My husband and I stayed at the Otsego Club 2 years ago. We had driven up to Gaylord from Ann Arbor for a weekend of snowshoeing and relaxing, but we decided not to make any hotel reservations and instead, "play it by ear". That was our first mistake.

That particular weekend, the Iowa Snowmobile Convention had its annual get-together in Gaylord, and every single hotel room was taken, except for one room at the Otsego Club and another room at the Holiday Inn. To make matters worse, it was snowing like crazy and driving conditions were terrible (even for Michigan standards). We chose to stay at the Otsego Club because, from the outside, it looks fabulous and we didn't feel like driving down the road to the Holiday Inn. The Otsego Club looks like a quaint golf club full of old world grandeur. Normally, you have to be a member of the club in order to stay there, but the management had opened to hotel to the public for the weekend. The lobby had a sort of rustic charm to it which we liked, so we went ahead and booked a room (sight unseen) for about $200. We thought to ourselves, "not bad for a last minute emergency place to crash, especially since the "resort" seems so charming!" That was our second mistake. The room was a disaster. It was dark, tiny, and dirty, and the black and white TV was straight from the 1970's. I mean, it was so bad that I was expecting to see bugs crawling around the sheets or something. Aweful.

Not only were we dissapointed with the room cleanliness and quality( the Holiday Inn would have no doubt had nicer amenities), the hotel was jam packed with loud and obnoxious kids running around. The whole place seemed like a poorly-run church youthgroup retreat. Besdes the obnoxious kids, the rest of the clientele were pretty strange. We saw one very drunk man walking with his son through the snow stark naked except for his boxers (no shoes or anything- in 10 degree weather) The whole experience was totally surreal. My husband and I felt totally out of place.

To add insult to injury, when we checked out, our bill was $350! Apparently, the management had "forgotten" to tell us that there is a resort charge for non-members. Crazy! Needless to say, we will NEVER return to the Otsego club. Northern Michigan has plently of gorgeous hotels and resorts that really cater to their clients. PLease don't waste your money on the Otsego. Thankfully, we can look back at that weekend and laugh at the crazy experience. We ruefully call it "the worst vacation ever".

The one redeeming aspect to the weekend was that we DID get to go snowshoeing! The blizzard had dumped several inches on fresh powder which we had lots of fun playing in!