**This review is not about the location or quality of stay here. It deals with a very uncomfortable and unsafe situation we encountered on the last day of our stay at the Barnacle, and one which we felt was not deal with appropriately. Because of this, I am not using my usual Yelp account to write about it. The place itself was very beautiful, and we had already discussed going back there again at a later time with our family when the situation below happened.***
We stayed at the Barnacle for a couple of days last week and I'm upset to say that one of the employees there (not the owners) had a domestic altercation with his partner on the property. I will not make any allegations about physical abuse, because we did not see it happen- I will say that this fight was overheard from three separate rooms at the house, and that it was loud and profane enough to suggest domestic violence. There were families and children on the property at the time as guests, and I personally found it terrifying to have someone on the property exhibiting that kind of behavior. Another group staying there at the time left around the same time we did- a panicked, very scary situation for everybody involved.
Eventually, we heard the situation subside and another group of guests called the local police department and the owner from the safety of their car once they were on the road. We called one of the owners ourselves, who ensured us that the woman involved had brought on the fight by drinking alcohol, told us about the issues in between the families of the couple in question, etc., and pointed out that he doesn't do this to her "all the time."
I don't know the history of these people, of their relationship to the owners, or the frequency and intensity of their fights, but let's stop and think this through for a minute. This is not a situation with a lot of grey areas. That it happened at all should have provoked a very different response than what we got. She brought it on herself? He doesn't ALWAYS engage in violent altercations so loud that those staying on different floors of the same building can hear them? The response that we expected from the owners was something along the lines of: we are calling the police, that person is fired, and this woman is going into protective custody, we are so sorry that this situation is happening in our home.
What we got was complacency and a set of excuses for an inexcusable situation. Loud, profane, and at a bare minimum emotionally abusive relationships are not ok, sheltering the people who treat their partners in this way is not ok, and allowing for this situation to go on, especially at a location where people have their guard down and where they bring their loved ones (which includes their children and their female partners who are smaller and less physically able to protect themselves against some volatile stranger that might decide today is the day to externalize his anger to strangers) is not ok.
If you choose to stay here or have a relationship with the owners of this place and read this review, please let them know that it's on here and encourage them to take steps to ensure what happened while we were there doesn't happen again. I will be glad to alter this review if there is any confirmation that the situation has changed, and I do understand this is a very serious charge to level against any establishment. But the lack of responsibility in dealing with this situation left us outraged and disappointed. If the situation will not be dealt with after speaking our concerns aloud from person to person, maybe the impact of this information being shared online to a community of people who are conscientious about where they spend their resources and time will. read more