pit available at the front as well as small dumpsters very conveniently placed in front of our cabin that did NOT smell badly at all and were encased in wooden crates. Each bedroom had 32 inch televisions but please keep in mind that the channels were very limited and these were not smart TV's, but the living room's 42 inch TV did have a Blue Ray DVD Player so, we ended up renting from a nearby Redbox for a few nights. There is a posted notice on this TV with instructions on setting up a gaming system. Please keep in mind that we were provided only 2 additional rolls of toilet paper per bathroom and if we were offerred to bring up to 10 people, this would not have been enough. Toilet paper is sold in the store detailed at the bottom of the review. There is no daily room service that provides more and I am unsure as to whether there us an additional charge to request that more be brought to the room or if we'd have to purchase our own.

WEATHER: I am grateful for the time of year we went because the outdoor amenities wouldn't have been enjoyable in the south Texas summer weather. The days were clear and sunny high 40's to low 50's.

ACTIVITIES: Go inside the actvities outpost and they will take a card given to you at check in to trade for the supplies for each game. One game at a time. All of these were very well kept up with.

OUTDOORS FOR FREE:

•Mini-Golf Beautiful! Take your card that was given to you at check-in to check out supplies.

•Basketball/Tennis Court: Full size courts; take your card that was given to you at check-in to check out supplies.

•Cornhole You are able to walk into the nearby entrance to the outdoor pool from here. Take your card that was given to you at check-in to check out supplies.

•Outdoor Pool Has a wading pool for the littles.

•Large Chess/Checkers/Connect Four: Located at the porch/outdoor picnic area of the Activity Outpost. Playing items the size of a small child. 😊

•Table Tennis Located at the porch/outdoor picnic area; Take your card that was given to you at check-in to check out supplies.

INDOOR FOR FREE: Various board games arw available for check out, includes: Large Jenga, regular size Jenga, Chutes & Ladders, Checkers, Chess, Dominoes. There are morw available.

INDOOR FOR A FEE:

•Arcade (located in Activity Outpost) Fairly priced via third party kiosk where a card must be purchased. Games available were: 2 basketball, 1 ski ball, 1 Jurassic Park, 2 motorcycle racing (2 player option available) 1 separate motorcycle racing, 1 air hockey table, 1 punching bag game, 1 crane game to win small electronics, 2 crane games for plushes, 1 crane game for cheap candies, 1 crane game for rubber duckies, (2 Quarter Pushing Games, which were outside of arcade room, but still within Activity Outpost).

I'd originally included MANY more details, but they won't post because the review would be too long, but the details would be very...

We had an okay time, but only because the weather was warm enough to tough out the freezing cold outdoor pool temps.

Helpful Suggestion to resort - HEAT your outdoor pools instead of being dishonest with guests over the phone to get them to come during off peak times.

We were lied to and told that the indoor waterpark would be open on Monday and Tuesday during spring break, just to get us down there. Then, they tried to gaslight me and say that noone at the front desk would have lied to me and told me that (as if I were making up stories.) It happened to several other guests while we were there and my husband witnessed them comping a boat ride to a family because they were unable to stay until Wednesday when the waterpark would be open. Granted, the website and Facebook does list out the correct hours, but I called since it was spring break and some places have unique hours for this. They said yes ma'am, the waterpark will be open on Monday and Tuesday and she sort of giggled as if it were a silly question when I asked. We would've waited to come later in the week had we known the truth and they know that. The two guys at the front desk ended up yelling at me and told me that they could only give me a partial refund if I chose to leave since I had already used their facility. I had just checked in several minutes before. Very very shady practices! They asked me what number I called to book and I informed them it was the only one listed. They again argued and said that is our generic resort line and I was rerouted etc and that noone at the front desk would have lied to me. Again, it's the only number listed so there's no way I would know exactly whom I was speaking to. Noone at that phone number should be giving out false information anyhow. They did end up transferring me to someone at the facility over the phone because I asked questions they could not answer in which they told me the same exact thing. No point in arguing with liars though.

Micro-Mini Waterpark It's teeny tiny! My 6 year old had a blast because he likes the medium sized slides. My 11 year old was begging to leave after 30 minutes because she was bored. She doesn't like water slides though and there is nowhere to really swim. All you can do here is wade. The wave pool is the size of a regular indoor hotel pool and has a little bit of wave action. We kept getting bumped into, so we just got out. The whole place is more of a splash pad really.

Rooms - Bait and Switch Tactic

They are very vague concerning the details of the room you book. We stayed in a 2 queen bedroom villa lodge. The confirmation email showed a multiple story building with a beautiful, updated exterior and interior. This is NOT what we stayed in. We're not real picky. So it wasn't a big deal to us, but guests shouldn't be led on with false info. It was more like a tiny run down cabin and only 1 person at a time could fit inside the kitchen. This wasn't in our pictures.

Anyway, if you're going to stay here just for the waterpark my personal opinion is either don't, or wait until the summer when it's warm enough to use the outdoor pools. The outdoor pools and hot tubs are nice but freezing right now because it's March. My family was pretty much the only ones crazy enough to swim. The mini golf was fun too. I would not go again just for the splash pad type park though.

Ultimately, it was a fun family trip because we adapted and made the best of it. We don't appreciated being lied to and gaslit by employees though.

Also, yes, there are bugs in the admissions area as well as the rooms. We only saw a couple and we're not bothered by seeing a couple here and there since it's near a lake, etc. Some people may flip out over this though,...