No Rescue for Castaways

Spoiler alert: This is not a shill review. A shill review of Castaways would recommend that it be burned to the ground (while unoccupied, of course) as a service to the public. I would go further recommend that the ashes that remain be loaded onto the next Spacex rocket so that they could be blasted into oblivion. The place is gawdawful.

It’s on the southbound side of US Route 22 about 20 miles north of Harrisburg. There are truckstops on either side of the road just north of the place, where you can buy something to wash the taste of it out of your mouth. (The Sheetz on the east side of the highway doesn’t sell beer, however).

Castaways is connected to an adult video store. Three cars in the lot at 11 pm on a Tuesday, so plenty of room to park. Club has its own entrance which, as it turns out, is also the only exit. You walk through a cattle chute affair until your entrance is blocked by a chain and a guy in a both collects your $20 entry fee. He then beckoned a small, wiry guy from the video store who demanded that I empty my pockets and turn off my phone. Darkening the screen seemed to be sufficient. Place doesn’t serve drinks, other than the beverages in the vending machines, and is apparently BYOB.

Place is one large room, connected directly via a well-lit vestibule with vending machines on the left which led directly into the video store. As soon as got a load of the place, I was drawn to the light on the left as my best possible escape path. Space was appropriately dark, which a large, unlit stage adorned with a skeleton in tropical attire on a wicker chair (the “castaway”, I suppose) and a very large (pushing 250 lbs) young AA woman. A lot of seating around the stage, plus upholstered chairs set further back, including three seats occupied by young white women who were as large as the woman on stage. A fourth young white dancer who was more conventionally overweight was with the only other customer. One of the other dancers looked back at me and I shuddered at the thought of having to make pointless small talk with women I had no interest in touching with a 10 foot pole.

It looked like LD booths with curtains were against the right side of the entry wall, but by that time in my survey I was full into escape mode. I moved toward that lighted pathway into the video store to make my exit. Doors were locked, and the wiry guy said I had to exit the way I entered. So, I went back there, and the chain was back up. Told the booth guy I wanted to leave, and had to go through more of a song and dance than I should have to get him to take the chain down so I could hightail it out of there and spin some gravel in the lot..