May there is something wrong with what I'm finding, but it looks like in order to "connect" to a beacon, you have to first authenticate via:
[ESTBeaconManager setupAppID:@"..." andAppToken:@"..."]
When I do this, then the beacon's proximity, name and some other information becomes available ( otherwise, everything is nil ).
The problem I'm seeing is that if you're logged into cloud.estimote.com while you are trying to [beacon connect], it never fully connects. The only way I was able to connect to it is to actually "logout" of the cloud.estimote.com portal.