Canoe Outpost-Little Manatee River — Hotel in Riverview

The river was beautiful. Would probably be nice for experienced people or if this business had offered any help to us about what to expect. I rented 2 bd cabin for us, another couple and our 2 dogs for 2 nights. Owner sounds nice and efficient on the phone. You arrive to see a deplorable business set up. Broken down yellow school buses everywhere, trash, unkempt, very unprofessional. We dealt with a total of 3 young men during our stay. They were nice but clearly had no interest in welcoming guests. They seemed disinterested, bored, and could have cared less. We are fairly inexperienced at canoeing (done it about 10 times) and they told us zero about anything. Our "bus ride" to launch the canoes consisted of one bus they could not get to run, and a back up bus that lacked decent brakes, power steering (pointed out to us by the unconcerned driver), and basic maintence repairs. He dropped us off at a poor launch spot and left, leaving us to launch our canoes ourselves in a 3 ft opening next to a highway bridge. The current was moving a bit and we immediately tipped one canoe and a brand new canoer into the river because there isnt any room to stand next to the canoe.The equipment was old and worn out, stunk and clearly needing replacing. The canoe seemed ok.

Once we got started, the river was beautiful, although too much for inexperienced people and children. We did the best we could but we tipped a total of 4 times. There are zero markings anywhere so you have no idea how many miles you have gone, which had always been a part of every other trip we've taken. Three separate times when the canoe went over, it was all we could do to get it back up. One point it was at the bottom, in very deep water. Took us abt 30 mins to get it back up. Beautiful river but we were never warned about the currents, safety, or how to recover the canoe (we have NEVER tipped before). We loved the river, but this business made it a miserable experience for us all.

Finally made it back to their business. The owner, who we didnt see for the whole 2 days, pulled up in a van. My friend explained that it did not go very well, explained we tipped multiple times. His response, out the window of his truck was, "you got the canoes though, right"? Really? We had cuts and scraps from the trees downed that no one told us about, huge bruises from trying to rescue the canoes, and my husband had blood running down his arm from a bad scrape, but we're ok, thanks for asking. Good grief. No concern for us at all. I had to just walk away.

The cabin we rented was nice and relatively clean. Next to the cabin is an old broke down bus (no bathroom) the owner rents out, and several people living in tents there, including employees. There is only one 5 minute trail around the place, which we decided to take. We were disgusted to find put that people are using the woods along the trail as a bathroom instead of the one they are supposed to walk to. Wads of toilet paper (with #2) were scattered in several places. Yuck. We went back to our cabin.

Finally, several blacks cats are allowed to roam the property freely. Now I love cats, but my dog doesn't. Everytime we tried to open our cabin door the cats would try and run in. We couldn't use the "screened back porch" because the eaves aren't screened and the cats are on the porch laying all over the furniture every time you try to walk out the back. Wed chase them off so the dog could come out, and 30 seconds later another one be at another door.

We've camped and stayed at places across the whole east coast and midwest. This was one of the worst. Just really poorly managed and it really ruins the fun for the patron. We will never stay here again and would never recommend this place to anyone else. Lots of much nicer, better managed places to stay and canoe at...

We went kayaking (not camping) through Canoe Outpost so I’m only reviewing about our kayaking experience. The local county park wasn’t able to accommodate us as they were still waiting for new kayaks since they lost a bunch in last year’s hurricane, so we called Canoe Outpost and they were able to set us up with less than 15 minutes notice! I was happy that they were able to save the day since we were really looking forward to kayaking. The kayaks are reasonably priced and in excellent condition. They have a little store too with snacks, drinks, and supplies for kayaking, camping, & fishing. Trust me that you’ll appreciate those drinks and snacks once you’re out on the river! The staff are super friendly and helped us into the kayak and we were on our way. We had a lot of fun, and the river was extremely quiet. Some bad planning on my part was the heat in August, and since we had tried the county park first it was approaching midday, so if you’re set on going in the dead of summer, set out very early!! We saw birds, fish, turtles, and a couple of alligators. Because of the gators, I personally wouldn’t bring pets or very young children or swim around in the water unless it was a designated roped off area (we passed one area with a short metal pier and kids paddling in the water.) Canoe Outpost is great regarding your return time, you get at least 4 hours and they have regular pickups on the hour at the end of the route. Since we were the only ones out that day (a weekday in Aug) we were able to just call them when we finished and they sent the air conditioned van to get us (and the kayak) So overall a great place and we had a blast but I’ll probably try again when it’s not so hot and it would...

My husband and I stayed here at the end of January, and had a good time despite the rain. Skyler convinced me to do a sit on top kayak ,and it turned out to be a great choice. The river was way up and there was some challenges going down the river with branches that the river had come up to meet. I did, being a northerner, appreciate some of the tangerine, and orange trees that sprang up here and there, and ohhh the smell after you pick one and bring it with you down the river. || I was only nervous one time on the river after we made a turn and there were these run down, dilapidated homes with gunshots going off, I felt for a brief few minutes like I might be part of a horror flick, and the vultures were conveniently perched in the trees nearby, to pick away at any carnage. We learned after our journey that if you yell to these people for a beer, they will throw you one. I'm just glad they didnt throw knives.||As for the cottage we stayed in, it was nice, with a kitchen area to cook and keep you feeling kinda like home. They keep them up fairly well, although if your expecting the Ritz Carlton they are not that. We weren't able to walk around much as the rain kept us from that. They did have a peacock roaming around, and we did check out the Teepee, but other than that we were off doing touristy kinda stuff. ||Make sure to go to TECO and check out...