My wife decided she was really interested in doing a fossil tour – where you actually search for things like shark teeth and bones that are up to 30 million years old. It’s not really my thing, but she really wanted to do it at the Peace River in Florida just east of Sarasota. The weekend we had available had a pretty poor weather forecast and I was concerned our flights would get delayed or the tour would get canceled due to thunderstorms and we’d be stuck in a crappy Hyatt Place or Fairfield Inn off I-75.

I found a fossil tour in Charleston where the forecast looked better and where we could drive to from home without worrying about flight delays. We were only booking this about a week out so when I looked at hotel options, my choices were somewhat limited if I wanted to use points or hotel credits.

I still had a Chase The Edit credit to use which gets me $250 toward a two night stay at a limited set of luxury properties. That seemed to be the best option because I could also use Chase points at an elevated rate through Points Boost to avoid spending cash at all. As for the other options, Amex Fine Hotels and Resorts were all ridiculous prices, the local chain hotels were either outside of town or poorly located, and the Citi portal didn’t have any good deals.

I narrowed it down to two choices through The Edit, Hotel Bennett and The Pinch. Hotel Bennett has close to 200 rooms and suites and seemed to be the hotel of choice for high-end bachelorette and wedding party weekends. Judging by the number of “brides” we saw walking around Charleston, many of them were probably staying at Hotel Bennett. The Pinch is a boutique hotel with only 25 rooms and suites. In the end, I picked The Pinch because it cost me 78,000 Ultimate Rewards points at 1.65 cents per point (with the Points Boost after the $250 credit was applied) and Hotel Bennett was over 100,000. Did I mention this was an expensive weekend to visit Charleston?

Booking through The Edit provides daily breakfast for two, early check-in/late check-out based on availability, a $100 food and beverage credit, a welcome gift and upgrade if available. So, what did we think of The Pinch? It delivered on the room and location, but not on the food and beverage aspects. Read on for the detailed review.

We left very early on Friday morning and made the 5+ hour drive to Charleston where we first stopped at Sullivan’s Island, a beach area not far from town. We were fortunate to find a parking spot and spend a couple of hours on the beach before it just got too hot and we decided to head to the hotel for some air conditioning.

We arrived at the hotel around 1:30pm. I didn’t get any kind of email or message from the hotel prior to check-in which is unusual for a property booked through one of the premium credit card hotel programs. When we arrived, the valet was friendly and showed me how we could message to get the car whenever we needed it between 7am-11pm or go via the front desk for 11pm-7am.

At the front desk, they were a bit standoffish at first. We probably smelled of sweat and looked shabby in our beachwear. They said the room would be available shortly, but said check-in was officially 4pm so they couldn’t guarantee it earlier. We left our bags and walked around for 45 minutes or so, but it was just too hot to stay out so we figured we’d park ourselves in the small lobby and wait.

Thankfully, as we walked back in the lobby, the receptionist told me she had just then texted me that our room was ready. The text came in as I was standing there. She said we had been upgraded to a one bedroom suite. The hotel has an interesting variety of rooms and suites because it is in an older building that was converted to a hotel. There are everything from regular rooms to two bedroom suites and many of the suites (like ours) have full kitchens as well.

Our bags that we had left with the front desk were already placed in our room which was a nice touch. We were in room 208 on the second of three floors. The living area was to the left of the door and had a small table, couch, armchair and TV by the front window.

There was a full kitchen and minibar items in the fridge and on the counter.

We were given a decent bottle of champagne (around $40 retail) which I sampled the next day. There were also refillable glass water bottles.

The bedroom was to the right of the door and quite nice, although not five star luxury. There were USB A, USB C and plug outlets right by each bed just below the nightstand. The closet had robes and slippers for our use.

There was a TV on the wall opposite from the bed and a small desk.

The bathroom was just across from the entry door and had a single sink and large walk-in shower. Strangely, there was also a stacked washer/dryer in the bathroom closet. Who is staying here long enough to do laundry at these rates?

So far so good. We got in our room around 90 minutes before standard check-in time and we were upgraded to a suite. The suite itself was comfortable if not luxurious and everything worked fine. Now let’s get to the not so good.

