Our 2-day hell at the Riviera on Vaal Resort

I would like to share our story about the horrible, horrible, terrible experience we had at the Riviera on Vaal Hotel this weekend... I have to list everything here just so that people will know exactly what a poor experience we had...

My husband and I booked a room there for a romantic getaway... The entire stay cost about R 3000 for 2 nights... Which, for some people, may not be a whole lot of money, but for us, was quite a lot for what we got...

First off, driving up to the hotel, the stench of raw sewage surrounding the area was terrible... Granted, this is not something that the hotel can help for because of the current state of the sewage problem in the Midvaal Area... But, keep this in mind as you read through the rest of this review...

We arrived at the hotel, eager to get indoors and away from the smell... Coming there straight from work, we were looking forward to a hot bath as or shower... When we booked in, however, we were told that the water might be cold because the hotel did not have power or water earlier that day... Not exactly what you want to hear if you booked a "luxury room", but we understood and we went to our room to enjoy a hot cup of coffee behind closed windows as the stench of the sewage from the river or where-ever it came from, blew into the foyer through the open doors and windows... Again, we understood that they could not help for this but we did feel that we did not want to enjoy our dinner in a restaurant/eating room where the smell came blowing in through the open windows and doors looking out on the river... We talked about rather ordering in room service as the lady at the desk told us we could do... That way, we could keep our room window closed, lock out the stench, enjoy the view over the river and just be alone... We were on a romantic getaway after all...

When we got to our room, however, we could not enjoy coffee, as the milk provided at the coffee station was sour. We opened the mini bar to look for other beverages, just to find it empty... When we then decided to try and order some room service and coffee with fresh milk, we looked everywhere in the room for a menu... Just to find none... We decided to call reception and to ask for a menu so that we could order in and to notify them that the milk left out was sour... However, none of the 2 phones in the room were working...

Determined not to get irritated and to ruin our 2 day getaway before it started, we went downstairs to eat in the restaurant... Here, we sat in the stench coming from outside, overbearing at times, and waited for our dinner trying not to loose our appetite... When our food did eventually come, it was ice cold... Being in such a hurry just to get away from the smell, we ate the cold food so we could leave the smelly eating room as soon as possible...

When we got back in our room and wanted to shower, we found that there were no bath towels... Only three face towels... Again, we could not call reception to request towels as the phones were not working... We took a shower in the very small bath tub and used 2 of the 3 face cloths to dry our bodies... We had could not use the third one as the toilet leaked and the toilet water was leaking onto the floor... We had to use the third towel to keep the floor dry... The whole 2 days...

The next morning we went for the complimentary breakfast... The smell was gone as the wind was blowing into a different direction... Relieved we sat down in the restaurant and decided to enjoy our breakfast there as there was no smell this time... We waited an HOUR AND A HALF for our breakfast... As did the other patrons... Eventually people from the table next to ours stood up and complained to the manager... Another gentleman from another table also stood up an complained..,. I was so shocked at the utter "up-yours" attitude of the manager... The lady came back after their discussion with him and sat down at her table... She asked us if our food had come already... "No", I said... She then proceeded to tell us that they tried speaking to him but that he brushed off their complaints, not evening batting an eye at the fact that we all paid a lot of money for this poor service... She said that the milk in their room was sour too... Another lady then said that the phone in their room was also not working...

Eventually our food came... It was ice cold again... Cold eggs... Cold baked beans... Eeuw...

We ate the breakfast and decided we were going to watch a movie in the room. About 3 quarters into the movie, the DSTV suddenly stopped, a message appeared on the screen "Your account has been suspended"... We just started laughing... We could not finish watching the movie because their account was suspended...

The next day we skipped the "complimentary" breakfast and opted to pay R 300 for a warm breakfast at Three Rivers Country Lodge instead... We were done!

So... If you want to pay thousands of rands for a "luxury room" and arrive to find a room without towels, with sour milk, with an empty minibar, without room service, with broken phones, with DSTV that cuts out mid-movie, with a leaky toilet and the smallest bath-tub ever, this is the place for you! If you want to eat your dinner and breakfast ice cold amidst the stench of sewage after waiting for your food for more than an hour.. This is the place for you... And if you want to complain to a manager who clearly could not care less, this is the place for you...

All in all... A TOTAL RIP-OFF!