Courtyard by Marriott Burlington Taft Corners, Williston

Watch out for the Courtyard Burlington Taft Corners. The general manager and the assistant general manager are impossible to deal with, and I question their ethics. I made a reservation for a block of rooms two months in the future. I knew that it was possible that I would cancel the reservations so I made sure that that there would be no penalty if I needed to do that. Recently I did decide to cancel the reservations and found that I was incorrectly hit with a penalty. To get this mistake corrected, I called back to reservations, who said that I had to call customer service. I called customer service who said that they did not have authority and told me to call the assistant manager at Taft Corners. I called the Assistant Manager and reached her after several phone calls, and she said she could do nothing and I needed to call the General Manager. I called the General Manager several times, leaving a message each time. The General Manager never called me, but instead I received an email from the assistant manager saying they had decided to keep the penalty fee. As you can imagine, I'm angry about the whole experience.

The room was clean, the bedding was nice (6 pillows on each bed). However, the original room assigned has a disconnected fire detector with wires hanging out. Since we were staying with young children, we asked to be moved. The next room had a missing chair and just an ottoman. Seems they should check rooms out before they assign them.

I always stay at Marriott hotels and was extremely disappointed in this one. The staff was moderately friendly, but did not go out of their way to be helpful. The hotel's website boasted an on-site ATM, however when we arrived (late at night and exhausted) we were informed that we would have to drive to the nearest ATM. The room was very loud after 11pm, and there were people shouting to each other in the hallways late at night and early in the morning. The room next to us was vacuumed at 5 am, which woke us up, and the maid entered the room 3 separate times without knocking first. Did I mention that we specifically requested and were told we would receive a guaranteed quiet room? When we arrived, there was hair in the bathtub that obviously did not belong to us. Overall, I was thoroughly disappointed in the quality of this hotel.

When we arrived for a weekend of skiing over MLK Weekend in 2006, all the beds had been replaced and they were so comfortable. The HVAC system worked great although we did request extra blankets because the new comforters hadn't arrived yet. The room was clean and all of the staff was very helpful. The parking lot was plowed promptly after a heavy snow and the steakhouse across the street was awesome! My only negative comment was about the free continental breakfast. They ran out of food before 0900! I can't say it was all their fault because we saw people taking 5/6 of everything back to their rooms like pigs at feeding time. There were some noisy kids in the hallways after 11:00 PM, but a call to the front desk promptly quieted them down. We were very happy this hotel has gone entirely non-smoking. I hope all the other Marriott's follow suit.

Indoor pool was great, friendly staff, delicious food, nice rooms! 5 stars!