Re: Be careful renting boats at Lake Lopez -- West Coast Angler

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Date Posted: 08:21:07 05/07/02 Tue
Author: Terry
Subject: Re: Be careful renting boats at Lake Lopez
In reply to: John 's message, "Western Outdoor News" on 17:47:41 01/23/00 Sun

Hello,
My name is Terry, I writing this letter in hopes of letting people know of an incidence that happen to me this last weekend.

The day started off as one of those days, you know, you got two young boys and a teenage daughter you promised to go fishing on Saturday, my brother had been going through the same thing with his son all week long, after he heard us talking about it. I keep track of the different catches at the at the different lakes that WON posts each week. I like to fish for pan fish, last week lake Lopez had showed a good possibility so I told my brother that was our destination.

We left Los Angeles about 3:45 AM and arrived at lake Lopez about 7:45 we proceeded to the marina store to see about renting a pontoon boat for the day.
The lady behind the counter in formed us that all of there pontoon boats were non operational and all they had was a 16 foot aluminum boat with a motor that held 6 people. Well we were a total of six, my baby son Alex age 3, my middle boy Chris 11, daughter Kameale 13, my nephew Andrew 10, and my eldest brother Neal and myself. The lady that served us was very nice she went over the rules of the lake and the area�s we needed to stay out of. After condensing our icebox to a smaller icebox we purchased from them and getting everything setup, we proceeded to the boat dock to board the boat, the young man at the dock again went over the operation of the boat and we boarded and we were off to look for pan fish. The dock guy said that the best area to look was over by the dam so over by the dam it was. On the way over to the dam, the motor on the boat had started to sputter but we were moving. We got over to the area where the guy said and started to fish, after a while my brother caught a small trout �released� soon after Chris caught a bluegill then it went silent so we decided to move, I went to start the motor and it started but soon shut down, so I restarted it again and it did it again, I traced the gas line and found that is was not seated correctly so I fixed it and we were able to move, as we were moving out of the area we were, another boat came by and the gentleman told us that they were catching bluegills and crappies out in the main channel so we went there. We caught about 5 or 6 fishes were using night crawlers and soon was running of them, my daughter had to use the bathroom and we needed more bait so we decided to go back to the marina store.
I started the motor and started for the bathroom, on the way back my daughter said �dad what was that black thing, that flew off in the water?� I said to her oh it must have been Alex�s hat and I though nothing about it until the motor became more rough in it�s running and it felt like as if we shared off a pin on the prop, because we started to move slower than we were moving before, I didn�t hit anything so that was my deduction.

Anyway we made it back to the dock and the gentleman on the dock was it the process of changing the motor on another boat that was having problems, I told him that we were having a problem with the motor and it felt as if we shared of a pin on the prop.

He asked if the motor had been vibrating hard? and I said yes, I then asked if he could change the boat because all the problems I had experienced, he said no because he did not have a boat to give me the other boats were reserved and he did not have another motor because he gave the last motor to the boat that came in just before me with a problem. He then told me that I needed to go see his boss, so I went up to see how we could resolve the issue, when I got up to the store, another lady was there and informed me that the dock hand said that I damaged the boat and I signed a paper saying that I would be responsible for it, my reaction of course was, I did not hit anything how could I be responsible for the way the motor was running. I told the woman that I had experienced problem from the very start but she would not have it, you moved off under

your own power so as far as she was concerned all was good when they gave me the boat. I again told her of the problems, she said she would give me back $20.00 dollars of my rental fee which was $85.50 and keep my $30.00 deposit because I had the boat signed out from 8:30 that morning, I told her no that was not fair just give another boat and allow us to finish our day, it was not fear to the kids who had been waiting for this trip. I then asked the lady that served us earlier that day, what time did we get in the boat she said about 9:30 which was correct after all the turning around we had done that morning, it was now 1:00 Pm and I had paid for all day, when this gentleman came over and snatched the paper work and started to shout at me that a prop cost $65.00 dollars and they were not giving me back anything, he then proceeded to call the police telling them that he had an �irate� customer in the store, a gentleman in the store turns to his wife and says � he not irate why is he saying that?� I went over to a area they had for eating and waited for the police to come. Shortly after the police arrived I told the officer what happened and I felt like I had no recourse because the equipment had problems before I got it. The officer went over to talk to the woman in charged, the man left the area that called and I did not see him any more, the officer soon came back to me and said that she would give me $20.00 and keep my deposit, again I told her the officer, that this was not fair because the boat had issues before I got it, and all I wanted was to finish the day of fishing. I told her to let them keep the money because it was not about the money it was about faulty equipment and nothing more.

The officer urged me to take the $20.00 and forget it because it was a long drive back up here to go to court, I told her again it was not about the money or the drive, it was about the fact that I felt cheated and not been dealt with fairly, let them keep the money.

I do intend to peruse it. But the reason I�m writing this letter is to let your readers that go to these lakes and rent boats to remember to check out your boat before you get into it, check out the surroundings around the dock see how many boats are in pieces and if you don�t feel comfortable or the boat does not feel correct take it back fast or they will end up in the same predicament.

We left lake Lopez and started home about 2:00 pm on the way home we saw a sign for Lake Cachuma, so we went there, talk about difference between night and day the boats were clean and everything worked, we managed to get a pontoon boat the cost was $145.00 for two to five hours we caught 2 more fish that afternoon and the kids had a great time after all the drama we went through earlier. I don�t know if this will make the publication but just thank you for giving me the opportunity to sound off.

Sincerely,

Terry.

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Replies:

Re: Be careful renting boats at Lake Lopez -- Helen, 08:24:01 09/16/02 Mon