We spent last week at Bear Lake Reservation in Western North Carolina. Here is the first of three recaps of our trip, including where we stayed, the lodge, and life on the lake.
Wait, isn’t that Bald Head Island? We changed our family vacation from the beach to the mountains at the last minute when Hurricane Debby threatened heavy rain and winds during our scheduled time on Bald Head. We went as far south and west as we could to make the trip reasonable and to get out of the storm’s path. Kudos to Dad and my sister for getting organized the day before we left!
However, we made the right choice because we had PERFECT weather for our week at Bear Lake Reserve. My sister’s friends recommended it to us and this place is a gem. Here’s the summary of our family trip.
Bear Lake Preserve
Bear Lake Preserve is a mountain resort about an hour west of Asheville, North Carolina. It’s literally in the middle of nowhere, surrounding Bear Lake, which is a man-made reservoir. As far as lakes go, this one is a bit small, but there was plenty of room for boating, swimming, and fishing.
Bear Lake Reserve is a sprawling resort community with homes, condos and villas for both permanent owners and renting guests like us.
The bears
There seem to be a lot of bears living in the reserve. The week before we found out that there was a family of them on the porch of our villa! I was a little scared to go out for a run alone or outside after dark, but sadly I didn’t see any bears while we were there. Thomas and Mazen saw a family when they were returning home from golf.
How to get there
The drive from Charlottesville took about 7 hours with a few stops, but we all agreed that the views of the mountains made the trip more enjoyable than the trip to the beach.
There is a reception booth as you enter the resort that will give you a nice map of the property just in case you start to lose cell signal. We found all the staff at the resort to be very friendly and helpful.
It was about a 20 minute drive from the receptionist’s cabin to our villa, but the views from the top were worth it!
Our Villa
We rent Saddle Notch Villa #7 which had wonderful views of the mountains and even the lake. We LOVED the porches! The villa had 4 bedrooms and a couch/TV/family room where Mazen slept, so it was the perfect size for us. It was beautifully decorated, equipped, and very family-friendly.
We had a fire pit which was great for making marshmallows at night. We shared it with other guests and villa owners, but we made friends with some nice families there!
Groceries
Keep in mind that you’ll need to bring all of your own groceries, as there isn’t a store nearby. We brought most of what we needed for basic groceries and ended up ordering through Instacart from Ingles in the neighboring town to buy dinner ingredients one night. We didn’t have a great experience with our driver, who dropped them off at the cabin instead of delivering them, but the friendly staff brought them to us. The cabin and cafe have a few things, like milk and snacks, if you need something quick.
First night dinner
Breakfast + Lunch with a view
Waiting for the cousins
My sister and her family didn’t arrive until Monday night, so there was a lot of anticipation for their arrival!
Taco night
We brought taco ingredients from home and made them for dinner on night 2.
How to move
We were a little disappointed to find out that the walk to the pool and beach was, in fact, a hike; however, many of us did this 0.8 mile hike every day. There were two wooded trails you could take or you could walk along the road. Going down wasn’t difficult, but going up wasn’t for the faint of heart. It wasn’t difficult with a small backpack, but you don’t want to go up and down with pool gear or coolers, so we usually had 1 or 2 cars driving around with the gear and the humans chose whether to go on foot or in the car.
The entrance to the lower path
Or we could walk down the street. We didn’t let the kids go out alone.
It was a walk back!
The Lodge
About a mile up the mountain is the beautiful lodge. The pool was amazing and the kids loved it. There was a water slide and hot tubs, and they heated the pool on our one cold day. There was also a poolside bar where we enjoyed tropical drinks and some lunch.
There was also a gym which I used several times, a sauna and steam room, changing rooms and of course a nice restaurant where we ate twice. They had lots of activities for kids but most of them were paid so we didn’t do any of them.
The lake
The lake was absolutely stunning! Mazen and Thomas rented kayaks on the first day and spent most of the day fishing. Sadly, they didn’t catch anything. We also didn’t see many fish swimming around (much to my delight!), so it must not be a huge lake for fishing. It was lovely for swimming and tubing, though.
Dinner at the Lodge
We had a great night at the hostel on Tuesday. The food was pretty good!
