Banned from Swinomish Casino and RV Park WA

[omega]

I left this review on Tripadvisor about Swinomish Casino, RV Park, Bingo Hall and Lodge 12885 Casino Drive Anacortes WA 98221, which has resulted in me receiving a threading phone call to my home from Dallas Widmark (Lodge Manager) and being banned from Swinomish. Swinomish will go to any lengths to manipulate their ratings and travel reviews. To a point where they will ban people who post a review they do not like, you have to wonder what they do to get so many positive reviews? You will see in his response on Tripadvisor he confirms the review as correct. After I reported the threats to Tripadvisor and the banning from Swinomish I found out my account with TripAdvisor had been disabled.
This review is my first hand experience and is meant for my fellow travelers and RV’ers. I do not expect any action by Swinomish as their responses to my reviews has been inappropriate in the past
They charge RVs to park, $10+ in their parking lot, they do not charge cars. I do not understand why they want to send customers to other RV friendly Casinos, which are close by. Their RV Park is substandard.
They have become RV unfriendly and have redesigned their parking lots making it difficult to park RVs or any over sized vehicles.
They have no washrooms (or services) in their RV Park, I have witnessed some disgusting activity by RV’ers that did not have adequate self contained RVs. It is a long walk to the lodge to use the washroom and at night the sprinklers may be on, you can hear them but cannot see them.
The RV Park has low power, which can damage the electronics and electrical systems in your RV.
Most food is spicy, I think due to their customer base of Mexican/Spanish customers.
They supply coffee whiter not milk in the Casino and Bingo Hall for coffee. They do have free soft drinks in the Casino located by the Sports Bar.
There is a busy train track that runs beside the RV Park, behind the Lodge, that sounds its horn, night and day when it crosses the Rail Bridge.
There is a large A/C about the size of a city bus at the rear of the Lodge that can be quite noisy, making it difficult to sleep in the RV Park.
There is a sewer treatment building just west of the RV Park. The smell can be quite strong around the Bingo Hall and RV Park when the wind is blowing in their direction.
From time to time they have live entertainment on the stage in the Casino that can be extremely loud I carry earplugs to protect my hearing.
They have some very nice people working in the Bingo Hall.
· Stayed January 2015, traveled as a couple
o Location
o Cleanliness
o Service
Was this review helpful? Yes 36

Ask Bill W about Swinomish Casino & Lodge
This review is the subjective opinion of a TripAdvisor member and not of TripAdvisor LLC
Dallas W, General Manager at Swinomish Casino & Lodge, responded to this review, 3 weeks ago
Thank you for reposting your review.

Unfortunately there will be no immediate action on the construction of an rv building, the increase of individual site power capacity, the relocation of HVAC equipment at the back of the property, or a new sports bar menu, nor is there a plan to turn our RV Park into a free park. Should you decide to return, please be aware that upon your return you will discover these aspects of our property unchanged. Hopefully this is helpful in your decision to return or not.

We here at Swinomish Casino & Lodge aim to provide memorable hospitality & gaming experiences to each and every guest with our guest service & array of amenities. We take great pride in our successes, and enjoy reading positive reviews from our guest on this site and others.

Best Regards,

Dallas Widmark
Lodge General Manager
Report response as inappropriate
This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of TripAdvisor LLC
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[answerswillvary]

Time to close this thread.

[westernrvparkow]

omega wrote:
Clarification

I apologize for the people that have not read the post of my review properly and taken offence to some statements and have jumped to incorrect conclusions. Forums do bring out the crazies.
.
The review is a statement of facts that has been confirmed as true and correct by the Swinomish Casino manager. Their on line response is far different than their actual response. They tried to bribe me, and then threaten me and when that did not work they banned me from Swinomish. They have not been able to remove my review (at this time) but before they banned me they had my account with Tripadvisor disabled so I can not make a complaint to Tripadvisor regarding their violation of Tripadvisors Guidelines as it applies to bulling of reviewers. Over the last few months I have seen other reviews that were not positive and after a few weeks they were removed, I assume that Swinomish pressured them to remove them. They obviously have done this before, I see a Good Sam responder indicated they do the same thing to people that leave a review they do not like. It is said that over 40 percent of positive reviews on Tripadvisor are fake. Swinomish manipulates the reviews, as do many businesses to get as many positive reviews as possible. There is a web site that will pay you to leave positive reviews.

The review is meant to inform, I know that some people go to Swinomish so they can get up close to the trains, as they stop before they cross the bridge. Some people like spicy food and they know they can find it at Swinomish. If you do not like whitener in your coffee, come prepared (as I did) or pick up a small container of milk at the gas station or in the deli, in the Bingo Hall. I have seen several people having a great time playing chicken with the sprinklers, granted they may have been drinking but they were doing no one any harm and having a great time, except for knocking over some walkway lights and getting wet. Any one that may be concerned about the low power in the RV park, or noise from the A/C or trains, will be aware that they can be charges $10 to $35 to park in the parking lot. Etc.

