Big-group houses at Arrowhead Lake, near Tobyhanna
If you're searching Coolbaugh or Tobyhanna Township because you have ten or twelve people and one weekend to get them all under the same roof, start with Arrowhead Lake. About half the community sits in Tobyhanna Township and the other half in Coolbaugh, and the gates are a short drive off I-380 and I-80. Our homes are addressed Pocono Lake, inside that gated community, which is the practical answer to a Tobyhanna search: same lakes, same roads, same ski drive. For twelve, the houses to look at first are Lakewood Mountain, Game and Spa Getaway and Cedar Grove.
The houses that actually take twelve
Three of ours sleep twelve, and they're not interchangeable. Lakewood Mountain is the one people book when the trip is built around the house itself: the ground floor holds an indoor hot tub, a sauna and a ping pong table, so a rained-out Saturday has somewhere to go. Game and Spa Getaway runs to more than 1,600 square feet with a game room, hot tub and sauna, and the backyard backs onto game lands, which means nobody behind you. Cedar Grove is the quieter, more modern of the three, with a private hot tub and a position near one of the community pools, which matters in July when you have kids who want to swim twice a day.
Just under that, Wooded Bliss takes eleven across four bedrooms. Then a cluster at ten: Mountain Haven Retreat, a bi-level with five bedrooms and easy reach of Kalahari and the ski resorts; Lakehouse Legacy, lakefront, five bedrooms, built for a group that wants the water out the window; and Moores Lake House, which sleeps ten out of three bedrooms with a five-minute walk to the seasonal community pool.
That last one is worth pausing on, because bed count and bedroom count are different questions. Ten people in three bedrooms works beautifully for one family with cousins, and badly for five couples. Treehouse Escape has the same shape: nine guests across three levels, three bedrooms plus a loft, with two living rooms and a foosball table on the lower level. Dogs are welcome there, and there are wood-burning fireplaces on two floors. Decide how many doors that close you need before you fall for a floor plan.
One house or two?
Groups of fourteen to twenty ask us this constantly, and the honest mechanics of Arrowhead Lake make the answer easier than it looks. Houses here sit on wooded lots within the same gated community, so booking two near each other gives everyone their own kitchen and their own bathroom queue while you still share the lakes, the beaches and the pools during the day. Pairing a twelve-sleeper with an eight like Elegance Peak, which has a pool table, a firepit and a private hot tub, tends to work better than squeezing twenty into one building.
Driveways decide more than people expect. Groups arrive in three or four cars, and a house with a long private driveway and free parking saves you the awkwardness of blocking each other in at six in the morning when someone wants first chair at Jack Frost.
What the community adds, and when
Arrowhead Lake is the reason a big group can spend a whole day here without driving anywhere. Two lakes, four sandy beaches, three heated outdoor pools, tennis, basketball, volleyball, bocce and horseshoe pits, plus a lodge with a gym, a billiard room and a library. There's a seasonal Rental Shack for kayaks, bikes and sports gear, and an island recreation center on the main lake.
The seasonality is the part people get wrong. Pools run Memorial Day to Labor Day, and the Rental Shack is a summer operation too. Outside that window the lodge carries the social life: fireplaces, game rooms, the banquet hall. A February group books differently from a July group, and the February group should be thinking about a house with its own entertainment inside it. That's why the sauna-and-game-room houses earn their keep in winter and the lakefront ones earn theirs in August.
Access runs on temporary membership, paid separately to the community association, with a gate card per vehicle. You'll want names, driver details and car information from everyone before you arrive, and everything registered at least three days out. For a group of twelve that's a single annoying spreadsheet, done once, and it's the thing most likely to catch out a host who leaves it to the last minute.
Lake houses for smaller crews
Not every "large group" is twelve. If you're six to nine and want water rather than square footage, the smaller end of the portfolio is where the good lots are. LiWay Lakeside sleeps six on a secluded wooded lot with a private dock, kayaks for guest use, and a king bedroom with its own half bath. Lakefront Retreat sleeps seven with kayaks and a canoe on the property and a firepit down by the water, though it has a single bathroom, which is a real constraint for seven people on a ski morning.
Broken Oar Cottage splits the difference: seven guests, two full bathrooms, two queens and a twin room, a loft with a workspace, and a six-minute walk to Beach #2. For a group that plans to cook, it's a strong choice, with a granite-counter kitchen and a dining area that seats eight. Lakeview Oasis takes eight on the lake with two covered patios, which is more outdoor shade than most of our houses offer.
Getting around, and what's nearby
You need cars. The community is deliberately remote, set back from the highways, and there's no walking to a grocery store. Ahart, Weis, Walmart, ALDI and a CVS are the shops people use, and we stock about two or three nights of essentials, which a group of twelve will burn through faster than that. Send one car on a real shop the first afternoon and save yourself three trips.
Jack Frost and Big Boulder are the close ski areas, Camelback a bit further on, and Kalahari's indoor waterpark is the standard rainy-day plan. Pocono Raceway is near enough that race weekends book out early, so if you're coming for a race, book well ahead. Tobyhanna State Park has a level, gravelled trail circling the lake, a little over five miles, and allow somewhere between an hour and a half and two and a half hours depending on how many of you stop to take photographs. It also has a snowmobile trail starting from the first lot. Hickory Run and Gouldsboro state parks are both an easy drive, and Brady's Lake game lands sit right next door to the community.
For dinner without cooking, Murph's Hideaway and Robert Christians are both on Route 940 in Pocono Lake, and Moyer's Country Kitchen is the breakfast end of that same road. Mount Airy Casino is the late-night option.
Booking a big group
We book direct, with no middlemen or platform fees, which for a group mostly means you're talking to the people who hold the keys rather than a support queue. Tell us the dates, the headcount and how many separate bedrooms you actually need, and we'll tell you which houses genuinely work. Community fees, current rates, minimum stays and availability all get confirmed at the time of booking, and the registration paperwork for the gate is something we walk you through.
One thing to settle early: trash goes out with you. Everything has to leave the house at departure and go to the community Trash Center, address in the guidebook on the counter. For twelve people over a long weekend, that's a bigger job than it sounds, so nominate someone on day one.