Today we drove from Archbold, OH to Clay’s Park Resort, Canal Fulton, OH. Clay’s resort was the only RV park in the Canton area that we could find a parking site for the full month we plan to stay. All the other parks we checked had no sites over the weekends, which are booked all the way through when they close after Halloween. We were completely surprised by this problem. Clay’s Park was the most expensive ($41.66 per night, no discounts)), did not include sewer or cable TV. The addition of sewer would have been an additional $1000!! But pump outs twice a week were only $165 a week. We pulled into the park using the OH93 entrance. When we arrived, we were met at the entrance gate by the staff that rudely told us to pull forward but not to block anyone. With a 61-foot long combination (Trailer and truck) and no place to pull off the road, that was impossible, but the young lady did not understand. When David went into the office to check in, the young lady handed David the package from the mail forwarding service that we had arrange to be sent ahead and told him this one was a special case and that they would not accept any more packages. There is no such restriction explained on the website, nor was anything said during the reservation call. She suggested he should have asked and he go down the road and get a PO box, any packages received would be sent back. Not a very friendly reception. We received plastic bracelets we were told we had to wear whenever we were in the park! We also found out that any visitors we had, even though they were just coming to visit us and not use any of the parks other attractions, would be charged $17 for a day!!! This was just the start of the rules that were not stated anywhere!!
They did not provide an escort to our site. The park is huge and the sites are not marked very clearly. Once off the main entrance/exit roads, the roads are gravel or broken pavement, lots of potholes, washed out and very narrow. There was a big tree at the corner, along with a narrow turn into our site (Pine Trees 18) that made it difficult to negotiate the turn into the site and stay on the road. The site’s gravel surface was barely as wide as the Wanderer. We got slightly off to one side and sank several inches into the muddy dirt. There were multiple ruts where previous residents had the same problem. But we finally got the Wanderer situated on the gravel and set up. The grass area along side our site was muddy from the recent rain. That is when we found out the WiFi is not included in the daily rate and we had to buy “access time” at $1 per day.
Most of the sites in this park looked like they were long term leases. Most of them had “improvements” like wooden decks (some covered and screened!), pergolas, and “special lighting”. Some of the sites had extensive landscaping, while others looked trashy. Most people had golf carts. But there were rules on what kinds of Golf Carts you could bring into the park, or you had to buy one from them. All the sites were close together, with barely room for a vehicle to park. One of the trailers across the road from us had neon green light strings outlining the trailer and spiraling up a tree. At night it looked like a UFO! We just do not see the sense in spending several thousand dollars a year to lease site (We found out the leases here are at least $9K per year), plus several thousand dollars in site improvements and tens of thousands for an RV, just to be on top of each other with no idea what your neighbor is going to be like, no view, no cable TV, and tons of rules (you can't even bring in outside fire wood). And you would not see a return on any of that investment. Why not buy a piece of land and build a nice cabin? At least you could get your money out of it.
We drove over to Veronica’s and went out for an enjoyable dinner.
 |
| eroded roads |
 |
| Trashy sites |
No comments:
Post a Comment