The Boat — Restaurant in North Bay

Disappointing. It looks nice and they have some nice seating there, however; they will not allow you to sit where you want. There's no special process to get a good seat, they said that they just don't allow people to sit there unless there are no other seats. Pretty backwards if you ask me. We drove 6 hours to go, first time it was closed, second time we told them how far we drove just to check it out and asked if we could sit in one of the many empty seats by the water but they declined saying it's easier for staff if customers are closer to the kitchen. I was under the assumption that paying customers would be the priority but I was wrong. Also, when we were leaving staff were smoking next to the entrance. They thought we were going to smoke to and rudely told us "YOU can't smoke here, WE can because we are staff but YOU have to go all the way over THERE!". We were just leaving but found it really rude. I mean, again; if we were smokers, why would staff have a much better apot than customers? The only stars given is because the girl who actually served us was friendlier than all the others' although she wasn't able to give us a better seat even though so many were...

I really want to love the Boat as it’s such a cool spot - right on Lake Nipissing. Alas, the last two meals I’ve had there are sub par with tonight’s meal being the absolute worst. I can’t even say it’s “typical pub fare” because it was just bad all around. We ordered two buffalo chicken wrap meals with fries and gravy on the side. The gravy was honestly the worst; I told the waitress and she said that it’s odd we say that as it’s new and usually people love it; that it’s vegan and gluten free. Welllll... it tasted like old mushrooms. I feel like vegan/gluten free should be an option you request- not automatically served. Thankfully they didn’t charge us the gravy but imagine my disappointment if I had ordered a poutine! Hahaha. Gravy is not what it used to be!

The Fries must have been frozen fries- not fresh cut. They were mushy on the inside- just bad. Not what the fries used to be!

Lastly, the wraps.... I wanted to like it; but just couldn’t. The Caesar salad was soggy and soaked in dressing, the chicken was very mediocre. The buffalo wraps used to be so good!

My iced tea was good though. So that’s...

Needed to email, call repeatedly with no answer, use their Facebook page, then call again to get a reservation. Then when we checked in at their shack…still no reservation recorded. They put the five of us at a table on the deck, right in the sun, with an umbrella that would not tilt. The menu was considerably condensed from the menu, posted online, basically pasta and fast food. This was a birthday celebration, that was envisioned being close to the water, and enjoying the sunset with a coffee after a leisurely meal but was a quick bite, accompanied by a not so suttle hint to make tracks, and not linger for the sunset. There were no hot beverages available, so coffee was out of the question anyway.

I understand that Covid has taken a toll on restaurants, and would have been able to overlook a few of these problems, but they just kept coming, and made what should have been a fun evening, a disappoint to say the least. On a scale of one to ten for this place I regretfully say 0. The one star you are forced to enter, to post would be only for...