I am very reluctant to post reviews, as I worked in the travel industry for almost 30 years and traveled the world, so I am well aware of the large number of fake reviews and that places are much different in real life, or described in their pamphlets, business leave things out they do not want you to know. I was relived when Swinomish confirmed my reviews is correct but did not expect their actual response would be so different than their public response. Even though similar harassment had been on the news. We spent most weekends over the last 15 years or so at Swinomish, site 35, ($11 per night with club card) and spent over eight thousand dollars a year, we have been going there longer than most of the employees, and have seen many changes over the years. (No upgrades to the RV Park and non planned as indicated by them) After finding out that the low power had possibility been damaging the electrical system on our RV, we started boon docking at Wal-Mart and have had no electrical problems since.

I sure agree with you about one thing, forums do bring out the crazies. They tried to bribe you? Really? They got YOUR account at Trip Advisor (a company they have no affiliation with) closed. Even though they have the power to close your Trip Advisor account and the power to alter and remove other people's reviews, they can't do that to your review?
At $11.00 dollars a night, (your stated price) you could not have physically spent over $8,000 a year at the RV park. If that $8,000 is your total losses each year at the casino, big deal, there a people that lose more than that in a single roll of the dice. Losing $8,000 a year puts you in the small minnow category of Casino patrons.
Maybe I am one of the Crazies as well, but I hardly think a Casino is going to commit multiple felonies including bribery, threatening reviewers(that would be assault), interfering with interstate commerce (that is what altering someone's account with a company they do not own or control would be) all because you don't like the fact they don't serve cream with their coffee. To once again return to your most salient point, these forums do apparently bring out the crazies.

[wbwood]

omega wrote:
Clarification

Forums do bring out the crazies.

no offense, but many had that some conclusion when they read your posting.

[omega]

Clarification

I apologize for the people that have not read the post of my review properly and taken offence to some statements and have jumped to incorrect conclusions. Forums do bring out the crazies.
.
The review is a statement of facts that has been confirmed as true and correct by the Swinomish Casino manager. Their on line response is far different than their actual response. They tried to bribe me, and then threaten me and when that did not work they banned me from Swinomish. They have not been able to remove my review (at this time) but before they banned me they had my account with Tripadvisor disabled so I can not make a complaint to Tripadvisor regarding their violation of Tripadvisors Guidelines as it applies to bulling of reviewers. Over the last few months I have seen other reviews that were not positive and after a few weeks they were removed, I assume that Swinomish pressured them to remove them. They obviously have done this before, I see a Good Sam responder indicated they do the same thing to people that leave a review they do not like. It is said that over 40 percent of positive reviews on Tripadvisor are fake. Swinomish manipulates the reviews, as do many businesses to get as many positive reviews as possible. There is a web site that will pay you to leave positive reviews.

The review is meant to inform, I know that some people go to Swinomish so they can get up close to the trains, as they stop before they cross the bridge. Some people like spicy food and they know they can find it at Swinomish. If you do not like whitener in your coffee, come prepared (as I did) or pick up a small container of milk at the gas station or in the deli, in the Bingo Hall. I have seen several people having a great time playing chicken with the sprinklers, granted they may have been drinking but they were doing no one any harm and having a great time, except for knocking over some walkway lights and getting wet. Any one that may be concerned about the low power in the RV park, or noise from the A/C or trains, will be aware that they can be charges $10 to $35 to park in the parking lot. Etc.

I am very reluctant to post reviews, as I worked in the travel industry for almost 30 years and traveled the world, so I am well aware of the large number of fake reviews and that places are much different in real life, or described in their pamphlets, business leave things out they do not want you to know. I was relived when Swinomish confirmed my reviews is correct but did not expect their actual response would be so different than their public response. Even though similar harassment had been on the news. We spent most weekends over the last 15 years or so at Swinomish, site 35, ($11 per night with club card) and spent over eight thousand dollars a year, we have been going there longer than most of the employees, and have seen many changes over the years. (No upgrades to the RV Park and non planned as indicated by them) After finding out that the low power had possibility been damaging the electrical system on our RV, we started boon docking at Wal-Mart and have had no electrical problems since.

[D_E_Bishop]

I too question this review as I would question any 120% positive review from a new member who only has one post, a review.

[Skid_Row_Joe]

2oldman wrote:

omega wrote:
There is a busy train track that runs beside the RV Park, behind the Lodge, that sounds its horn, night and day when it crosses the Rail Bridge.
There is a large A/C about the size of a city bus at the rear of the Lodge that can be quite noisy, making it difficult to sleep in the RV Park.
There is a sewer treatment building just west of the RV Park. The smell can be quite strong around the Bingo Hall and RV Park when the wind is blowing in their direction.

