Turtle Jack's Upper James — Restaurant in Hamilton

Theoretically, this was a 5/5 stars visit. Granted, some fault lies with our party as customers, but we arrived at the restaurant with a request for 17 of us to get tables. We tried calling in advance (same day which is not enough in advance but we tried because we know 17 is a lot!), was told they cannot take same day reservations, and was told after that to just walk in....which we did.

When we walked in, we explained it like the following, "Hello, we are here in town for a wedding which is why we are 17 people looking to eat here. We called in advance earlier today but we were told to walk in instead. Since we know it is impossible to seat all 17 of us together, we are fine with sitting in 5 tables of 4."

We were told immediately by the hostess that it would be an hour wait. Typically, this would make sense if we didn't visually see at least 10 tables of 4 that were empty, and without "Reserved" signs on them. We clarified our request again, this time, putting more emphasis on how we would be willing to sit on opposite sides of the restaurant if all the tables had to be separate, and the hostess said it a voice with an edge, "It'll still be an hour; you should have called ahead."

This rubbed someone in our party the wrong way, so that person demanded to speak with a manager. As soon as the manager arrived, that person summarized the situation, and the manager in question walked away with their hands in the air stating, "I can't do this." At this point, the person from our party demanded that person's manager because that wasn't a professional way to handle any customer inquiries so finally, the location manager was brought in, and lo and behold, magically, 5 tables of 4 suddenly opened up lol.

When we left, we found out the first manager had a death in the family earlier this week, so our sympathies are with them and their family. However, it should be noted that it is quite unprofessional that the resr waiting team spent the rest of the night blatantly gossiping about the person from our party during the time we dined there.

Prior to us leaving after we ate, we asked the manager whether or not them seating us caused them to turn away any tables, or if we took any tables that were reserved. He confirmed with us that seating us indeed did not interfere with their ability to serve others as intended. Aka, no we did not take other people's tables, nor did we take any tables away from other patrons of this restaurant.

Despire the above, the waiter for our table specifically was really cool, and served us well. Made good recommendations when it came to wings, and beer! My serving of chicken fingers was extremely generous, and saucy, just the way I like it. I do think it is important for management to evaulate the way their team speaks with and about customers as there is always room to grow. Truly hoping this was just an off night as my food, and drink was enjoyed!

-[CLASSIC BUFFALO FINGERS] $19.95 🍗 Tossed in your choice of wing sauces - I went with medium 🍗 Also served with fries, and coleslaw 🍗 The number of chicken fingers served was at least 7 in my order haha, suuuuper generous

-[RASPBERRT MOJITO] $10.95 🍹 Smirnoff Raspberry vodka, sweet & sour, raspberries, mint, soda water 🍹 This drink goes down so easily that I could have downed a whole pitcher...

Went to this location for lunch on 11/25. Our server was great, however the wait for our food was almost 50 mins. At around 40 min we received word that our food was making its way to our plates and should be out shortly. When the food arrived I was advised my plate was very hot, which it was due to it being under or in a hot oven to keep warm. I ordered a chicken pasta cheese dish. The plate was actually blistering hot which explains why the chicken was dry and pasta too, and the portion was small with literally 5 slices of chicken. 2 other meals ordered were a beef on a bun of some sort, one with mushrooms and one without. They both came with mushrooms! Had to send it back and make another. I am not one to give feedback or speak up at the time in a restaurant as it's really not worth my time. This time I did. When our server asked how are things, as they always do, I spoke out. I said we waited quite a long time for this food and wondering if there was a back log? In my mind I was thinking there couldn't have been since there were no more than 6-8 other tables with people in the restaurant at the time. I also told the girl my pasta and cheese was dry and the chicken was not edible as it was very dry. And the fact that we had to send back a meal that added to the so far unpleasant experience. With all this said, I advised our server that I assume this was not her fault and to pass this feedback on. Our server apologized and said she would let the manager know. We never received a visit from the mange, which is what I was expecting! Our bill came ($175.00) and with 15% off(which is the managers way of apologizing for everything wrong. This was the most unprofessional display of customer service in a restaurant I have experienced. I told our server to let the manager know who was working this day, around 1300-1400 ( want to be specific so they know who I am referring to) that we were extremely disappointed with the quality of the meals, time it took and mostly that she (manager) didn't have the "decency or courage" to come to our table and apologize, was less than impressive. I do NOT recommend this restaurant and especially this location. Beer was cold, I give them that, but not sure how anyone can mess up with a glass of beer! In closing I read some other reviews for this place and the lunch time manager noted in other reviews was rude and also never did anything to accommodate their bad meals and experience. For a bill of $176.00, taking off %15 was not what I would expect. My take is the owner of this chain should really review the service of this location or managements ability to provide a decent experience at least for others. But we will never go back. If the manager who worked this day reads this, I welcome any feedback to my review if you have the decency or...

HORRIBLE! Save Your Money! Before I describe the food I'd like to say that the only reason that I gave 2 stars is because our waitress was fantastic. I believe her name was Maddie. If it was not for the great service I definitely would rate our experience with only one star as I can't rate lower than that. I don't mind paying any price for a purchase as long as I feel I'm getting value for what I spend. Luckily my kids treated us as a late mother's Day dinner. So I'll mention some of the outrageous prices first. Just a few examples are: the non-alcoholic raspberry lemonade $7.45, 18oz beer {not even a full pint $10, a bottle of wine roughly $50 {certainly not the atmosphere for a $50 bottle} They do advertise on day where the bottle is ½price. Which kinda shows you how much they're trying to gouge you the rest of the week. Anyway, on to the food. Appetizer -Nachos. Taste really good, nothing special about them for the price they charged. Now on to the food. I must say that I am using the term food loosely. 1st son had a burger with a very small side salad. On special so the price was fair and he said that it tasted really good. The problem was that the plate had a puddle, not a bit shiny, but an actual puddle of grease. 2nd son had the ribs and wing combo. Very expensive, but he did enjoy it. Husband - New York chicken with instant potatoes, yep fake spuds. If you charge almost $30 for a plate of food at least use real potatoes. Now mine. I have chicken parmesan at pretty much every place we go so without looking at the menu that was my order. Afterall they used to have an amazing chicken Parm. Not anymore! The pasta was a broad egg noodle mixed in a tomato sauce. There must have been a shortage on sauce though because they were quite dry. Now the best part of this whole fiasco the chicken. Bear in mind that they charge at least $10 more than other places. You'd expect a chicken breast hand breaded with tomato sauce and, if course cheese. Well, if you expected that, like I did, you'd be sorely mistaken. They were 2 chicken cutlets that weren't even hand breaded. Chicken cutlets! Like the cheapest kind you buy in the frozen section of No-frills. The cutlets were covered in the thin factory breading that goes mushy. For the first time ever I sent a meal back. Honestly it was disgusting. I exchanged it for the Bison meatloaf. At least the gravy, on the boxed potatoes, was tasty. Seriously, save your money, $300+ bill, and spend it on food that isn't premade from the discount grocery store. NO, DEFINITELY NOT, would I ever recommend this place...