Bear Mountain Inn

We had our wedding ceremony and reception at the Overlook Lodge, and I couldn't have asked for a better venue! The views were amazing, the food was incredible, and the staff was great! The coordinator Ann Marie was a blessing; she was an immense help w/ the planning leading up to the wedding and then w/ helping the day run smoothly. I would highly recommend this venue to anyone looking for an amazing place w/ an extremely reasonable price tag.

We had our wedding ceremony and reception at the Overlook Lodge, and I couldn't have asked for a better venue! The views were amazing, the food was incredible, and the staff was great! The coordinator Ann Marie was a blessing; she was an immense help w/ the planning leading up to the wedding and then w/ helping the day run smoothly. I would highly recommend this venue to anyone looking for an amazing place w/ an extremely reasonable price tag.

This review is inexcusably late! We had our ceremony and reception at the Overlook Lodge and it was truly fantastic. Ann Marie and her team were extremely responsive and helpful throughout the process. The setting/atmosphere is stunning. The food was excellent. All of our guests gave it rave reviews. And the price cannot be beat. We know two people who have subsequently book their weddings here. Highly recommended.

We had our ceremony and reception at the Bear Mountain Inn on August 17, 2012. We live in NYC and were looking for somewhere not too far from the city that was still affordable. Bear Mountain is less than an hour away, and most of our guests were able to stay on site or very nearby. Things could not have gone more smoothly. The bridal suite is gorgeous and perfectly laid out; the two bathrooms made it easy for my bridesmaids and me to get ready and the swinging French doors dividing the bedroom and seating area meant the groomsmen could hang for a few minutes after the ceremony while my girls bustled the dress. The ceremony was outside on the deck, overlooking the lake. We were able to have a rehearsal the day before with everything all set up, and the staff was so helpful as chuppahs, flowers and music were set up throughout the day. Of course, the beautiful, rustic setting provides the perfect place for portraits and group shots! And the reception was everything we could have wanted. It was so nice to have the reception in a separate space from the cocktail hour, as it made everything go so much more smoothly. The staff followed our instructions about placecards, table names and favors to a T, and the effect achieved was even greater than I could have envisioned. The room was perfectly laid out for our 156 guests, and the dance floor was able to handle the stampede of enthusiastic guests. Ann Marie worked with us every step of the way to make sure our special day was beautiful and memorable. When we decided on Bear Mountain, the inn was still a construction site, and it could not have turned out more beautiful! Many of my relatives can be opinionated and fussy, and some are actually in the hospitality and wedding business themselves, and all agreed that Bear Mountain Inn did an exceptional job with the wedding. Friends reported that the cocktail hour had some of the most amazing and unique food they have tried (Thanksgiving dinner in a martini glass!).

the staff did a great job on our weding, the food was delicious and our guests didnt stop complimaneting the scenery all evening. i would love to use them again soon!

We had our wedding at the merry-go-round pavilon at bear mountain inn. What a wonderfull venue. Especially for a night time wedding. Service was impeccable. Food was delicious. Everybody had a good time. The event coordinator is were friendly and always available to aswer our question. The price is were affordable for the hudson valley. They had room for all of our guests. Rooms are very nice.

We could not pick a better place for our big day.

This review is a little complicated to write. Overall, we loved having our wedding and reception at the Overlook Lodge at Bear Mountain. We felt like we got a terrific value for the money spent in terms of catering. The food was delicious and portions were generous! The service/waitstaff were attentive and lovely. The event flowed very well. The catering manager, Ann Marie Grew, is so organized, responsive and helpful that we just loved working with her. We were completely delighted with our wedding day at Overlook.

Ann Marie made some good recommendations in terms of local vendors.

Bear Mountain's Achilles Heel is the reservation bookings for overnight guests. We had continual problems, start to finish, even though we stayed on top of them as much as possible.

So I would recommend having your event at Overlook because of the view, the fantastic food and staff. Again, it was a phenomenal quality given the affordable price.

The only thing you need to know is to stay on top of those room reservations. Even if you think they have it right, keep checking because you want to make sure the reservations STAY right.