There was a lot of noise in front of the hotel from loud cars and loud music from cars which was annoying when in the living room area of the suite. Thankfully, the bedroom was toward the rear and had a closing door as well so we didn’t hear anything in there. I would be very wary of any room where the bed is near the front windows of the hotel.

Breakfast was served in the dining room off the lobby called The Quinte, which is actually not a full restaurant at all, but an extension of the hotel restaurant called Lowland, located just next door across the driveway. This is where we had some real issues with the description in the Chase booking as “daily breakfast for two.” If it says this in the description, I am going to assume there is a full breakfast on offer, either a buffet, a menu or some combination with eggs, pancakes, French toast, etc. Unless it says “continental” I will assume it is not a continental breakfast.

In reality, The Pinch served a very light continental breakfast more akin to a Hyatt Place or Hampton Inn, albeit with fresher fruit and higher-end yogurt. There was a waffle iron where you can use waffle mix, some pastries and bagels that looked like they came from Costco, fruit and yogurt in a small fridge and some coffee. Pictured below is the whole thing.

There was no menu, no server, no premium coffee drinks and no cooked food. This was very disappointing considering how many Chase points I used for two nights, which was equivalent to a Category 7 Hyatt where you will always have a full breakfast served (complimentary for Globalists like me). We are not big breakfast eaters at home, but when traveling we often eat a big breakfast (especially when it is included and convenient) and skip lunch while were out doing whatever activity we have planned. With our fossil hunting tour planned for that morning, I ended up eating a protein bar from home just to tide me over until we got back.

The second morning, we decided to walk down to the Swamp Fox restaurant at the Frances Marion hotel on Marion Square (coincidentally close to Hotel Bennett). We had a fantastic breakfast there where I had the buffet including a made to order omelet and my wife had the bourbon butter French toast. There was also peach cobbler and other items on the buffet. Breakfast for two cost about $49 plus tip.

I had a conversation with the front desk rep about this as we left on Sunday. She said they never offered breakfast at all but are required to for Chase and Amex hotel programs. I told them they needed to bring in a chef and a server to offer a full breakfast if they are going to be competitive with their competition in Charleston for these luxury hotel programs. Or, at the very least, they should offer a cooked breakfast option via room service. I think their issue is that The Quinte is not a full restaurant, just an added dining room to Lowland, the hotel’s restaurant across the driveway from the main building, but they could just open Lowland’s kitchen for breakfast.

On Saturday night, I booked us a table at Lowland, which had great reviews and was obviously popular beyond the hotel as it was very busy with few reservation slots available a week out. We were seated in the Quinte, but we first had to go across to the main restaurant to check in. Essentially, we left the hotel, walked across the driveway, and then walked back to the hotel where we were sitting.

We grabbed a drink at the bar while we waited for our table and the bartender, who wasn’t all that busy, made the wrong drink for my wife at first before correcting his error. Once the error was corrected, the drinks were good. Here’s the drink menu:

We were shown to our table and took a look at the menu. There are small plates and salads followed by main dishes below that.

What we ordered was fine. I really enjoyed the rigatoni and my wife got the beef tartare and quail. They did (again) bring the wrong dish at first which was annoying. We were able to apply the $100 food and beverage credit by charging the meal to our room. I would have liked to use a $20 Resy credit on my Delta Amex Reserve but I didn’t want to complicate things for the restaurant staff that already had trouble bringing us the right food and drinks. Overall, the food and beverage program at The Pinch was a real letdown and put a damper on our stay.

We left Sunday morning fairly early to head to Edisto Island Beach before driving home so I don’t know if we would have received a late checkout. Overall, The Pinch was a nice boutique hotel in a great location, but the lack of a real breakfast means it is hard to recommend it versus the other Edit or FHR options in Charleston if you are headed there to use a luxury hotel credit.

Oh and how was the fossil tour? Hot and boring if you ask me – fun and interesting if you ask my wife. We booked with Charleston Fossil Adventures and the owner does a good job if you are into this kind of thing.

If you have questions about this post, let me know in the comments or send me an email at emptynestermiles@gmail.com. If you are thinking about opening a new credit card, please use one of my links. I also recommend using CardPointers to track your credit card spending discount offers.