This past fall I earned 12 Next Big Thing award nights with Hyatt’s stay 2 nights get 1 award night promotion.  This is by far my favorite promotion because you can redeem the nights at any category hotel during the promotion redemption period.  Other programs such as SPG offer similar promotions but cap the category of hotel you may redeem the award nights.

To burn our remaining 4 Next Big Thing award nights we decideed to check out the Hyatt Lake Tahoe , and it was a great choice.

Getting There

The hotel is situated on the North Side of the lake in Incline Village, Nevada.   To get to the hotel we flew from Tampa to Salt Lake, then on to Reno all on Delta flights using Skymiles.  We then rented a car and drove the Mount Rose route which only ended up being a 35 minute drive with great views along the way.

Hotel

We were very impressed with the hotel when we arrived.  We found complimentary valet (valet only work on tips, so they greatly appreciate and were very friendly), and the hotel situated across the street from the beach and water.  The lobby seemed to have been recently renovated and gave a genuine lodge feel.  Next to the lobby was a 24 hour casino.  The casino had all the usual table games, a poker room, fireplace behind the bar, and had a nice feel to it.  Upon check in we were offered a choice of Diamond amenity, offered two glasses of champagne (which of course we accepted), an upgraded room, and access to the club lounge.  I was very impressed with the check in process.  Even though we only had a few bags we had a bellman help us with our luggage to the room, and we were glad we did.  He was very helpful in explaining all about the hotel.

Beach

Room

We were upgraded to a Balcony room which looked very similar to picture 9 in these pictures.  We had a view of one of the 2 pools at the hotel.  There were essentially two areas of rooms at the hotel, rooms in the tower which seemed to be in the original part of the hotel, and then our room type which seemed to be a newer part of the hotel.  We really liked our room, but given our situation it was a little bit of a walk to the club lounge, casino, although we did have direct access from the stairwell to the hot tubs and pool area.

Room View

Location

The Hyatt Lake Tahoe is located in Incline Village on the Nevada side with close proximity to the water.  There are a number of local restaurants nearby at all price points.  While the hotel is not directly on a slope, there is Diamond Peak which is literally a 5 minute drive just up the hill which the hotel offers complimentary shuttle service, and a number of other slopes are in close proximity.  We went to Diamond Peak and NorthStar slopes.  We found NorthStar to be crowded and have the typically ski village with all the shops, etc.  While we found Diamond Peak to be not crowded and under developed.  Diamond Peak has great views of the lake, see below for the view.  We visited two restaurants in Incline Village and another in NorthStar.  The two in Incline Village were great and I would recommend both.  Big Water is up the hill on the way towards Diamond Peak, and it has a great view of the lake.   The other is Lone Eagle which is part of the Hyatt but down by the water.  At Lone Eagle, I would recommend getting down there about an hour before sunset to sit by the fire outside, fireplace inside or listen to the live music by the bar.

View of Lake From Diamond Peak

Bottom Line

This was a great place to spend a few nights checking out the area, skiing, gambling, and just relaxing.  Using 4 Next Big Thing award nights from Hyatt made it even better since the hotel was paid for.  On our way back to Reno we encountered a snow storm the night before, so had to take an alternate route which took us the California route.  It turns out the alternate route had some great views as well.