Now those things are legitimate complaints. I'd complain too.

X 2

I'd want a lot more clarification on the details the OP mentioned too. The Gen. Mgr. didn't address any of the OP's specifics mentioned, so it's impossible to make any kind of rational assessment based on the manager's responces.

[wbwood]

dieharder wrote:

Tom/Barb wrote:


You can check here, Casino in question. and you will see no sewer treatment plant. I do not believe the OP smelled anything but the low tide oder of the back water bay.

To be fair to the OP, if you zoom out of that view and look to the north west, you'll see what looks to be a treatment plant with a few lagoons.

I don't see what you are talking about. I see the checmical and oil plant on the peninsula there, They have 3 rectangular ponds on it, but can not say they area sewage treatmant plant.

[wbwood]

Tom/Barb wrote:

toedtoes wrote:
Tom/Barb - the OP stated "There is a sewer treatment building just west of the RV Park." Can you confirm whether this is a building owned by the casino or is it off their property and owned by someone else?

I ask because if the latter, then it IS out of the casino's control. If the former, then there might be ways for the casino to mitigate the smells.

The Reservation extends far past the casino. The sewer treatment plant would be on the reservation, which neither the state or township have any control.

You can check here, Casino in question. and you will see no sewer treatment plant. I do not believe the OP smelled anything but the low tide oder of the back water bay.

Accroding to the aerial, there may be a drainage pond in the maintenance area, but have to agree that if you been around any tidal low country, it doesn't smell good.

[Doug33]

Like an Olympic event, I throw out the worst and best reviews when judging whether I want to stay at a specific CG. I don't go just by the rating numbers - I sort through the comments to find bits and pieces of comments that apply to me, and then make the call whether to stay there.

I also usually throw out comments that are two years old or older. Campgrounds are usually in continuous improvement mode and many change ownership, management and staff on a regular basis. So if there was a comment from 4 years ago that the lady working in the store was rude, I ignore it.

There are legitimate complaints that other potential customers should know about, and then there are complaints about insignificant things. Some people go to restaurants, and if everything isn't perfect, they complain and expect to get their money back, or get freebies because of something that didn't meet their expectations. Many years ago I had a boss who I went to restaurants with many times when working on the same project. He was the kind of guy who would complain about the smallest and most insignificant things, and I wanted to hide under the table it was so embarrassing. I felt so bad for the wait staff. And the kicker was that guy made a lot of money but he would still bicker about a few cents here and there, and try to get a free dessert out of the deal. Ugh.

Those type of people sometimes go to RV parks also. So you have to throw out the bickering type comments and focus on the ones that could potentially impact you if you stayed there.

I don't drink coffee so I don't care about the milk comment. However, I have stayed at a CG back when I owned a PU, and our site was close to a sewer manhole that stunk to high heaven. So for me it's good to know if there's going to be sewer smells in the vicinity.

[dieharder]

Tom/Barb wrote:


You can check here, Casino in question. and you will see no sewer treatment plant. I do not believe the OP smelled anything but the low tide oder of the back water bay.

To be fair to the OP, if you zoom out of that view and look to the north west, you'll see what looks to be a treatment plant with a few lagoons.

That being said, I think they are being unfair. For one, you can go to tripadvisor and look for their review, you can click on their profile and it still exists. Doesn't look like they have deactivated their account at all. In addition, if you zoom into the RV park, you can see the closest row of the park is about the width of 10 cars from the back entrance to the casino and there are only 3 rows in the park. Unless you can not access the casino from the rear, I have been in many RV parks where the facilities were much further away from my site than that. In addition, the profile only has 3 reviews, and only 1 for that park, so I don't see where the casino has inappropriately replied to their other reviews when they haven't made any other reviews.

To me, it just sounds like an awful lot of sour grapes for not getting the freebie in the parking lot. There are an awful lot more positive reviews of the place than negative.

[fla-gypsy]

Oh gee whiz go somewhere else next time. Problem solved

[Tom_Barb]

toedtoes wrote:
Tom/Barb - the OP stated "There is a sewer treatment building just west of the RV Park." Can you confirm whether this is a building owned by the casino or is it off their property and owned by someone else?

I ask because if the latter, then it IS out of the casino's control. If the former, then there might be ways for the casino to mitigate the smells.

The Reservation extends far past the casino. The sewer treatment plant would be on the reservation, which neither the state or township have any control.

You can check here, Casino in question. and you will see no sewer treatment plant. I do not believe the OP smelled anything but the low tide oder of the back water bay.

[toedtoes]

I believe he stayed in the actual RV Park after he found out they would charge him $10 a day to stay in the parking lot.

[Dog_Folks]

PRodacy wrote:
So the OP stayed in the parking lot instead of the casino's RV park and then wrote a critical review of the parking lot. Is he serious? If so, he needs a big dose of reality.

Well....... after all he paid a whole ten dollars to park there!!! :R