Lazy Turtle Bar & Grill — Restaurant in Oak Island

DO NOT ORDER LOADED NACHOS WITH CHICKEN OR HOT DOGS TO GO!! Sorry for the long post. The only positive to this place is the bartenders and the atmosphere at the beach-side bar/patio seating area. Bartender inside was unconcerned and not friendly. Owner likes making excuses for substandard food and service. My family and I tried Lazy Turtle for the first time this week based on recommendation of a friend. Unfortunately, our experience was one that will most likely keep us from returning. Since there was a 45-60 minute wait, we went to the beach-side bar and had a few mixed drinks and beers. The bartenders were very prompt and knowledgeable. Once our table was ready we moved inside and the vibe was instantly gone. No sweat though, we're troopers and can entertain ourselves. We did have a party of 10 and I know that can be difficult for some restaurants, but this place offers mostly bar food. I figured there would be a bit of a wait on our food to come out and there was. Where I start to have concerns is when I have to starting bussing my own table. I cleaned our table of cups and beer cans so we would have room for more drinks and for our food. We did have to flag down our waitress several times for refills or new drinks/beers. I had a fish sandwich that was ok, not bad, not great. I dont remember what everyone else had, but there didn't seem to be too many complaints. My wife ordered loaded nachos as her meal and the waitress suggested adding grilled chicken. When her nachos came, they were completely cold. The queso had sat long enough to become congealed and the chicken was ice cold. I confronted the waitress about it and the owner came to our table and offered to remake them or to replace with something else. I appreciate that, but he stated that if he remade them, they would come out the same way. He literally said there was no way to bring them out hot. He said once the pico is put on top everything is going to be cold. This is the most absurd thing I've ever heard. My sister had ordered the loaded nachos and opted out of the grilled chicken add-on. Her nachos didn't come out until everyone at the table finished eating except my wife who decided to have a fish sandwich instead of asking them to remake cold nachos. Her fish sandwich actually came out before my sisters nachos. When we asked the waitress about it she said she forgot to put them in. But guess what, my sisters nachos were hot and they had pico on top too. I guess opting for the grilled chicken causes issues. The owner even said that he didn't know why the waitresses were offering that because he couldn't serve them hot with grilled chicken. I understand that things dont always run smooth in restaurants, but as an owner, you should really work on your excuses for serving cold food... especially chicken. Against my better judgement, we also placed a to-go order for my dad and step mom. They just wanted hotdogs. We ordered them both a Carolina dog. When eating their hotdogs, half of the bun fell off. Buns were obviously straight out of the packaging and not heated or toasted. On my dads second bite the bottom of the bun split completely and everything fell in his plate. The interaction that I had with the owner was just really aggrevating me and left me feeling disappointed. Our bill (which they won't split if you have 6 or more in your party) was over $200. I dont have to spend my money at places like this and not everyone deserves 2nd chances. Quit making excuses and make things right, or if you can't execute it, don't offer it! If we were to go back, it would be for afternoon drinks at the beach side bar after a day on the beach, but that is highly unlikely after this experience. I wouldn't recommend this place for dinner, especially if you have more than 2-4 people. Bummer of an experience. By far the worst dinner experience we had on the island all week. If you decide to give it a try, my suggestion would be to request a picnic table on the beach at the back of the restaurant and DO NOT ORDER LOADED NACHOS WITH GRILLED CHICKEN OR HOT...

Came in tonight because we were staying in a vacation rental within walking distance. We were seated during an obviously busy time. That said I had realistic expectations of the service. However after about 20 minutes and seeing every other table seated after us being served and having no server even make contact with us I went inside and told the person at the hostess station that I had been here for a while and no one had even made contact with us. I also said I understand that you guys are busy and we may have been forgotten about but that we wanted to let you know we were still waiting. Another server walked up and begrudgingly said that she would take care of us “in a few minutes”. I said thank you and went back to my table and waited. And waited and ….. you get where I’m going. When again no one showed up after about 10 minutes I went back inside and asked for a manager. I calmly explained that I was leaving because I hadn’t even been made contact with after 30 minutes of waiting and let them know they had lost a weeks worth of patronage as I was staying within walking distance of the restaurant and was looking forward to going there. The manager asked me if I would stay if she gave me a discount on my order. I said yes I would stay and I appreciated her wanting to keep my business. She told a server that was not covering our table that she would be helping us. I went back to my table and waited ….. five minutes later a different server came and said she would take our order. We placed our order. Five minutes after that the server that was assigned to us finally showed up and we told her that someone else took our order. Five minutes after that we got our drink order. We drank our mediocre drinks and after about 15 minutes our server came back and we asked for the check. When she brought our check back we noticed there was no discount applied. She said she would talk to the manager. She came back and said that it was against the law in the state of NC to discount alcoholic beverages. I said i understood that so if we came back and ordered food would we be given the discount we were promised and her answered “why would you get a discount the next time you came in unless you got bad service again ?” I gave them my business that night on the understanding that my patronage was valued and I would receive a discount per the manager. I would also add that the waitress stood there staring at us waiting for us to pay our bill without contacting the manager as if we would take off and not pay or something. The fact that I was told my repeat business would not be valued I paid my check - yes minus a tip and left. I work in the service industry and would NEVER allow a customer of mine to be treated like this. Even when a customer of mine receives what I deem to be less than satisfactory service without complaining I give them a reason to come back with a discount for their patience and consideration. I will NEVER go back to this restaurant. I will go out of my way to reward the other establishments on OI with my business. Only gave one star because I had to.

EDIT - the owner made contact with me and went above and beyond to make good on the poor service received and is truly committed to making all customers feel valued and welcome. I look forward to...

I'm kind of torn on this review but here goes honesty

We had never been to this restaurant before but the ratings seemed like something to try. When we arrived we had wanted to sit outside but recently the sand had been pushed up into the outside dining area and there were dunes between tables. The hostess asked us to go look at the area to see if we still wanted to sit outside. Others were sitting outside and we saw a table that would work. The hostess wasn't incredibly friendly BUT you never know what kind of day it has been. We all have tough days.

The view of sitting outside is one of the best in the area, even though it was windy and sand was occasionally blowing in our eyes. The view is everything!

I loved that dogs were allowed and even had dog items on the menu, we didn't come to the beach with our dog this time however, we would in the future.

Our waitress was very sweet and super nice and attentive, I hate I don't remember her name but she was young and maybe had reddish/blonde hair. Sun was heading down and made it harder to see.

We ordered Fried Pickles - Fantastic Grilled Cheese with tomato and bacon - wonderful Fried shrimp - also good We both subbed onion rings and they were also really good. It did take a long time to get the food BUT we are on vacation, we had an incredible view, we didn't mind the wait. All these items were very well priced

We ordered a Shark Bite drink from the specialty drink list and we noticed no drink prices when we got the bill we were a little shocked at the $12.50 price. It was decent but not sure it was worth the price.

We finished up eating and went to use the restroom inside so we could walk down to the pier. We walked inside and boy the smell was awful. To be 100% honest if we had walked inside to be seated we wouldn't have eaten there. The bathroom was relatively clean but the men's was out of order. I will say that the manager and a worker were actually actively fixing the restroom while we were there. It's a hard review cause most of the experience was wonderful but I never would have known that if we had walked in first because we would of left. Give it try and see...