Date visited: July 2017
Well, I think we’ve unofficially won the title ‘The Couple Who Stayed at a Glamping Resort for the Shortest Period Ever’. It was a completely normal idea that we would manage to see the Hohenzollern Castle, the Neuschwanstein Castle and drive to Innsbruck in one day, with crossing a border (and then the Alps) and all, while still having time to enjoy our one-night glamping accommodation. Right? Right?! Well, it wasn’t. Nevertheless, without going into details about the first part of our day, let me give you an honest review of our first ever glamping experience.
IT WAS AWESOME!
I’ve been dreaming about going on a glamping holiday ever since…well, ever since I read about it a couple of months ago. Not a lifetime dream, but it got on my bucket list very quickly and stayed on top for a long time.
If you’re not familiar with the concept of glamping, it comes together from glamorous camping. It can be in the form of a tent, a tree house, a yurt, you name it – they probably got it covered by now. We stayed in one of the Panorama Wood Lodges that accommodates two. The Ferienparadies Natterer See offers tents and sleeping barrels, but the tents would have been too big for us and we both have slight claustrophobia, so we also skipped the sleeping barrels and voted for a wood lodge.
The wood lodge functions like a mini apartment – it has a VERY comfortable bed, a proper dining table with two chairs, a reading nook/living room made up of a leather reading chair and a log coffee table, a small kitchen that has utensils and basically everything you would need (without food, of course, since it is still camping) and a Nespresso machine (since it’s still glamorous). The ensuite bathroom even has a hairdryer. With all this, we really only needed food and ourselves to enjoy the night. (Tip: order pizza for takeaway at the restaurant, buy some beer and cozy up on the balcony/porch of the lodge. Just be aware that they only accept cash!)
From what we saw, it is really a holiday paradise for kids and adults alike. You can swim in the lake or play water basketball, take a stroll on the nearby fields or go hiking – the mountains are not so far away. We saw a small storm coming so we stayed inside, and it was the perfect end of our week-long Europe trip. Just listening to the rain knocking on the lodge and enjoying some uninterrupted quality time was the best we could ask for.
The next morning welcomed us with a clear blue sky and generous amount of sunshine, so we could sit outside for a while to enjoy the view from our porch. The plan for that day was to get home safely, we didn’t have anything else on the agenda, so we decided it was worth staying for a bit longer and getting home later than initially planned. I spent quite some time just watching the hardcore campers in front of their vans playing crossword puzzles, it reminded me of how movies usually portray retired Americans who sell their houses and buy a camper van (or RV) as a late adventure in their life. Soon it started raining again, so we went back to bed and had some post-breakfast snooze. Haven’t had such luxury in a long time!
Although it was a short stay, we had the best time and would gladly choose it again if longing for some mountain views. It was the perfect place for the first time, and I already know our next glamping destination: stay tuned for my review on the Garden Village Resort in Bled, Slovenia!
