We are repeat customers & have used this Marina 4 times over the last 2 years.
When we arrived, we were told to go to boat 7. Upon arriving, the dockhand was surprised & said he hadn't had a chance to clean the boat. There were chips smashed into the floorboard. Gross, but we were just ready to be on the water.
Another thing off was that the propeller looked pretty scuffed. We noticed this before leaving & took a photo (attached & timestamped).
We get out on the water & follow the boats out of the marina, staying slow in the no-wake zone. When we get to the open deep water, we "give it some gas." The boat wouldn't pick up speed. We just heard the propeller spinning. We were confused & turned the boat off & back on. Same issue. (We've piloted a boat many times, we're no experts but we know the basics).
We called the Marina & explained the situation. They wanted to come out on the water to meet us & asked us to share our location. We did. They arrived & towed us back.
When we arrive back at the Marina, the GM, Lance Looper, is waiting on the dock. We are hopeful he's there to apologize for giving us a defective boat & offer a solution. He's not. Instead, he is immediately angry AT US. He steps onto the boat & says the only way that that propellor would have spun like that is if we ran aground. We immediately informed him that we did not hit anything, we were directly in the middle of the water & noticed when we did because it was the first time we attempted to go over 5 mph.
He didn't believe us, gave us zero benefit of the doubt & doubled down that we definitely hit something & that the issue ONLY happens when we hit something. He told us to go home & that we're done here because he has no other boats & that we broke this one.
Once we de-boarded, I tried talking to a dockhand, someone reasonable, & one of the other dockhands said "Oh #7 was doing that yesterday."
We tried to explain, & he said the location we shared was near a shallow area. Hint: it wasn't. It was in the middle. We also mentioned that a dockhand said this boat was having this issue yesterday, & he dismissed that.
We asked him to check the boat for trauma. He said no, he's "too busy". He walked away, refusing to refund our res. ($1200), & we're sure he was planning to charge us for boat damage.
He's refusing to talk to us or look at the boat, & still pinning guilt. He was incredibly worked up, speaking to us with disrespect. He then called the cops & said that we broke his boat & were refusing to leave/trespassing & needed to be escorted off. We believe this tactic was to scare us into leaving, admitting guilt by default, & losing our $1200 res. fee + whatever they chose to charge for “boat damage.”
We sat in the sun for 30 more minutes & waited for the cops. The officer arrived & was incredibly kind, & thankfully an effective communicator.
This is where Lance changes his story & attitude. He calms down, speaks respectfully, & tells the officer that he just wants to resolve this & wants to check the boat (after refusing to check the boat for trauma repeatedly). We agree. That's what we wanted this whole time.
The officer suggested we wait in some shade while Lance checked the boat. The officer was respectful to everyone. Lance inspected the boat & came back with the officer about 15 minutes later.
To our shock, Lance told the truth. He said if we had hit something, this small cylindrical piece would have busted into a million pieces. It was still intact.
Lance apologized to 1 person from our party. His excuse was that he was busy/stressed & that "everyone says they didn't hit something when they did." Somehow that’s a good excuse for his behavior.
We went home, our res. was refunded, but not our transportation for 7 people to the marina & back, & we couldn't get a boat anywhere to go on the lake. We also had people visiting from out of state to go on the lake.
I also want to say that Elizabeth & all of the dockhands were respectful & professional.
This was our 4th & final time using Riviera Marina.