We were looking for budget-friendly accommodations on our trip and have loved off-grid experiences in the past so we were excited to find Lava Lookout. But then we got there. The property had a lot of trash around, there was trash overflowing in a bunch of cardboard boxes, and there was little information posted anywhere to help us navigate the communal spaces. When we got into our room, our sheets had holes in them. One pillowcase had a fresh-looking brown stain and another had black hairs on it-clearly not clean. The bathroom vanity also wasn’t clean and one of the towels was stained and looked like it hadn’t been replaced in cleaning. Our hammock was ripped in two places making it not safe to use, and there was a broken recliner on the patio with it. The water from the sinks is not potable, so said a note on the fridge, but the gallon of drinking water in our room was empty on arrival and we didn’t know where to get more. We cancelled within an hour of arriving and had to find a new place on short notice. Not a great way to spend our anniversary.
I do think this place COULD be awesome, but it needs work on the state of the property and the guest experience. Without much communication from the host beforehand (we got no information or messages aside from the directions to the location that were in the confirmation at booking), we were fish out of water when we got there. We didn’t have a sense of how to navigate the shared spaces or make sure we had what we needed (like water).
Ultimately we cancelled and reached out to Lauren for a partial refund. I think 5pm here is overnight where she is, so I woke up to a message the next morning saying she had refunded my cleaning fee and offering to refund additional nights if anyone else booked the ones we had cancelled. I was happy with that result and appreciated her response.