A Midsummer’s Inn B & B

Let me preface this review by saying when researching a hotel or restaurant on
, Unilocal,Traveladvisor etc, I generally dismiss the best and worst reviews. I realize a lot of factors can affect an individual’s experience and focus on the average review. I wish I had more closely read the negative reviews of this establishment however, prior to booking. There is theme running through them, specifically the owner’s lack of courtesy, respect and professionalism. Please, please read the reviews at several sites before making a decision to book.
Our experience was as follows: my wife and I wanted to stay someplace centrally located to Bryce, Zion & Brianhead, hence Cedar City. Given we would not be with the kids for Xmas, we decided to stay someplace a little more romantic than the numerous inexpensive hotels in the area. This place, advertised as a bed & breakfast, seemed to fit the bill.
When I booked the room,
said there was only one room still available. It was a basement room but, other than a complaint about hearing other guests walking around, it seemed fine. The problems started when we called from the road. It was Xmas and snowing so we figured we should call ahead to give them an ETA. To our surprise, they weren’t even in town. The place was empty and they had left a key to the basement under a flower pot (Charlene wasn’t sure which one so my wife had to go through them all, in the snow with bare hands, to find a key)! To make matters worse, Charlene had no idea it was snowing; our small car ended up stuck in a snowdrift at the entrance to their driveway. Fortunately, a neighbor across the street saw us stuck and dug us out with his snowshovel. We had to park in the mall parking lot a few blocks away.
When we surveyed the room, it was clear our booking was an afterthought; a greedy ploy to make a few extra bucks when they weren’t really open. Here are a few issues (besides the problems above):
–They left one set of towels for two people for a three night stay.
–The pipes and house creaked so much (from the cold & wind I assume) it literally kept us awake all night. The refrigerator in the room turning on and off all night (as well as the heater) was annoying but the sounds the house made were disturbing enough my wife was concerned for our safety.
–The mattress/​bed was so old & sagging my wife and I kept rolling into the middle of the bed. We like being close but we literally had to climb to the edge of the bed to turn over! Not acceptable!
After a night without sleep we knew we had to stay elsewhere. We called Charlene and let her know about the problems and asked she refund the two nights we weren’t using (of course we paid for the night we stayed, no matter how bad it was). She said she had no objection but because we booked through a third party (
), they had to request the refund. When
requested the refund however, she refused to refund the nights we didn’t use. Were it high season and she was turning away customers we could understand but the place is basically closed for the holidays. It’s clear from our experience and the other negative comments we’ve read, this woman does not care about her customers (or negative reviews apparently).
should not be listing this place on their site and you should consider other options.
BTW, we moved to the Stratford Inn, a generic hotel around the corner for half the price which was completely acceptable (nice bed, shower, employees on site etc). Do yourself a favor and avoid Amid Summer’s Inn.

The location of this property is great if you are attending the Utah Shakespeare Festival, as it’s only a short three-​block walk to the theaters. We arrived to find a clean well appointed room, a very comfy bed and an accommodating innkeeper. We stayed in Oberon’s Grotto, which is billed as a downstairs suite with a kitchen and a private entrance. We opted for the «vacation rental» rate instead of the «full B&B» rate, which doesn’t include breakfast, snacks or daily maid service. At the time of our booking this was an option on the inn website, but as I understand it, now it’s only available on VRBO.
The room itself was nice, but since the bed and the kitchen were in the same space, it’s not a true suite. The grotto around the bed was interesting; as it was done of styrofoam and plaster, much like some sets are made. The kitchen was more than adequate and we cooked all our meals from scratch there. There is some noise coming from the upstairs parlor in the mornings, but it didn’t bother us; and to be honest we didn’t spend much time in the room.
My one complaint is that the room didn’t really have a private entrance. «Private» in B&B terminology means that you don’t have to traipse through common areas and chit-​chat with other guests on the way to and from your room. To get to our room we had to go up a ramp and through the terrace (a huge gathering place for guests) then down 9 stairs where there were 3 doors — our room, the room next door and the laundry room. Every time we left we had to run the gauntlet and do the ruse of polite chit-​chat with the guests on the terrace. To be fair, they were there for this type of interaction, but since I have to do that when I travel for business, I don’t want to do it on vacation.
I also have a bit of an issue with the $ 25 cleaning fee for the «vacation rental» rate for the room. Even though it’s listed on VRBO I don’t consider it a true vacation rental (like a house) and I feel this fee is a bit excessive. It’s just a room in a house, not an off-​site stand alone vacation rental. But it’s the owner’s prerogative to charge whatever she wants, so if you want to stay in this self catering unit you just have to cowboy up and pay it.
We’ve already purchased our tickets to the festival for next year, and booked a private rental home close to the festival grounds. And incidentally, that home has no «cleaning fee».
Bottom line — if you want the full B&B experience, and interaction with other guests then this is the place for you; however if you’d fancy a bit more privacy, you’d best look somewhere else.

just to clarify– i never actually stayed here. saw the ad on living social and know that i go through this area at least once a year, i saw she was advertising fruit smoothies and a good breakfast, i thought we’d give it a whirl. oh boy.
was making the drive from las vegas to salt lake city and thought it would be nice to take some time and revisit bryce canyon.
i was already put off by the manner in which she answered the phone– ‘hold on, hold on, i have to get dinner going’ and when i said i would be happy to call back she demanded i wait on the phone while she messed around because i ‘wouldn’t get through again, the phone never stops ringing.’ ok, awkward, too much information, not very professional.
then we got to room booking. she didn’t know her availability, had to check paper, computer, voicemail, who knows what to determine if there was room. she thought she had room. couldn’t gaurantee it. THEN we got to the check in time. well, we had a lunch date in vegas, planning on arriving in cedar city around 7, ut time. got a huge guilt trip for not arriving between 3 and 6 because last weekend she didn’t get to go to the grocery store, hadn’t seen her husband in two weeks, had a string of poor guests (for which i AM sorry, but i don’t need to know that) and just a general oh woe is me attitude.
all of this is making me reconsider my choice of accomadations… not really warming me up to the idea of staying at this b and b.
so then we get to the ‘do you have a pet’ question. yes, we do. he is a border collie. he guards the stuff in our truck while we’re away from it. we don’t want him inside, we’re not worried about him being cold, he is a dog. he stays in the truck in november in yukon territory. he is fine. he is very well taken care of and spoiled.
so, after all the hullabaloo about the owner’s disintegrating personal life, and her ‘asking’ her husband’s permission for the dog to STAY IN THE TRUCK, she turned us down.
to her credit, she did call her neighbor’s trying to find a place he could stay– and called back that her neighbor could put us up and our dog could stay in her OUTDOOR kennel. what? we don’t want the dog outside, we want him in the truck.
long story short, this woman is in the wrong business. hire help, or keep your sob story to yourself. very unprofessional.
one more thing, thanks to the jerk that snuck their dog in to the b and b and flushed the wash cloth down the toilet. thanks a lot.

Rooms are beautiful: themed and quite lavishly decorated. Beds big and comfortable. The place itself has a very small-​town, quaint feel… which makes sense since Cedar is, in fact, a small town. Walls are quite thin. Attentive if almost singular staff. It’s beautiful for a peaceful and (almost intimidatingly) quiet stay.