Also, you need to be aware that Hessian Drive, which is the road leading from the Stone Cottages to the Overlook has no lights, and is too long and dark (in my opinion) to ask your guests to walk to and from Overlook, especially the ladies in high heels. So we booked a van service as a shuttle.

I realize that my review rates higher than others, which I think is largely due to the fact that we did not use the Overlook Lodge for lodging...though we offered it as an option, we provided other hotel blocks.

That being said, I really feel like I cannot speak highly enough of working with Bear Mountain for our wedding. Lots of positive things to speak about--the food, the support we received from Ann Marie (the catering manager), the flexibility during our planning, the beauty of the set up, the support with setting up for the wedding...it was really all great.

Like others have said, the food was delicious, and there was a lot of flexibility with our menu--a few alterations were made to include vegan options without any issues, and lots of compliments were given by all, vegans and non-vegans a lot. And there was a LOT of food. Considering how much their was, I feel like the per head price was more than reasonable.

As far as the set up goes--the morning of the wedding we handed off our decorations, etc. to Ann Marie with minor instruction, and it all ended up exactly how I envisioned it, which was really nice and a huge stress relief. Plus, it was wonderful to walk in and have everything be beautiful and how I envisioned it.

I feel like this is a bit of a gushy praise, though really we had a wonderful experience with our wedding. Planning was simple, everything turned out beautifully, and everyone really had a wonderful time.

Like the other brides, I have mixed feelings regarding the Overlook Lodge at Bear Mountain.

Let's start with the good stuff. The food is outrageous!!! There was not a single complaint about the food, in fact most guests commented that it was the best food they ever had at a wedding (and we had some very picky guests). Chef Mike is very willing to work with you. His vegetarian and vegan selections are wonderful too-not your standard pasta with vegetables.
The view from the Overlook Lodge is breathtaking-from the patio and the ballroom. Unfortunately it rained the day of our wedding so our ceremony and cocktail hour were inside instead of on the stone patio.
The bad. We first found the Overlook Lodge 2 years prior to our wedding date. When we finally decided to hold our wedding there, the person we were initially speaking with had left. The first price quote we received from the next person was about 20% higher than what we were initially told. After some emailing, they agreed to give us the original price we were quoted. As we moved forward in our planning, we began working with another person. She was accommodating, but not as much as the initial person we met with. You have to stay on top of everything and double check their paperwork. We opted to upgrade to the premium bar. When we received the updated contract, they also changed the price per person to the rate that was 20% higher. After more emailing, they reduced the rate again. The night of our rehearsal we dealt with our coordinators assistant (this was the first time we met him) and for the final hours of our wedding we dealt with the assistant. Dealing with so many people was stressful, in an already stressful time. The assistant was not as willing to work with us and promptly ended our wedding mid-song. (the coordinator told us we could stay a little later since we got started late). There are not many accommodations there so if you have a lot of people coming from out of town, as we did, you will need to setup additional lodging.
Overall our guests had a fabulous time, which is important. The planning aspect was stressful, and there were many times when I wanted to bail on the venue (even 1 day before the wedding)

I had my wedding at the Inn in November 2010 before the Lodge reopened. I was hoping to be one of the first weddings in the newly renovated lodge but when it's completion date got pushed back and I ended up in the Overlook instead Ann Marie Grew made sure every detail was just how I had envisioned. She was wonderful, responsive and is an absolute pleasure to work with... she handles picky brides very well! The venue was absolutely breathtaking and the food was wonderful. Our ceremony was held in the Merry Go Round Pavillion and the reception at Overlook, guests loved both locations! When I came up with ideas she was accomodating and made it happen. I couldn't have been happier with my choice for location and highly recommend it to anyone considering Bear Mountain for their special day. All that being said I did have one complaint... making the lodging arrangements. That was the biggest headache. I forgot the man's name who ran the front desk, but he was quite unorganized and made a number of mistakes on our reservations. We had pretty much the whole place booked out with the exception of a few rooms. Example of one mistake made, we also had most of the lodges below the Inn reserved. These have 6 rooms each that share a living room. He booked people that weren't with my wedding in the same lodge as guests, so that they walked in to a cabin that had items scattered all over the living room area from strangers (they weren't there when our friends came in). They need to improve on the lodging customer service portion of the venue - however, that being said if I had to do it all over again I would still book Bear Mountain, while it was frustrating, it didn't take away from a beautiful wedding.

