Arbor Den Log Cabin Vacation Rental

Angie Yount

This is the cutest little cabin! The location is great, it's super fast to get to downtown Boone and downtown Blowing Rock. I love the upstairs and downstairs porches, and the layout is wonderful!

Woodrow Allen

It was awesome trip of a lifetime in the beautiful mountains of North Carolina.

Scott Addington

This log cabin was wonderful. When we go back to the mountain we will look at renting this one again. Thank you

Russ Schampers

First I'll address the positive, the cabin itself is gorgeous and favorably located for local attractions and food. Unfortunately this was completely tarnished by a weekend rental experience that was in a word, miserable. First, online reservation and checkout went without a hitch and I successfully reserved the cabin for a weekend ski trip a month in advance complete with confirmation #. Fast forward to getting a call the Friday before the trip informing me that I "really needed to confirm my trip because it's not fair to the owners to miss out on revenue if I don't plan to come". Bizarre. I call back and express that I've successfully checked out complete with confirmation # and express concern I will lose my reservation when I've already invested on ticket purchases at the ski hill. Come to find out a place called "Jenkins Realty" has emailed me an additional link I need to fill out to actually reserve my weekend trip. I find this completely confusing and frankly unreasonable. Don't provide someone a completed checkout process if the place isn't actually reserved. Secondly, the "link" I needed to fill out through Jenkins Realty was a formal 6 page lease agreement requiring signing and initialing in multiple locations. We're talking the type of lease you sign when you're renting a home for a year plus, not a weekend get away. The rental lease is full of your typical legalese verbiage buried into a 6 page document. I found this unconventional and adding in the threat of losing the rental if I didn't sign it quickly all due to a completely disjointed reservation process, frustrating. So we hit the road after work on Friday to drive 3.5 hours to the arbor den lodge. I pile through my email to find any type of check-in door codes customary to Airbnb or Vrbo. Nothing. I call the phone number for the arbor den lodge to get an automated recording saying it's outside of business hours. An emergency # is provided but you are specifically instructed not to call unless it is an actual emergency. Since technically it wasn't an emergency I honored their request figuring there would be something available at the property to gain entry. Wrong. I arrive at the property 10pm after driving nearly 4 hours to a locked home. Great. I call the emergency # and in their defense did get a quick response. The response was "did you stop by the rental office at <completely different address> to pick up your welcome packet?". At this point my experience goes from "unconventional and frustrating" to "downright ridiculous". 25 mins later chasing back and forth from office to property again we get into the property to find beds with no sheets and pillows with no pillowcases. The next day we discover no towels or washcloths. Best part? We were also asked to wash our dishes despite the property not providing any dish soap. I suppose at this point I should be thankful there was even toilet paper available on the property because after close inspection of the "lease agreement" they even say you're expected to being your own toiletries and paper products. Imagine being asked to bring your own paper to wipe yourself with. In closing, I'm sure Jenkins Realty will respond cheerily to this review stating it's all in the rental lease, and technically it is. They happily provide each of these items at additional cost if you catch it ahead of time and ask for it. My perspective is the entire process is completely unreasonable and if there is a personal owner who owns this cabin, you have a beautiful place and you simply need to drop Jenkins Realty and go with Airbnb or Vrbo. The experience from a customer perspective through Jenkins Realty is absolutely miserable. If Jenkins Realty owns this place, here are your next steps: 1) Drop the lease and fix your checkout. Completed checkout = fully reserved. 2) On completion page make clear the secondary address to get keys from. 3) This may come as a shocker, but customers expect sheets, pillow cases, towels, and toilet paper provided. If you expect customers to wash their dishes behind them, provide the soap.