Sam's Sports Grill - Blue Turtle Bay

It was great to visit a place right at the marina in Old Hickory. The big heavy door reminded me of something from Pirates of the Caribbean. Terrific salads and the citrus lime dressing should be tried by everyone. The women's restroom is incredibly small, so be warned.

I usually order the shrimp platter. Delicious! Sometimes the shrimp is a little overcooked and something's are a bit pricey, but other than that we enjoy eating here with family and friends The atmosphere, food, the service, Amazing! Always have a wonderful time!!

Unique floating sports bar and restaurant on Old Hickory Lake. Great place to sit outside or in the open bar and enjoy the lake vibe. Staff is attentive and the food is a notch above standard bar fare in taste and overall quality, yet it feels like prices are in line with similar sports bar/restaurants. The pizza is excellent too - Kitchen Sink pizza is a favorite. Plenty of free parking. Parking: Park in the marina parking lot up by the walkway out to the restaurant. Kid-friendliness: My kids loved going here when they were younger.

Dead Rats & Alive Rats in the kitchen also underneath the drink machine. Insulation on the floor from where the rats chewed thru the wall. The bathroom floor in the women’s restroom has fallen in and they just put a piece of plywood over it. They don’t use scoops to put your ice in the cup; also ice outside is kept overnight so bugs are in it “just scoop around them.” I have videos of the BOH being told to get the rats from behind the drink machine SEVEN OF THEM!! WITHIN TEN FEET OF GUESTS EATING FOOD!! Somebody’s going to get hurt plus it’s just plain disgusting not morally correct!! God forbid you want to speak with the management team, as my table did, instead gave four “$5 Sam’s bucks” to avoid customer contact at all cost & apparently didn’t help keeping us quiet.

Never had a bad experience. Sometimes there is a long wait time for a table based on time of day, but once you're in it is worth it.

If I could give the service a negative review, I would. We had our first unpleasant experience here tonight. We got stuck with a server named Reginee. From the moment we came in, she was on her phone. She came to our table and I had to tell her multiple times that I wanted an unsweet tea and needed more Splenda. She never did bring more Splenda and I asked her again and she said she had just come off of a break and couldn’t get to it. When she took our order, she didn’t write anything down and had to repeat our order to us 3 times. Our food was brought out to us by one of the food runners. We were at least halfway through our meals before Reginee got off of her phone (from rolling silverware) to ask us how everything was. When I finished with my dinner, she came back and asked, “Everything good?” We just nodded and said, “Yes.” We were over it at this point. The entire time, we are watching all of the other servers running around checking on their tables and here we sit, miserable because our server has no business working there. When she left our table, she left my dirty empty plate at our table. That was it. We saw the manager, Tawny, and talked to her. Food was great, but our concern was that we wanted the tip to go to everyone else who waited on us, not her. We expressed our concerns to Tawny as we have been coming to Sam’s for almost a year and this was the first time we have ever had an issue. Fortunately, my husband had cash and we gave it to Tawny for everyone else who is working. Tawny ended up taking our dirty empty dishes from our table. Then, Reginee brought us the check, my husband looked it over, and then put his credit card on it. Probably 10 minutes went by and now, I’m just done, so I get up and go looking for someone who might now be too busy and then, I go to the bar and stand there patiently waiting. Reginee comes up to me and asks, “Are you ready to check out love?” I told her, “Nope, I had to get up, so you can go back to your phone, I’ll wait here for the bartender. Bye.” She goes looking for her manager and then goes to the manager’s office and starts knocking on the door. I then see Tawny coming from across the way and ask her if she wouldn’t mind checking us out because I’m just done since Reginee was too busy on her phone (again rolling silverware) to ring us out. Tawny was happy to ring us out. Tawny apologized for everything again and even surprised us with $20 to use on our next visit. We asked her to take those back, but she insisted. I have been a hostess and a server. My husband has been a server, a cook, a manager, and a bartender. We come from the industry and it’s not for the weak or the ones who can’t put their phone down. We highly recommend letting Reginee go find a different place of employment where she can get paid to be on her phone. She has zero work ethic and is not an asset to this business.