Is "Freedom" Free?

Last year, we noticed the shuttered Travelodge on the drive home receive a gradual facelift and a new sign, announcing the Freedom Resort & Spa. Our initial surprise that anything in this particular cheap-tourist strip of highway would be pretentious enough to call itself a spa was replaced by amazement when they added "GLBT Destination" to the bottom of the sign. A gay-oriented resort, in our neck of the woods? Less than four miles from our house? 40 minutes from downtown and any sign of gay nightlife? And across the highway from a trailer park manufactured housing community, a recently-shuttered RV park and a Beef O'Brady's?

This was last summer. The October grand opening didn't happen (darn hurricanes). Neither did the November one, nor the club-in-December-hotel-in-January ones. Most recently, the bar was to grand-open in March — which has, of course, passed — and they were encouraging people to sign up for property tours so they could sell "memberships," hurry in before the end of March, because we open in April. Now, their website says the bar, Club Freedom, is "Do (sic) to open April 2005." I'm glad they added the year to clarify.

Sunday afternoon, Dan and I decided to drop by. For one, we wanted to see if they expected locals (a.k.a. potential regular patrons) to pay an annual membership fee to visit the club ("the hottest club scene in town"?)and restaurant, as the website once mentioned the sale of Club Memberships. We pulled in to find the main front building closed and dark, but the gates to the hotel proper open. We drove in, trying to figure out where a temporary office might be. We passed where we decided the office must have been based on the cars parked in front, so we started looking for a way to turn around and park in an empty space. This is when a woman came running out (office location confirmed!) waving her arms at us. We stopped and rolled down the window, and she said, "This is PRIVATE PROPERTY. You need to turn around. ...unless you want a tour. We can arrange that over here in the office."

Once we got the car turned around, we decided to leave — no tour, no opportunity for a sales pitch. (We wonder if she noticed the gay-pride sticker in Dan's car window at that point.) Helpful hint: If you want to sell me on something, may I recommend you start with a friendly attitude, such as providing the offer of a tour FIRST. Lead with the admonishment that I'm trespassing, and I'll be glad to respect your privacy and leave.

No, I didn't put in a link to the website. I see no reason to drive traffic to the site, nor to increase their Google rating.