Over the weekend, I visited Tenaya Lodge and other properties operated by Delaware North at Yosemite National Park as part of the company's familiarization weekend. Since WAML's 2013 meeting will take place at Tenaya, I thought it would be a great idea to see the meeting facilities, lodging accommodations, and, most importantly, taste the food, in person before the meeting. Plus, who would pass up a trip to Yosemite?
Getting There
My family (wife Jenica and daughter Clio) and I set out on Friday morning after rush hour, planning to stop a lot along the way. After stopping in Mariposa for supplies (sandals and craft beer: Dust Bowl Brewery Hops of Wrath), we headed to Madera for another rest stop:
Another stop for lunch, and we finally made it to Tenaya!
Tenaya Lodge property tour
The first order of business was to tour the Tenaya Lodge property. We saw three levels of sleeping rooms, the indoor pool, game room, three on-site restaurants: (Jackalope's Bar and Grill (casual dining), Sierra Restaurant (with a giant patio), and Embers (fine dining), the currently-under-construction outdoor pool (heated and open all year), meeting rooms, and "the cabins," which is a separate set of buildings that house three 1-2 bedroom apartment style sleeping rooms and Timberloft Pizzeria.
Sleeping rooms
WAML has been assigned standard lodging at Tenaya. All sleeping rooms were renovated within the past year and have granite counter tops and flat screen tvs. Wifii is $9.95 for 24 hours and I had a very inconsistent cell phone signal (Verizon) in the room.There's a nice set of rocks in the parking lot where there's a really good signal. The beds were comfy with ample pillows. You can see that the chairs were suitable for reading:
Meeting rooms
Tenaya Lodge has over 15,000 square feet of meeting space. WAML is a relatively small group for Tenaya, so we'll fit in a pretty standard meeting room with air walls for the meeting, lunches, and the banquet. You can see a map of the meeting rooms on the Tenaya site as well as a capacity chart (pdf warning for both). We can bring our own A/V equipment or use theirs. It's nice to have a choice!
Food
One of the nice things about participating the familiarization weekend is that I had the opportunity to meet and talk with a number of professional meeting planners. One thing I found out from a few of them is that there is a saying about planning meetings, "As long as the food is good, nothing else really matters." If that's indeed true, then WAML will have a fantastic meeting at Tenaya Lodge.
Our familiarization weekend group (about 35 people) was able to sample a wide variety of catering services while at Tenaya. We had breakfast, lunch, snacks, heavy hors d'oeuvres, and dinner at Tenaya and other properties operated by Delaware North. Everything was very, very good. A number of chefs had recently changed properties where they were working and their interest in providing food specific to their location was apparent. You can find out more about catering and food on the Tenaya Lodge site. Suffice it to say that we'll be well fed and happy! Delaware North has emphasized well prepared, sustainable food for quite sometime. It really shows in the care they provide at Tenaya.
In addition to the restaurants mentioned above, there's the Parkside Deli which offers quick breakfasts, sandwiches, and food to go.
Look for part 2 where I'll detail the exciting adventure the familiarization group had touring other properties in Yosemite. Plus: snow, outdoor beauty, and field trip ideas!
