Dangerous and falsely advertised
Ranchor cooking retreat. Dangerous! Falsely advertised!

These 'retreats' are not held at marcoola beach resort - as falsely advertised - but at Atlantis next door. Not only is it share accommodation but the whole 'retreat' / 'cooking classes' are held in an apartment/s (one small kitchen, 4 bedrooms, long dinning table set up in lounge dinning space and a small balcony). The apartment is where the cooking classes, eating, sleeping and living all takes place - with lethal cooking equipment. What you would be cooking on is the lethal, nationally recalled, extremely dangerous butane gas camp cooking stoves.

I turned up at marcoola beach resort friday afternoon 8 april 2016 - the receptionist advised 'the cooking thing' is next door at atlantis. I drove to atlantis where the receptionist gave me ranchors phone number. I phoned him, he came to reception and then showed me to one of the 2 apartments that the 'retreat' was to be held. On the way to the apartment ranchor told me he had been doing retreats here (at atlantis) for 8 years. (I wondered why the false advertising of it being at marcoola beach resort - i wondered if maybe people would not come otherwise ... marcoola beach resort has a yoga room ... i thought maybe we would use this room on the retreat ... but it is not even held at marcoola beach resort! Never has been).

When i walked into the apartment i saw the very small kitchen - where a stack of potable butane camp cooking stoves (about 4 or 5) sat on the counter, the space was cramped as there was a long dinning table taking up what would have been the dinning lounge space in the apartment. I immediately was fearful of the weekend - the cooking stoves have been recalled by the ACCC after multiple people across Australia have had them explode - some poor people had them explode in their faces.

I knew i had to leave. I took my bags back to my car and phoned ranchor as i was leaving. I firstly confirmed with him that the camp stoves in the kitchen were what we were to be cooking on. He said yes, that's what we cook on. I then told him about the stoves being recalled and the dangers of using them and that i request a refund as i was not prepared to take such a risk. Ranchor said he used the stoves correctly for last 8 years and with no problems. He offered for me to cook on the kitchen stove. I explained again the dangers of the recalled stoves and that no-one should be using them and i told him i hoped no-one was hurt during the weekend while using the stoves. He was adamant that he used them correctly for 8 years and they were fine.

Please be aware of these lethal stoves and not allow a publicly run cooking retreat to continue to put people in danger. Furthermore this was very falsely advertised - not even held at the advertised venue, then cramming people into a small apartment for the duration using multiple lethal cooking stoves!