A Place Made for Gathering
The Otter Lodge is more than a large place to stay. It’s a place designed around something simple: giving people enough room, time and freedom to enjoy being together. Whether that means a family getaway, a weekend with friends or a wedding celebration, some of the best moments happen when everyone can settle in and stay awhile.
Room for the Moments You Didn’t Plan
A morning that starts slowly over coffee. A meal that stretches longer than expected. Kids fishing at the pond while everyone else catches up. One more conversation by the fire before calling it a night.
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Those are the moments The Otter Lodge is meant to make easier. With generous gathering spaces indoors, 16 acres to explore outside and room for up to 30 overnight guests, the property gives groups the chance to spend real time together without everyone scattering at the end of the day.
How The Otter Lodge Became Ours
The Otter Lodge Began as a Family Idea
Thanksgiving 2025 at The Otter Lodge
After our youngest daughter, Amelia, discovered skiing and a love of the outdoors, my wife, Ashita, and I began looking for a place in the Poconos where our family could spend time together. We had already created a beach getaway, The Turtle and the Sloth, and a mountain property felt like a natural next chapter. Big decisions like this have always been family decisions for us—we tend to dream about them together.
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We first visited the property on September 11, 2021. We had already fallen for the pond, the acreage and the unusually long building that seemed to settle naturally into the landscape. As we walked inside, a 9/11 memorial program was playing on the radio. The owner at the time, Maggie, told us that some of the building’s massive beams had once been used as scaffolding during the construction of the World Trade Center in New York. The coincidence of hearing that story on that particular day gave the property an immediate sense of meaning for us.
Amelia & Ashita
Then Maggie told us about the pond. Green herons, turtles and other wildlife regularly visited—and, from time to time, so did a family of otters. She showed us a clip of them swimming in the water. Ashita and I looked at one another, and the name came almost immediately: The Otter Lodge.
Natalia & Jason
Designed Around Family
The Otter Lodge: May 2022
The building had lived several lives before becoming a lodge. For decades it had been a restaurant, and later Maggie operated an online auction business from the property. When we purchased it, much of the commercial kitchen and restaurant infrastructure was still in place.
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We completely renovated the building, with Ashita leading the design alongside an architect. Much of the inspiration came from the way our own extended family likes to travel. During the pandemic years, we took a trip to Napa with Ashita’s parents, siblings, nieces and nephews. We have always valued trips where grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and children can all be together under one roof.
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Those experiences shaped the way we rebuilt The Otter Lodge. We wanted generous shared spaces where everyone could gather, but we also wanted every guest to feel equally comfortable. The bedrooms were designed at similar sizes, each with views toward either the pond or the forest, and the first-floor bedrooms have their own en suite full bathrooms. The goal was never simply to accommodate a large number of people. It was to create a place where multi-generational families could genuinely enjoy being together.
Completed May 2024
A Place That Keeps Evolving
After a long renovation—made even more challenging by construction and material shortages during the pandemic—we welcomed our first Airbnb guests in May 2024.
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We didn’t know exactly what would happen next. What we discovered was that other people felt something here, too. Families began gathering at the lodge. Groups asked about yoga and wellness retreats, church retreats and other shared experiences. And increasingly, couples began asking if they could bring their families here for their weddings.
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That evolution has felt surprisingly natural to us. A wedding is, in many ways, the ultimate family gathering—people traveling from different places, sharing meals, celebrating together and creating memories that become part of a family’s story.
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So as The Otter Lodge has grown into a wedding destination, we’ve added furnishings, amenities and services to make those celebrations easier. But the purpose behind the property hasn’t really changed.
We Built The Otter Lodge to Bring People Together.
Come Make Some Memories Here
Whether you’re planning a Pocono getaway or a wedding weekend, The Otter Lodge gives you the space to make the experience your own.