Can You Actually Rent a Castle for the Weekend? (Yes, and Here's How)
Yes, you can rent a castle for the weekend, about two hours from New York City and Philadelphia. What you get, who books it, and how to book.
Every year a great many people type “rent a castle for the weekend” into a search box, half expecting the answer to be overseas, out of reach, or both. It is neither. There is a castle you can book for a weekend about two hours from New York City and Philadelphia, in the Pocono Mountains, and booking it works much like booking any other rental.
What people mean by “a castle”
Most people searching for a castle are not after a drafty medieval keep. They want the feeling of one: a building with a sense of occasion, rooms nobody else has, and a weekend the group will still talk about years later. They also want it to work as a place to stay, with real beds, proper bathrooms and a kitchen that can feed everyone.
Hilltop Castle is built for both. From the lawn it is a long pale stone wall with battlements and a crenellated gatehouse; inside it is 30,000 square feet of rooms made for a large group to spend a weekend together.
What comes with it
The Castle has 18 bedrooms, each with its own private bathroom, and sleeps 44. Then there is everything else:
- Three outdoor pools, in the courtyard inside the Castle’s walls
- A 72-seat theater
- Two bowling alleys, an arcade, billiards and air hockey
- A full-size indoor basketball court, which also takes pickleball
- Indoor mini golf and a yoga room
- A 48-seat dining room, and a 60-seat conference room for groups that are working too
And there is the part that makes it a castle in more than name: the Legend of the Lost Kingdom, a treasure hunt through twelve hidden rooms built into the building itself. It comes with your stay, with nothing extra to book. We won’t say more than that. The rest is for your group to find.
Who rents a castle
A wider range of groups than you might guess:
- Families gathering three or four generations for a reunion that needs to feel special enough for a once-in-a-decade weekend.
- Companies taking their team somewhere that says “this is not a normal work trip”, with a conference room for the mornings and bowling for the evenings.
- Friends marking a milestone birthday, or getting the old crowd back together.
- Couples planning a wedding weekend. A Hilltop wedding takes all four buildings for three nights, with beds for up to 92 guests; the weddings page has the details.
For a group larger than 44, the Castle can be booked together with the Mansion, the Farmhouse and the Lodge, each a short walk from the next on the same hill.
How booking works
You choose your dates in our booking calendar, where you see the price and availability for those dates and book directly. The guest of record must be 25 or older and stay for the whole reservation. For a group of friends, everyone in the group must be 25 or older; families are welcome with guests of any age.
If you have questions first, about which building fits your group or how a weekend usually runs, the team is a message away on the contact page, and our frequently asked questions cover check-in times, minimum stays and the rest.
So, yes
Two hours from New York City and Philadelphia, you can book an 18-bedroom castle with a bowling alley, a theater, three pools and a treasure hunt through hidden rooms, for a weekend. The question is not really whether you can rent a castle. It is who you are going to bring.
