Hilton Vacation Club Bent Creek Golf Village Gatlinburg in Gatlinburg, TN

Stayed 4 nights in 2-bedroom cabin with my husband, 11-year-old son and mother. Cabin: Perfect. Private patio with gas grill and jacuzzi, all of which we took advantage of every day. Jacuzzi was roomy and hot. Location: This is not walking distance to anything or even to trolley. We have stayed in downtown Gatlinburg before and know the advantages to that. We deal with the pain and expense of traffic and parking to go to Anakeesta. But this was a trade-off well worth making to get a full cabin with kitchen and all the amenities for the type of trip this was. If you want to prioritize convenience to downtown Gatlinburg don't stay here. But to be in reasonable driving distance to multiple attractions-Gatlinburg, Great Smokey Mountains National Park and Dollywood it was great. Service: Prompt to fix tv. Value: Unbeatable. Got a deal through Amex for about $200 per night which would have been comparable to a standard hotel room elsewhere in the area.

The Bent Creek Hilton at Gatlinburg is not a hotel but a golf course with time share units on the property. You'd never know this from the description on TA or the BCH Website. We stayed here for three nights because a convention we attended listed the Bent Creek Hilton as a recommended hotel for its proximity to the venue. Pros: The Hilton is over 11 miles from downtown Gatlinburg. This means that you will not get the noise from a town whose sole purpose is to attract tourists with hundreds of cheek to jowl candy shops, pancake houses, parking lots ($20 a day), and miniature golf courses on the side of steep hills. -The rooms are functional, and if you intend to cook, the kitchen is adequately equipped. Cons: This is NOT a hotel, it is a golf course with time share units without the amenities one expects from a hotel. There is NO housekeeping, no exterior cleaning of the units -- there was a formidable bug pileup outside our door -- and no public areas except for the pool tables and small exercise room, which the hotel charges $15 per day. - Reception staff is there to convince you to buy a time share. After I checked in, they steered me to the "concierge," a woman who handed me a bunch of cheap booklets with de $2 discounts on Ripley's Believe it Or Not and an aquarium. I had to tell her four or five times that our vacation plans were set in stone and did not include a time share in a Hilton. - Reception hospitality is erratic. Check in and check were friendly, but when I called to ask the location of our venue down the road, the reception guy said he knew nothing about it -- even though 80% of the guests that weekend were staying at this Hilton and shuttles from the Hilton to the venue site operated throughout the day -- he directed us to a convention center 7 miles from the actual site. - There is nothing inviting about this property except the golf course: no outdoor seating arrangements, no lounge area (forget the photo in the TA site), no nothing. - There is NO FOOD on the property except what you bring, so for $270 a night you get no breakfast, no snacks, just two bottles of Food City water in the kitchen. -This Hilton is over 11 miles from downtown Gatlinburg and 5-6 miles from the nearest supermarket. This means that you are stuck at this property with nothing but two bags of old coffee and a few creamers. The Food City supermarket is a 7 minute drive. -- Rooms were dark. -- Air conditioning was sub par: the temperature was set to go down o 68 degrees, no further, okay in winter but not when the unit was getting warm. -- WiFi was non-existent. Forget about texting, even the cell reception was spotty. -- The only restaurant within two miles is Trish's: ok but nothing great; no wine/beer. Th Alamo, five miles down the road, was spectacular. -- No elevators for second floor units. -- Check your appliances on arrival. Our dishwasher door did not close.

The actual resort is very nice and the staff was helpful. However the Hilton Grand Vacations staff are pathological liars. Literally everything they told us that convinced us to buy a membership was a deliberate, intentional lie. For example they told us we could sell back some of our points to offset expenses like loan payments and annual maintenance. When I called Hilton to do this they told me that they have no such program and that the sales person, Chris Watson, lied.

The entire staff were friendly, knowledgeable and helpful. The one bedroom unit was exceptionally clean and well equipped for our stay. The one policy that I questioned was the daily amenities fee that you had to pay for. It came out to be just over $70 for the week and it covered WiFi, access to a news app, use of the barbecue utensils, pool tables and basketball/volleyball courts. I feel that WiFi should always be included, I get my news from the apps on my phone and as far as the rest of the amenities we didn’t use any of them due to it being December and us being there to visit the surrounding areas. The amenities fee is more of a money grab than anything else. These policies have to come to an end or Airbnb will be getting more of my business.

Our room was very clean and cozy. Perfect timing and we were able to see most of the Christmas celebrations at kicked off.