Rezort Drevenice Terchova

We paid 70 Euro for a one-hour beer bath for two, but the session felt disorganized and poor value. When we arrived about 10 minutes before our 3 PM appointment, two staff members were chatting at the wellness desk. We said it was our first time, and they gave us towels and locker keys without explaining what to do. By 2:58 PM we were ready and waiting where they’d told us to wait. Nobody came over, so at 3:05 PM I asked what was going on. They then took us toward the beer bath, but just before we went in, they said we had to use the spa first. That should have been explained earlier. We spent around 10 minutes in the steam room with no instructions, unsure what to do or when we’d move on. We finally got into the beer bath at 3:15 PM. At 3:30 PM, a staff member abruptly switched off the jacuzzi and ended it, saying another treatment was scheduled. We were sent to a room with stone or ceramic seats. Nobody explained their purpose, and they didn’t feel heated or special (see photo). We sat there without guidance for 30 minutes, until 4:02 PM, then left, frustrated and confused. We returned the towels and key and went home. The beer bath itself lasted only 15-20 minutes. The rest was a muddle, with no communication or sense of hospitality, and we felt our time and money had been wasted. This experience wasn’t worth it.

The restaurant waiters and the women at reception were genuinely nice, and the room was very clean, though average. Still, I paid 110 euros for the room and another 15 euros for my dog, and I’ve never had such an unpleasant interaction with hotel staff. I was walking down the stairs with my Labrador on a short leash when two maintenance workers came around a corner and we bumped into each other. One man was startled. I apologized, though I couldn’t have seen him coming. He said it was fine and that my dog was calm. Then the other man suddenly looked angry and wagged a finger at me. I couldn’t understand what he was saying in Slovak, and he didn’t speak English. It seemed like he was threatening me. He was a hotel employee. I was frightened, so I took my dog outside for a short walk. When I came back, I asked the receptionist, who had been about three meters away during the exchange, what the angry employee had been saying. She either didn’t know or I didn’t understand her. We were speaking Polish and Slovak because she didn’t speak English. I can understand a lot, but not someone waving a finger in my face like that. This is the first time I’ve ever rated a place below five stars, but I feel I should warn other guests, especially people with dogs.

The best part for us was the food. We really liked the breakfasts, served à la carte in the main building’s restaurant near reception because of the Covid-19 restrictions. For lunch and dinner, we tried the modern menu with local dishes like bryndzove halusky and bryndzove pirohy, plus salads. The taste was excellent, and the prices were good. I also tried every local beer the restaurant had, and they were all delicious. We stayed six nights with the family for a winter ski holiday, renting the whole chalet for 6+ people. The beds were extra comfortable, and the modern, modest rooms and bathrooms were clean. The living area worked for six, though the kitchen was sparsely equipped. Internet and IPTV were fine, and we could park both our cars in the space provided for the chalet. We did miss having anywhere to dry our ski gear, especially boots and skis. The place was quiet and relaxing, close to the village center and 4km from the main slope at Vratna-Paseky. We had a great time. The one thing I’d improve is the waiting staff’s skills and customer approach. Some could work on serving from the right, clearing plates from the left, making eye contact, and not keeping guests waiting too long for menus.

The trips from here were a real highlight, with many of the best parts of Malá Fatra nearby. Staff were friendly and helped us delay dinner one evening. On our last day they also stored our bags safely after checkout, so we could take one more trip before leaving the country. We booked a cheap Sunday check-in for five nights through Slevomat.cz, mostly over the working week. The room was spacious, cozy, warm and had a nice bathroom. But one bedside lamp didn’t work, the other had a broken switch, and there was forgotten food behind the windows, so the room could have been looked after better. The TV looked quite new, though we didn’t use it. The buffet breakfasts and three-course dinners, soup, main and dessert, had plenty of choice, good quality and enough food to keep us satisfied every day, even without buying a hot lunch during our roughly 20 km winter hikes. My one food complaint is that dishes were often much colder than they should’ve been. Cold scrambled eggs, sausages and bacon aren’t for me. We also got two 90-minute wellness sessions included, and those were amazing. Sitting in the outdoor hot tub in the snow under the night sky was hard to beat. There were three kinds of saunas, an indoor tub and more. It could get crowded on weekends, but was otherwise fairly quiet. For what we paid, the experience felt worth nearly twice as much. I’d definitely come back and recommend it, even with the little issues.