Where do I begin to describe a Sunday's nightmare? My family is big on birthdays and with this pandemic these past few months we thought a family day out on the water would be fun since we haven't had much time together. We planned a whole weekend full of good times and memories, while keeping social distancing in mind as much as possible. Since we were a big group, we knew we would have to book several boats to make sure we wouldn't have any issues from boat crews, police or "Karen's". On the day of our boat ride we received a phone call saying the four boats we reserved had been cancelled and they will be putting our 36 party on one big yacht. We thought oh that's weird with all that's going on with the world. Why would they put 36 people on one boat instead of the 4 that was reserved. We got to the marina 30 minutes early to make sure the cars could get parked in the correct area and to be sure no one got caught in the Miami traffic. We got to the dock and had to pay $30 for valet parking, now keep in mind we DID NOT mind paying because we've been cooped up and working for months! We waited for the person we've been in communication with to ask where our group should go now that we were all parked and ready to celebrate our July birthdays. The lady asked, "why were we there so early?" Yeah you read that correctly "why were we there so early?" To be clear we live in Broward and know how bad Miami traffic can be on a SUNDAY. We waited calmly, the guy that was in contact with another person from our group finally came up and reassured us that despite the change we would still have a great time. We had to sign our names and year of birth and began walking to the boat FINALLY after an hour of parking, waiting and signing. We got to what should have been in my honest opinion at least two decker boats turned out to be a FISHING boat called the "Mariah". Please google it! Our group paid about five grand for four hours on the water relaxation. When we saw that fishing boat, we knew we were bamboozled. They told us not to let the look of the boat get the best of us and we would have a "GREAT" time no matter what. The guy at this point became enraged because we didn't want to get on the boat. After 15 minutes of telling him we are not willing to compromise we were told we must leave the dock and go back to our cars. Yeah, we paid $30 to valet park to walk up to see a boat and walk back to our car. At this point EVERYONE was disappointed. You would have thought they would have made the situation better but the gentleman we were speaking with for weeks came to let us know he had to pay the captain for waiting for us. As I told you previously, we DID NOT go anywhere, we looked at the boat and said we are not happy with having paid 5 thousand for a fishing boat and went back to our cars. He then left and now we were left to deal with the women from Mansion Key only. She informed us that she has two boats at ANOTHER marina, and we can go there, and she is working on getting a third boat to accommodate our 36-person group. We left the dock where we first arrived and drove 11 minutes away to another place when the Mansion Key woman said she has the boats waiting for us. We all observed the woman walking back and forth to a few different boats for 30 minutes. Finally, she says to us she has the two boats (which we thought she been had reserved for us) we say okay 10 of our party go to the far left of the dock and board the "Mo Money" the captain was very nice and explained what the plan was and his first mate helped us get comfy. The remaining 26 people of our group were supposed to get on the other two boats she allegedly had for us. 10 minutes after we leave the dock, we get a phone call saying they couldn't get on the boats because the 2 boat were taken because the woman was outbid by another group. We then told the captain of our boat that we did not feel comfortable hanging out while the rest of our group were going home. He understood completely and turned around. He even informed us that she does this continuously, she NEVER reserves a boat for any one she waits last minute and hopes she can convince captains to take groups on the water. Once we re-grouped with the rest of our party, we find out that she is trying to get boats for the evening since the boats there were not working with her at the moment. Of course, most of the group at this point says NO! We began to tell her and her partner that we would like our money back. That is when all hell broke loose, she began with the different excuse of why we would have to wait 7 to 10 business days before we can get money back because they were all tied up in her business account, LOL. Please take a moment and try and see if you would have been levelheaded at that point. She even caught amnesia for an hour and forgot that we handed her CASH ($1,990) when we got to the first marina. To say this day was a day from hell was an understatement. read more
