Horrible Service at Merry Meadows Recreation Farm

[renee2012]

Don’t complain about services, they’ll call the police and have you removed!

My family and I booked the Labor Day weekend at Merry Meadows Campground (formerly Morris Meadows) in Freeland, Maryland for Labor Day Weekend. Their website said their pool was opened every day up to Labor Day. We decided to make a long weekend and arrive on Thursday Night so we could have 3 solid days of pool time. When we arrive, our site is full of grass savings. I then her from the Life guard on Friday Morning that the pool will be closed because all the Lifeguards went back to school. She was only there for a few hours to clean it. I visited the registration desk at 11am and spoke with Lorraine. When I complained she slammed a complaint form down and told me to fill it out. I also voiced that I was upset that all the other amenities such as golf, race cars, driving range were closed too. I also discovered that exercise classes that I was excited about throughout the weekend were also cancelled. I requested to speak with the Manager/Owner. She attempted to call but no answer. I asked Lorraine to make sure the owner knew I wanted to speak with her and then asked for a rake to be dropped off at the site so grass shavings could be cleaned up.

3 hours later a “part owner” yet not willing to accept the responsibility of ownership arrive to clean up the grass. We had a conversation about my displeasure with the above and instead of discussing the issues he wanted to tell me some long story about how his Brother is suing him over the business because he and Lois took it from him. No concern for my displeasure was ever shown. No apology was made. No discussion on how they can make it right.

The pool and activities remained closed and cancelled for the remainder of the day. We also missed out on taking the children for ice cream because they chose to close the snack bar at 8:30pm rather than the posted 9:00PM closing time. On Saturday at 12 noon, I walk the children to the pool. The lifeguard sends us away to walk back to the RV to find our receipt and show proof we are allowed in the pool. We were never told we needed to provide proof. I find the receipt, take it to the pool and gain entry. I then take a lounge chair and move it a total of 3-4 feet so it would be in the sun and was promptly informed by the Lifeguard that I could not move the lounge chair and if I wanted to be in the sun I would need to bring my own chair or lay on the grass. While at the pool I met a season pass holder who was not camping. I told her that I was waiting to hear from the owner and she pointed her out to me. She was judging golf tournament.

I waiting until it was over and approached the owner. I explained I had requested to speak with her and had not heard from her. She cut me off by saying that she was aware that I had complaints and she did not want to talk to me until Monday because she was too busy. I told her this was unacceptable to ignore my request for 4 days. I told her my displeasure about the pool be closed on Friday and she cut me off again by telling me that I am ruining my own vacation by allowing their lack of service to upset me. This is ridiculous! She then cut me off AGAIN and asked if I wanted my money back. I tried to explain that this was not about the money but the fact that we chose to go there because of the amenities advertised on her website and the fact that they were not providing the product represented on the website. Se then put her golf cart in reverse, almost hitting me, turned on the road and left me there. I yelled out that if she wasn’t going to listen to me I’ll just post it on Social Media.

Then as she drove away I said that I do want my money back. I return to my camper and started making the children lunch. Then, my Husband enters the camper to inform me that the police are here and the owner is kicking us out of campground. I walked out and asked the police why were we being kicked out because we had done nothing illegal and all I did was complain. She informed us this did not matter and that it was private property and they had to escort us out because she requested. She only gave us 1 hour to vacate which was not enough to properly clean, packed and get everything ready to leave. Because I complained this owner kicked us out. We had to leave our family behind and finish the holiday weekend at home. I was refunded only the days that I was kicked out and not the full weekend she offered in our conversation.

[Hobo5]

You ought to check and see if these nasty folk are member camp of Good Sam. This is truly disgraceful performance from a campground owner.

We are from the West Coast of British Columbia. Your post has gone national ..no, international. I hope these owners realize that they have earned some what bad reputation beyond just Maryland.

Hobo5 (Bob & Honora)

[RVerOnTheMove]

They didn't care then and they don't care now. Maybe this kind of publicity will slow down their business enough that they will pay attention. If they are in a "prime location," they will never get it as there will always be another victim around the corner.

The one review at http://www.rvparkreviews.com is also not good, so you might want to add this information to that site.

[Xplorer]

The one review at http://www.rvparkreviews.com is also not good, so you might want to add this information to that site.

Ditto,,,,,,We don't use private campgrounds often, but when we do, rvparkreviews.com is the first stop. It has been a great resource. Also, rvservicereviews.com is another good resource when trying to locate service facilities while traveling.

[skyking8]

They didn't care then and they don't care now. Maybe this kind of publicity will slow down their business enough that they will pay attention. If they are in a "prime location," they will never get it as there will always be another victim around the corner.

The one review at http://www.rvparkreviews.com is also not good, so you might want to add this information to that site.

I agree with posting at the above review site. But don't get carried away with your ranting about your personal experience with the campground because I doubt that it will get approved by the Admin staff. I've used the site for years. I suspect that all of us could rightfully dump on a campground or two, but I've never seen a review there that actually allows one to blatantly do it.

[aztec7fan]

I agree with posting at the above review site. But don't get carried away with your ranting about your personal experience with the campground because I doubt that it will get approved by the Admin staff. I've used the site for years. I suspect that all of us could rightfully dump on a campground or two, but I've never seen a review there that actually allows one to blatantly do it.

Have you ever gone to the main page and clicked on some of the reviews with low ratings (I do it since many of them can be very entertaining!)? There is plenty of ranting and dumping going on and it looks like the admins allow almost anything in the review, unless it's obvious the review is "suspicious" like another competing park giving a bad review.

[RVerOnTheMove]

That is the major down fall of most internet based reviews of most anything. People, just like the above poster, will make great efforts to post a bad review but when they enjoy an experience they just assume everyone knows already. Because of the the on-line reviews are badly skewed to the negative when the reality might be that it's a pretty nice place with a few unhappy customers. There really is no way to know.

It's not just this site, it's reviews in general. Imagine what it would be like if everyone who had a great experience posted. "My DirecTV worked exactly as it should today. Thanks DirecTV!" "See you tomorrow to make the same post!"