Day Eight- Banff!

---

Had a pretty slow day today. We woke up super early (about 5am) to pack up and leave our cute Vancouver bnb to head to Calgary! It was a pretty cold morning, but it is very hard work pushing a suitcase through piles of snow, so we worked up quite a sweat.

Made our train two seconds before the doors closed (that would have been a DISASTER) and we arrived at the airport super early/on time depending on who you are. We sent off our luggage and then headed to Subway for breakfast- once again we needed some vegetables. So far, so great. Everything is going smoothly. Until we get to security.

There weren’t that many people at vancouver airport at 6:30am, so I wasn’t surprised when Adam was pulled over for a security check before we even got to the part where you put all your belongings in the bucket (that’s what it should be called in my opinion, Belongings in Buckets instead of the boring old “security screening”. Anywho). The man patted him down and took a swab of his bag etc and placed in the machine. The machine then made a positive noise, and Adam made some kind of joke about “woohoo I passed”. The man then gave him a weird look and said, “this way please”. My stomach FLIPPED. All I could think was WHY Adam WHY make a joke to a security officer ESPECIALLY when you don’t even know- oh...oh wait... we’re being sent through priority screening...oh! Okay!

For some reason we got to cut to the front of the line, and then we really were super early. The flight to Calgary was about 1.5 hours and we jumped an hour ahead. We arrived at 10:30am and then had to wait 2 hours for the bus transfer to Banff. So we waited at Tim Hortons. Where else?

The bus ride was beautiful! It was another two and a half hours but the Alberta highway is just a winter wonderland at the moment. The bus dropped us off at our hotel, the Fairmont Banff Springs. Go ahead, look it up. We had seen pictures of it but nothing compares to how it looks in person. It’s a gorgeous Scottish inspired castle, with 730 rooms, an award winning spa (which is quite expensive and we shall not be using) and clothing/gift shops INSIDE of it. Mental.

We were checked in by a fellow Aussie (we’ve actually run into quite a few Aussies today, Banff must be a common destination for us) who told us that our room wasn’t ready yet, but it would be in about an hour and they could take our luggage immediately. So we decided to head back down to Banff village to rent our skis and organise lift passes etc so that we don’t have to do it early in the morning, but we’d hardly walked back to the front door when Adam got a text that the room was ready.

The room is fantastic, but the view is just indescribable. As soon as we dumped all our stuff I was keen to get down to the village to rent our equipment, but Adam was desperate for a nap. Apparently sleeping the entire plane trip, half the time spent at Tim Hortons, and the entire bus ride wasn’t enough. So while he slept I got everything organised (power adaptors etc, also our thermals, gloves and goggles for skiing) and went for a walk around the hotel. It is MASSIVE.

Eventually I had to wake Adam up at 7pm because I was very hungry and very bored and a lot of the restaurants in the village would be closing soon. He reluctantly got up and we were headed out for dinner at 8pm. We got the free shuttle down there to avoid the -20 degree weather, but that didn’t really help us when we got down there and had no idea where to go. We went from restaurant to restaurant, checking the menus outside for vegetarian options, gawking at the price (or at the fact that they served ALLIGATOR or BUFFALO), and moving onto the next. Eventually we found Boston Pizza, the same pizza chain we went to our first night in Vancouver. Stick with what you know, you know?

Before we ordered, we prepared a game plan. We’re here for a full week, so that means seven breakfasts, seven lunches, and seven dinners, and Banff is a very expensive place it seems. So we ordered the largest pizza available, so we could have half tonight and the rest tomorrow night. They are HUGE pizzas, so we’re definitely not going hungry.

We walked home because we couldn’t figure out how to get the shuttle back (it’s on request at the hotel so it was a bit confusing) and my eye lashes froze over. I just suddenly realised I couldn’t see or blink properly, so apparently mascara is an ice attractor!!

So a small day today. But first day of skiing tomorrow! Super, super excited.

---