My wife and I just returned from a five day vacation at this KOA. I'll preface this review by saying that I'm a BIG fan of KOAs and have stayed in many, many different ones in many different states. And with the sole exception of the KOA in Lake Placid, NY, I've never been disappointed by one. I've especially never felt compelled to go online and write a negative review of one. I'm not the online reviewing type. But the experience my wife and I just had at this KOA -- particularly with the staff -- merited a review from me.
Firstly, I'll say that the facilities and grounds were perfectly clean and neat -- just the way a KOA should be. There were carriage rides, a pizza night and an ice cream social. All very nice. All terrific. The issue -- at least for us -- was the staff (with the exception of two employees: Deb and the ponytailed guy on the golf cart who cleans the bathrooms ... they're both salt of the earth people). I couldn't tell you who the proprietors are, as they never said hello or introduced themselves, even as my wife and I hung around the ranger station buying gifts for the kids and filling out postcards. On return trips to the ranger station to buy cups of coffee and additional postcards, we weren't even greeted with a hello. Nothing. Zip. Zero. Nada. I ain't the hypersensitive type. I don't usually care one way or the other if someone says hello to me or not. But KOAs are typically SO friendly, SO hospitable that this experience struck me as being weird. I mentioned something about this to my wife on our second day. She agreed but also thought we might be jumping to conclusions, particularly after having just been spoiled by the superb experience we'd just had in Cooperstown, NY, at their KOA (a campground that really knows how to take care of its guests and make them feel like part of the family).
Okay. The third day of our stay at KOA Durham really brought it home. After spending a few hours hiking around Bradley Mountain State Park, my wife and I headed back to camp. When we pulled in a KOA staffer on a golf cart was in front of the ranger station. We drove by him and he hollered something unintelligible at us. I noticed he was following us on his little golf cart so I stopped and let him roll up to my window.
"You NEED to slow down!" he said, in a smug, snotty, imperious tone.
(Keep in mind, he's speaking to two adults here.)
Was I going too fast? I doubt it. If I were, fine. I can handle criticism. But the tone and attitude on this smug little fat guy was WAY out of line. WAY out of line. I don't need to spend nearly 200 dollars to stay in a place that's going to address me (and my wife) as a moron.
I shrugged this incident off at the time. My wife was more annoyed that this guy had such a lousy attitude on him than anything else. I told her to forget about it. An hour later I took a walk over to the latrine to take a shower. When I walked in there was an older gentleman -- a KOA staffer -- standing inside.
"I'm STILL cleaning," he said to me. Once again -- smug, nasty. I apologized and said I'd come back later. No problem. But this began eating at me later that day after my wife complained about the awkwardness she felt while at the ranger station buying a cup of joe. She said the drone behind the desk didn't say a single word to her. No hello, no nothing.
It seems to me that the staff at this KOA (and I want to again single out Deb and the guy with the gray ponytail as exceptions) view the campers with an Us vs. Them mentality. From the miserable little man on the golf cart who barked at me that I was speeding, to the crusty old man who was cleaning the bathroom, to the various drones behind the desk who never even offered a hello, to the nonexistent proprietors -- this KOA will NOT be getting anymore of my money. Not a single penny. They can sure learn a thing or two from KOA Cooperstown (and so many others) who know how to treat their paying campers. read more
