Our Weekend At The Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel

Last weekend Jay invited Mike and I to join him and the kids in Banff for a couple of days, and to spend the night at the Banff Springs Hotel.

We headed for the mountains early on Saturday afternoon (after we finished up with the condo developers) and after arriving in Banff, we checked into our hotel.

The place is AMAZING inside. You feel like royalty staying there. Mike and I got a room that looked out over the rear courtyard and the Bow River valley.

158. Spend a night at the Banff Springs Hotel

The first thing that the kids wanted to do after we arrived, was hit the pool, and since the weekend was really all about them, we obliged. The hotel has both indoor and outdoor pools, and an indoor hot tub. It was really neat swimming in the outdoor pool, among the mountains, with snow falling on our heads. It’s heated, like a hot springs, and the kids thought it was just about the coolest thing ever.

After the pool we were all ravenous, and so we headed downtown and decided to have dinner at the Maple Leaf Grille. It’s a very rustic feeling restaurant, but the food and the staff are excellent.

We shared the three cheese fondue to start. It came with air dried buffalo, venison salami, bread sticks, and lattice chips, and it was delicious. I’ve never really had cheese fondue before (we usually do hot oil or chocolate around here) so it was neat to try something different.

For mains, I ordered the chicken supreme (chicken stuffed with figs and almonds, served atop barley ragoût, and drizzled with cumin and honey mascarpone). It was incredibly rich and tasty.

Jay ordered the chefs creation of the day, which was elk steak, with whipped potatoes and grilled vegetables. I’m not usually a fan of elk, but he let me try a piece and it was really delicious.

Mike ordered the Québec Brome Lake Duck ( with roasted fennel, wild mushroom risotto croquette, and Saskatoon berry jus). He wasn’t very generous about the sharing, but the little bit I did manage to steal was very good.

Dinner was fantastic! After we got back to the hotel, the kids went straight to bed with their dad, while Mike and I had a brief soak in the hot tub before going to bed as well.

The next morning we had breakfast buffet at the Bow Valley Grill in the hotel. The service, of course, was second to none, and the food was spectacular. Fortunately the cost of breakfast was included in our room package.

After we were sufficiently fed and caffeinated, we all went for a wander around the hotel and took some photos.

The hotel is really huge, and there is so much to see. I would like to go back in the summer time so that we can take in more of the courtyards.

On our way out of Banff we made a quick stop at Bow Falls to take a look and a photo. With the warm weather they are starting to thaw.

We had intended to take the gondola up to Sulphur Mountain, but the clouds were low that day, and so we decided to pass on it. Instead we got hot chocolate at Starbucks (although as you can see from the photo, Lincoln remained extremely unimpressed) and departed for home.

It was a lovely adventure, one that I won’t soon forget!