I’ve recently returned from a long weekend at the new Auberge resort, Encantado. I’ve always wanted to visit Santa Fe, but have been less than impressed with the high end hotels/resorts in the area. So when Encantado opened and I was able to secure a discount rate with breakfast (thanks to DavidO), it seemed like a good time to visit.

Overall, the stay was good, not great or spectacular, but good.

Several days prior to our arrival, I received a call from one of their concierges, asking if I would like any help with reservations and the like. I thought this was a nice, proactive touch. I did make a couple of restaurant reservations and requested some information about cultural and hiking activities in and around Santa Fe and everything was handled perfectly.

The resort is about 15 minutes north of Santa Fe and is in a lovely, picturesque area. When we drove into the place, my first reaction was that the resort was lovely, but small. Granted, the place has only 60 or so rooms, but those rooms and all of the facilities are packed into a very tiny area. The resort is shaped like a crescent, with most of the main buildings in the interior. The villas all have balconies or decks that face in, also toward the center. Herein lies my biggest issue with the place: since all rooms face in, no matter what kind of room you are in (and we were in a suite, their highest room category), you are guaranteed a parking lot and building view. Granted, some of the rooms (like ours) did have a nice view of the surrounding mountains, but I feel that this is somewhat detracted from since you will have to look over cars and buildings and the road in order to see anything. Furthermore, the resort has opted against a central parking lot in order to allow guests to park in front of their rooms. So, not only do you get to look at the cars when you are sitting on your deck, but you get to see people getting into and out of those cars - and they can see you. Want some privacy on your deck? Not gonna happen. The parking situation really seems unnecessary given that you can easily walk from one end of the resort to the other in 5 minutes, so they could have located the parking area away from the rooms and it really would not have been an huge inconvenience to walk or take a buggy to the room (and if they had removed the cars and the asphalt road from the center of the resort and replaced them with landscaping, it would have felt like you are the desert, not a parking lot). The layout of the rooms is such that you park in front of your room (this is where the deck is), but you have to walk around to the back to enter the room. I actually enjoyed the views off of the back more than those off of the front, but there was no place in the back to sit and enjoy the view.

Room

The rooms themselves are very well done. As mentioned above, we were in a suite, which is made up of a living area and a sleeping area separated by a set of double doors. You could leave the doors open and have one large space or keep them closed to keep the rooms separate. Glass doors off of both the living and bedroom areas lead to a double deck, with two chaise longues and a small dining table with chairs. There is a powder room next to the entrance and a bathroom off of the bedroom. The main bathroom was a mixed bag - I loved the heated concrete floors, but the spacious shower only had one underpowered shower head and was so large and dark that it seemed like I was showering in a cave. There is a very large soaking tub, but the hot water heater that services the room is insufficient to fill the tub more than a quarter before the water turns cold. The room has an interior wood burning fireplace and one outside on the deck as well. As with all Auberge resorts, there is a mini-bar with complimentary non-alcoholic beverages, one of those pod coffee machines and free (and fast!) wi-fi. The rooms have the now-standard 42 inch flat screen (there were two in the suite), DVD player and ipod docking station.

Service

The service was fine - certainly not Aman or Four Seasons service, but there were no gaffes made either. I was somewhat surprised at the lack of management presence at the place - given that they have been open only around a month, I would have expected to see managers everywhere, making sure that everything was running well and mingling with guests. I did not see one. Housekeeping was fine - we always call and request specific times for our daily cleaning and turndown and they were able to get this right every day. One thing that surprised me was that there was no pool service at all. Every morning, towels were set on the chairs by the pool and that was pretty much it. There is a service area and bar behind the pool, but this was empty the entire time that we were there. If you wanted water by the pool, you had to go back to the gym to get it. If you wanted food, or anything to drink other than water, I think you were out of luck.

Amenities

For the most part, the facilities and design of the resort are well done. I think you could call the whole thing ‘cowboy lite’ since there is a southwest accent to the entire place, but it is offset with other design elements that are almost European. One area where the design is really disappointing is the pool. I admit that I am a pool junkie and I was hoping for a well designed infinity edge one here. However, the resort has chosen to install a small, somewhat ugly lap pool instead. It really looks like something one would see at in apartment complex. If you like to relax around a lovely pool with wonderful service, this is not the place for you. There is a nice, well equipped gym and a movement studio. The spa is lovely, with nice common areas (there is a separate relaxation area for men and women as well as a common area). Treatment rooms are functional, but not spectacular. I did not have a treatment, so cannot comment on the quality there.

Dining

We ate at their one restaurant every morning for breakfast and once for dinner. Both breakfast and dinner were fine - nothing really extraordinary, but better than average for resort food. The service in the restaurant was excellent. The restaurant has a nice outdoor area with a large circular couch surrounding a fire pit (it looked like a lovely area, but they never had a fire going in the pit, so we did not really use it).

Shuttle Service

Encantado has a very thoughtful (and complimentary) shuttle service that runs from the resort to downtown Santa Fe (and back) around every 15 minutes or so. There is also a concierge lounge in Santa Fe. I thought this was a nice touch, and made visiting Santa Fe much less stressful.

Overall

So, finally, the big question that I ask myself after visiting a resort is ‘would I return?’. In this case I would have to say no. Like I said, nothing was terrible, but nothing was really spectacular either. And the ‘parking lot view’ from every room is enough to make me not want to come back. For all it’s faults (and it has many), I find FS Scottsdale to be a more enjoyable desert resort experience (at least at the FS I feel like I am in the desert). Next time I will go back there (or wait for Amangiri!).