Pocmont Resort & Conference Center, P.O. Box 1232, Bushkill Falls Rd., Bushkill, Pennsylvania 18324, Tel. 1-800-762-6668, is to the Poconos what Club Med is to the Caribbean: an all-inclusive vacation resort offering room, two meals daily, sports and entertainment. And like some of the family-friendly Club Med resorts, it offers a kid camp. The food doesn’t compete with Maxim’s and the entertainment won’t challenge La Scala, but for parents starved for some adult time, Pocmont’s delivery of two two-hour camp sessions per day for the kids is an appreciable advantage over resorts without this feature.
Pocmont Guest Rooms
The guest rooms at Pocmont come in a variety of layouts. Despite the somewhat different room configurations, all have rather standard hotel bedding, nothing exciting or novel about the rooms. They have TVs in the room, bathrooms with toiletries, and table with chairs. Clean, comfortable, serviceable, nothing more.
Dining Facilities
The Seasons Dining Room is a gargantuan place. It offers full service dining except on Tuesdays and Fridays which are buffet nights. The meals are of respectable quality but not memorable. Daily breakfast and dinner at the Seasons is included in the package price. Also included during the summer is outdoor barbecue by the pool on Wednesdays and Saturdays.
Sports
Sports are king at Pocmont. All kinds of sports. The outdoor pool is always crowded, weather permitting, and the indoor pool, in a room with one windowed wall, is a nice alternative for foul weather days.
There’s an exercise facility with state-of-the-art cardio and lifting equipment, Jacuzzi, sauna and steam room.
The on-site outdoors recreation options include tennis, archery, paddle boats, mini golf, bocce, rifle range, softball, basketball and volleyball. Indoors, there’s billiards, badminton, basketball and aerobics. Most sports offerings tended to be available on demand except archery and tennis, which are in high demand and require advance sign-up. It was rather amazing that with so many people at one resort, there wasn’t greater competition for sports facilities and equipment; the variety of different activities and the popularity of the pool must be the explanation.
Kids World Camp
Kids World, the on-site kids camp, merits a mixed review. It had activities that kept kids busy and usually eager to attend. They did a lot of arts and crafts there. Tie-dying T-shirts was a favorite. The staff also escorted the kids to the pool. One day they prepared a Talent Show and later entertained guests in the lounge. Overall, Kids World was a desirable feature.
Kids World was not without faults, however. The staff of Kids World was responsible for retrieving the children who were signed up to participate each day from outside the Seasons Dining Room shortly after breakfast. Often they were late by as much as fifteen minutes, delaying parents who had scheduled their own activities.
The Kids World staff was young and energetic, but a few of them would have benefited from better training or supervision by an experienced parent:
- * The rules require children to be potty-trained. When one 3-year-old had an “accident,” the staff complained to the parents at pick-up time that the chair was wet; this was frustrating for parents and embarrassing for the child in question. Anyone working with kids should know that potty-trained kids that young have occasional accidents and should be prepared to handle it gracefully.
- * On another occasion, the staff was rattled by a child not wanting to participate in an activity. The child was sitting quietly, not disrupting the group, but the staff simply didn’t know how to handle the non-participation and took offense. Again, this is a common issue that comes up with kids and one a seasoned parent would have little difficulty handling.
So, Kids World did keep kids safe and busy, but it could stand improvement. In addition to improving staff training, Kids World should remain open for a longer time block at least once a day. Its availability for only two hours in the morning and two hours in the afternoon (frequently shortened 10 to 15 minutes by staff tardiness) makes it nearly impossible for parents to take advantage of off-site activities. This program would be vastly improved if one longer time block allowed kids a three to four hour stay so that parents could explore the best that the region has to offer. It was so tempting to canoe and revel in the spray of Bushkill Falls, but these options were out of reach due to time constraints.
Entertainment
The entertainment at Pocmont was fun and family-oriented. There are various offerings from Broadway singing after the dinner buffets to evening magic shows, comedy routines and musical performances. Parents who don’t want to bring their children to the mid-evening entertainment can obtain in-room babysitting by requesting it at the desk well in advance. The staff will arrange for one of its staff who is off duty to act as babysitter. There is, of course, a charge for this babysitting.
Off the Resort Property
Nearby there are some family-friendly activities to enjoy: Bushkill Falls, is described as the Niagara of the Poconos. The trails to the eight waterfalls include some serious climbing and may not be suitable for younger kids or some elderly or disabled people. There are flat trails to hike, fishing, paddle-boating and mini golf. The gift shop area has sluice troughs, educational exhibits and treats like rock candy, ice cream and fudge in addition to fast food meals.
Fifteen minutes from Pocmont, Pocono Environmental Education Center offers a variety of family nature activities. And the Delaware Water Gap National Park Recreation Area offers canoeing, horseback riding, hiking, boating and fishing. Children can get their National Parks Passport stamped there and participate in a Junior Ranger Program.
