Georgian Bay Park — Hotel in Tiny

Have been there for French fries before and really enjoyed the vendor they host there! They have wonderful fries for the area, however the signs out on the main road don’t give an accurate indication when the fry vendor is actually there. Wish they would have an Open sign out on the road for more clear hours when driving by.

Came across one of their posting about a pig roast event and got pretty excited. We saw it on the day of the event about an hour before it was due to start so we thought we would go and check it out.

When we arrived there was only panicked directions about what was going on. We figured a pig roast would be taking place outside but instead we were quickly ushered inside one of their buildings. We tried to ask about cost, and explained we were not from their campground but they just shooed us upstairs to speak with someone at at upper level of the building. We were then shooed to find seats, and our questions still ignored.

The speakers were amazing, and it was wonderful to get to learn more about First Nations traditions of smudging and their practices. I was expecting us all to go outside at some point to see the pig roast.. or even one cooked in a more traditional way (I’ve only experienced Coast Salish style cooking which is deep in the ground) so I wasn’t sure what was going to happen next.

They then began calling tables in to go up to get food, we planned to ask the caterers that were serving where we were supposed to pay as they seemed to be the ones in charge of the actual Pig Roast. Before I had a chance to get to the front, a woman came over to me and demanded to ask who it was that I “knew here”. I looked at her, and around, and said no one. I don’t know anyone. Very she was very suspicious of me, almost as if I was trying to rob her of her food. She asked me something about how I got here… I explained that I saw the Facebook event post that they, had posted about this.

She said that we have to have prepaid tickets for that, but when I was on her posting on Facebook there was no ability to purchase any. I explained this… she said I could have gotten them downstairs from the front desk.

I was growing rather frustrated because we had been at the front desk, asking for some direction about what was going on and where just ushered upstairs. The woman then rather sternly sent us to another man who reiterated that we had to go downstairs and buy tickets for a show we had half watched… already and come back for the food if we wanted some. Each moment that passed the situation was getting more awkward.

Especially when we got downstairs told the same front desk people what happened and they asked us for $35/pp. Because we felt we had been now watched half of the presentation, we moved forward with purchasing our tickets despite wanting to leave. The food was not something we found worthwhile, but that is our preference, and it was not what we had expected for a pig roast.

If accepting public attendees, I believe that having a bit more organization would be key. They had tickets available at the door - but no one directed us there to pay for them until far too late. If you want people to pre-purchase tickets only, then mark your Facebook event as full, or not simply open to the public especially if someone marks going, and says they are excited to attend in the comments section days ahead of time for nothing to be stated by the host about pre-purchasing tickets.

One of the hosts seemed very thrilled that the facebook event had drawn in some interest, but I am not sure the overall group is ready for change and new people. Besides the single individual the rest of the groups attitude felt very unwelcoming.

** Update : For you to add a comment reply to me on FB -TODAY- about pre purchasing tickets after getting this review is a poor way to manage...

We phoned to book this campsite for four days after reading on their website that the daily rate was $70 for an RV, but we were told that the daily rate was actually $110 a day, and the $70 charge was only AFTER you book a week for $499; very misleading. We didn't want a whole week but could not find any other campsite available for the days we were available, so we made the reservation, although we were urged to book the whole week. During a subsequent call to confirm, it was again suggested that we book the whole week. The address for the campsite was given as Crossland Road, and there was a large sign for the campsite alongside that road, but no directions on the sign. On a subsequent smaller sign there was a note at the bottom to turn left, but we only found that after a second drive along Crossland Road; better signage would be useful. When we arrived, we were yet again urged to book for a week. Yes, we knew that was a better rate but we did not want a full week. We were also give a spiel about the developments going on at the park, i.e. new condos and a full medical facility, and that everyone who came for a visit signed up for more - a sales pitch we didn't want or need. Our actual campsite was definitely not worth $110 a night; we have booked significantly better campsites both in Canada and the U.S for considerably less than $110 a night, and have never paid that much for a site. Except for the electricity, water and sewer hookup, we could have been setting up in a field. Not a single shade tree was on our site and the temp was 30+ when we arrived. The park has a pool but it is beside the office and quite a ways from most of the camping sites. It appeared not to be getting much use. Unfortunately, the car we had been trailing behind our RV exhibited brake problems shortly after we arrived on the Monday, so on Tuesday we called our regular garage and booked an appointment, which meant that we had to leave on Thursday instead of Friday. We notified the owner of this on Tuesday, i.e. with 48 hours notice, and hoped that we could get a refund for that day, but were met with a snide remark that they needed 2 weeks notice, and we should not be expecting a refund because of the difficulty for him in booking that one day. However, that made no sense; it would not be one day because we knew that site was available for the whole weekend - they tried to sell us on the whole week, including the weekend. All in all, we were pretty unhappy with this RV park and would never consider booking there again, or recommending...

Janice - I’m sure the comments you refer to came from your management patrons. One of the reason we left was to be closer to family and since management had the final say on the sale of our trailer this was the only reason we shared with them. As for decision to move to a more expensive site - we had already made the deal to purchase the “40’ trailer” before we knew you were raising the site fees from $5000/yr to $6200/yr. Had we known ahead of time we would never have considered it. But didn’t feel right backing out of the deal. We were unaware that we were actually paying for the water. All invoices say “water testing”. Maybe you should be more clear what patrons are actually paying for. Such as the hydro. What do patrons actually pay for? Just what they consume or the cost to put in the whole system? Every invoice needs deciphering, it’s never consistent. Development fees - It really blows my mind that people will pay you so they can use their own money to develop your property. But good for you. As for your garbage pick up. It is consistently overflowing. I know a patron who stood there when the garbage was being emptied so he throw the garbage from the ground in so the truck could empty it a second time. Maybe you should recycle like most parks do. Hopefully you can get lots of people to do more reviews so this one gets...