On Sunday, Dec 20th, Marcus and I woke up after only a few hours of sleep, strapped the boys into their car seats, and drove ~10 hours to Gun Barrel City, Texas. My dad had rented a 5-bedroom lake house so my brother's family, the four of us, and my parents could spend Christmas together in the same house. The house had not been previewed by anyone in our family, and the pictures and description on the website where my brother found it were misleading at best. Here is the customer review I wrote on Vacation Rental By Owner after we got home. (By the way, VRBO allows the owner to screen all reviews, so my negative review naturally did not appear on the website.)
My family (6 adults, 4 children) stayed at this lake house over Christmas. We liked the layout of the house because the preschool-aged kids had plenty of room to run around, but many other things were a disappointment. There were only 3 full baths, instead of the 5 advertised (the other two baths were half-baths...just a toilet and sink). At least 3 of the mattresses were VERY old, lumpy and so uncomfortable that it was difficult for my husband and I to get any sleep on them. There is no front door to the house, so one must enter through the garage (which can't be opened from the outside) or go through the fence gates and come in from the backyard. This was inconvenent, particularly when loading and unloading cars. The kitchen was haphazardly stocked and contained a lot of cabinets full of clutter, including old containers of cleaning supplies (which were a potential danger to our young kids). The dishwasher was tiny...less than half standard size. The bedding on one of the queen beds (the one our son used), did not even have a flat sheet. It was just a fitted sheet covered by an old, ragged comfortor of questionable aroma. The towels in our bathrooms were mismatched, old and smelled like mildew. Some pillows did not contain pillowcases. Something else that was a surprise is that the house is located across the street from a trailer park. All-in-all, the house was not what we expected it to be and we were disappointed.
So, though the house itself was less than pleasing, watching the four cousins play together all week made the drive worth it. My brother and his wife have two boys, Bennett, age 3, and Jasper, age 9 months. Bennett and our boys played hard together all day Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. There wasn't much to do in Gun Barrel City, but we did find a small elementary school park nearby, and we took the kids there when it was warm enough. The kids also played in the fenced back yard of the lake house each day. We also went to a nearby state park and hiked for as long as the kids would hike. We saw two deer in the woods and a beaver lodge out on the lake. Our boys always love hiking, and they weren't at all deterred from being outside by the cold weather. (I guess taking them camping with lows in the 30's has set their tolerance bar very low :)
That's all the time I have for today...more on our Christmas in Texas tomorrow :). Enjoy the pics!
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