The good: Beautiful area, nice lake, indoor and outdoor fireplaces. Kayaks and firewood available.
The not-so-good: cabin is stuffy without A/C. Bedroom window doesn't have a screen. Only one tiny lamp for the biggest room in the cabin. Needed my flashlight!
The bad, part 1: The bed. It's a double, when listed as a queen. Mattress is ancient and hard as a rock. No topper or egg crate available. I am not picky when it comes to beds, but neither my partner nor I were able to sleep on this mattress. We ended up taking the (also ancient, but comfortable) couch cushions, laying them on the floor, and using that as a bed, which sufficed.
The bad, part 2: The tap water. While clear, it tasted strongly metallic and smelled strongly of rotten eggs. Running the tap for many minutes did not improve it. It did not seem safe to drink, easily the most sketchy tap water I've ever encountered. With the sulfur-y rotten egg smell coming out of every faucet, doing dishes and showering felt counterproductive. There were a few bottles of water in the fridge but no Brita filter or anything to improve the tap water.
This place had such good reviews, so it was really surprising to us that no one else mentioned these issues! Over the years we've stayed at dozens of online home rentals, in this country and others, and we've never had a negative experience like this.
Between these two issues, we decided that we couldn't stay here beyond the first night (initially booked for 6). We called VRBO and attempted to cancel and get a refund. VRBO patched us through to the owner, Kerry. We explained our concerns about the tap water, and he insisted that the water was high-quality well water, the same he drinks in his house next door. I asked if he would like to come taste the cabin water, and he refused. He then said "Get the hell out of here!" twice. We felt very threatened by our host and immediately packed up and left.
He then only gave us a partial (~50%) refund when he promised one for the 5 days we didn’t stay. This is theft. We are still fighting for the rest.
An egg crate, a Brita filter, and a host capable of hospitality and a grown-up conversation would have gone a long way toward making this place habitable. Unfortunately, these things were beyond Kerry. Especially upsetting is how aggressive he became when we brought up our concerns. Thankfully, we didn't let him ruin our vacation, and we promptly found another place to stay in the UP that was totally great.