Sugar Creek Gem Mine — Attraction in Banner Elk

This place is not kid friendly and should be avoided. We recently took our grandkids and bought 2 70$ buckets and was told could buy more if needed. This was very high but we had drove 2 hours and the grandkids love doing this . We where close to finishing up the buckets we had and I ask one of the men assisting to bring another bucket. I was told we could not buy another bucket and we had to leave the site. We had done fine and causing no problems. But still we being thrown ( 2 senior citizens , 2 small kids 4 & 9. The issue was that a group came on and wanted the place to themselves so even though we were there first and this group did not have reservations we where being thrown out. I immediately ask how to contact the owner I was told to go inside while the rest where leaving the sifting area. When I left my wife was still there with the grandkids. After I went into the building one of them called me an SOB in front of all including a 4 and 9 year old. My wife did not share this until we where home. It took a few days to get in touch with the owner and shared the above. His response was his guys would not do that and one that called me the name was an assistant pastor at his church. Great example in front of anyone especially same kids. Although the owner was basically calling a liar but he would talk to them and get back to me. Of course He never did. Make your own choices but this is not a good place to go. As a side note the North Carolina gems are imported from...

UPDATED REVIEW - WILL NEVER RETURN!!! While the experience here was 'thought' to be an excellent one, it was unfortunately tainted by EXTREMELY bad follow up and HORRIBLE service/resolution. DO NOT EVER PAY FOR OR ORDER YOUR STONES TO BE CUT! We were promised one thing an received an entirely different product. While they did respond (finally after my 3rd call into them) the resolution was "we'll give you a credit" and NO FOLLOW UP EMAIL as promised to confirm this credit or that the time limit would not expire (we may not return to the area for another year). We spent $123 for JUNK and I'm still ticked off about it...thus we will NOT RETURN because of this issue. It's really too bad as the facility & staff seem great, but administration/owners/management could give 2 _ _ _ _'s about customer satisfaction. They got our money, that's all they care about. Multiple phone calls and all the time wasted and they obviously don't care; so I'm posting this in hopes it at least warns prospective customers. Again, really too bad - simple customer service AGAIN is just a thing of the past. But I can certainly speak by NEVER giving them another moment of patronage and SPREADING THE WORD to all of my connections to NEVER visit this business! Owners at Sugar Creek - I hope the $123 was worth the bad-advertising I'll be...

Overall very fun! Didn't feel rushed. Disclaimer for parents: if you bring your kids, PLEASE don't expect them to walk away with a lot. The point is to have fun and validate your kid, so don't make them think their time there was a failure just because they didn't find much. It's not fun to hear you berate your kid for not being a perfect miner.

Friendly staff who enjoyed their jobs and not a hint of condescension. Even offered helpful advice on top of what we asked. The yield was good, and several of us left with some big quartz crystals 2" or more. Good variety of gemstones, though usually in small pieces. Most of the pans, though, had fine mesh that had gaping holes. It made retrieving some the finds a little difficult because they got caught between the mesh layers, and honestly for the amount of money they take in per group, it's surprising that anything at all would be in need of repair. Cost for us was $16 per person, but only because we split a huge bucket between about 8 people. There are other packages, so admission is...