We used Bear Mountain for our rehearsal dinner and would not recommend it to ANYONE. We had a terrible experience with them and the service aspect was a complete nightmare.

We were originally drawn to Bear Mountain due to the spectacular natural setting and the really cool carousel room. From the beginning, it was difficult to get information from them, and we were frequently told different information by different people. Even worse, sometimes one person would promise us something and then months later, someone else would claim there was no record.

One of the appeals of Bear Mountain was that there was a large number of lodging options for our guests. We reserved 4 of their stone cottages for our guests, each sleeping about 12 people. However as our guests began calling to make reservations, we discovered that Bear Mountain had given away two of the cottages to another wedding party! To make matters worse, on the day before our wedding as our friends starting checking in, my fiance discovered that they had rearranged the rooms and were putting random people in the cottages and had relocated our friends to the (much less attractive) main lodge! It was a total disaster and really stressful and the staff were completely incompetent in dealing with the problem.

As for the rehearsal dinner, the staff was extremely inflexible and unable to accommodate basic requests. They gave incorrect price estimates, and seemed unable to recalculate once we changed options. They were unresponsive and unhelpful throughout the process. Worst of all, on the night of the dinner, my mother-in-law showed up early and discovered that they had set up the entire room wrong, failed to plate the salads and changed the menu without consulting her! In her dress and heels, she and her husband had to move the tables themselves and try to deal with the mess.

The entire experience was a disaster and I would say to anyone considering Bear Mountain for ANY event to stay away and find somewhere else. It may be pretty spot, but it's a terrible place to hold an event.

My review is kind of complicated- we were unsatisfied with one aspect of our wedding at Bear Mountain, but thrilled with another. I wish I could star the catering and the lodging separate, because the catering would get 5 stars and the lodging would get 1 or 2.

With the initial planning, everything was fine- the price was wonderful and they happily accomodated our specific menu requests. Communication wasn't great- things seemed to get worse and worse until we were passed to the wedding planner, who ended up being wonderful. She cleared up all confusion and we finally felt confident that everything would go smoothly. The ceremony and reception went beautifully - everything was set up perfect, timing was great, the food was awesome and the staff was so professional and nice! The catering staff and event planners are great! 5 stars!

The rooms in the stone lodges were very clean and cute- and they allowed dogs- a huge plus. Having the lodge filled with family and being able to use the common room together was a lot of fun.

The problems came in with room reservations. Like the other reviewer, we reserved lodges- 2 full lodges, one for each family. We were told these would be blocked until a certain date, then when family called to book their rooms, the rooms were not available. We were then told they don't block rooms that far in advance (even though I had proof in an email). Right up until the day of the wedding, there were mix ups with the rooms- leading to much frustration with family members, including some from out of state that showed up to check in only to be told there wasn't a room available. In the end, we got our 2 lodges; however, I feel that if we weren't annoyingly persistent, we would have lost several of our rooms. Staff and management kept blaming it on the reservation system- totally unprofessional. There was never a concrete record of anyone's reservation, and everyone seemed to pass the buck. There were more issues in this regard, but I'll stop here. It's really a shame, because the location is so gorgeous.

My husband and I honeymooned in Maine - in the winter. Being from the south we wanted snow, fires in the fireplace, and a cozy romantic atmosphere. Bear Mountain Inn delivered on all of that!!! We stayed in their Sugar Bear Cottage - separate from the main house - a one room cottage that included a charming old-fashioned bathroom repleat with iron claw-foot tub, a COMFY bed, a fireplace, and a well-equipped kitchenette.

Breakfast was served every morning at the inn and was always hardy and delicious. There was plenty to do at the inn (including but not limited to sledding, a game room, and snow shoeing) and locally there was both slalom and XC skiing. The inn served a gourmet meal for New Year's Eve dinner. The staff was very kind, and the owner Jim made us feel right at home. We can't wait to go back and experience the inn during all seasons!