Busy Weekend Ahead

Well it’s a long weekend this weekend, which means holidays and good times for everyone but us hotel workers. 

The hotel was at 95% occupancy just in the afternoon and was expected to be full by the evening. Yesterday the lounge was the busiest I have seen yet. Lucky for us porters the manager came upstairs to help us out and basically control the traffic of food that was being handed to us at an intense speed. There were lots and lots of running up and down the rundle stairs (I’m going to be very fit by the end of this summer, that’s for sure!).

After my long and pretty hard shift I decided to take it easy that night and write out some postcards, which I had picked up at the “OK Gift Shop”. That gift shop has EVERYTHING in it, you name it, and they got it.

A few days ago some friends and I decided to stop in at the Banff Thrift Store (on our way to the movies) just to take a look around and see what was in there (mostly looking for a microwave, which is impossible to find here).  We found a lot of pretty random stuff in there that people had left behind from their previous adventures here, but sadly there was only 1 microwave which was on hold for someone else. L

If you thought a cold or flu spread around fast at school, you haven’t seen anything! There is a pretty nasty cold being spread around staff accommodation at the moment and everyone’s slightly freaking out because nobody wants to be the one to get it next. I have equipped myself with lots of cold medicine and Kleenex just incase it makes its way over to me. 

Orientation, Uniforms & Elk

Monday and Tuesday are orientation days. The Monday was a short day, all we did was sign a few papers then they let us go. Tuesday’s orientation was MUCH longer. It started at 8:30 am and ended at 4:30 pm, with a break at 12 to have lunch with your leaders.  The orientation-covered things like policies, procedures, wildlife (and what to do to protect yourself), staff housing information and many more things. 

After the long day of orientation my leader came back to the room to pick us up and he told us when our shifts were and we went downstairs to housekeeping to pick up our uniforms. Now picking up your uniform is no simple task when there are about 30 people down there trying to do the same.  So after about an hour of waiting it was finally my turn to pick mine up, it took so long that by the time it was my turn my leader had to quickly inspect that the uniform fit right then he had to leave to go back.  I was left down in uniforms with a fellow porter trying to sort out the mess of the too long pants. The uniform lady it seemed gave up on me and handed me a fist full of safety pins for me to adjust my pants.

Rundle Lounge 

I found out yesterday what my job of being a porter actually dose. Rumor has that the Rundle Lounge kitchen is quite far from the lounge so my job is to read the orders, put them up, prep all the sauces and extras that go with each order, stack the orders onto a large banquet style tray then run it down to the lounge and give it to the customers.  It has been said that its all about team work which is great and lots of table charts.  I have my first shift tonight at 5 so ill be seeing if what everyone says is true.

Elk on the golf course 

Later that night a few friends and myself decided to go for a walk down to the golf course which is where I had my first wildlife sighting. On one of the greens there were about 5 elk just munching on the grass. It was a really cool thing to see, until I remembered about what they told us in orientation about elk being quite dangerous cause they could charge you at any moment. After remembering that we decided to keep our distance and head back up to the hotel.

Mountain view from the hotel

First Weekend Here In Banff

On Friday morning as most of you know I left for Banff, Alberta!

The previous night was just about the most stressful part of this journey PACKING…. It was a long drawn out process, which took a good 3 hours (even though I had all my clothes laid out on the “packing table” for day’s prior. After all was said and done I ended up with a hockey bag (stuffed beyond all reason) a hiking backpack (also stuffed beyond all reason), and a lululemon tote bag.

When I got to the airport on Friday morning I was 100% expecting to have to pay extra for the excessive weight of my bags BUT I didn’t have to pay anything because the lady checking me in was so excited that I was moving out here that she didn’t charge me anything! (whooot whooot)

So the flight from Thunder Bay to Winnipeg was about 45min then from Winnipeg I had a 2-hour flight to Calgary.  Once I landed in Calgary that’s when the fear kicked in. The fear was not there because I had landed in a place I’d never been before it was the fear of carrying all my luggage to the shuttle desk.  The Calgary airport was surprisingly easy to navigate around in, I didn’t get lost at all.  I decided to take the shuttle company called the “Banff Airporter” mostly because it dropped me off right where I needed to be instead of the other company which takes you to their terminal in Banff.

Calgary to Banff is a very scenic 2 hour bus ride, we did make a stop in Canmore but that was fine with me because it was amazingly beautiful as well.  Once we pulled into the town of Banff I thought that I was in a dream, the mountains look so incredible. We dropped other people off at their destinations and I was the last on the bus since the Fairmont is on top of the hill and a little outside of the town.  Once we pulled around the corner I saw the top of the hotel and almost died. It was so beautiful seeing the top of this castle hidden in the tree line surrounded by mountains.  We pulled up to the front of the hotel and my mouth actually dropped open in shock that this incredible building is my new place of employment.

Picture of the Hotel from the Spray Ave.

Once I grabbed my bags off the bus, I walked across the street to the staff housing office, which was really easy to find.  Upon your check in to staff housing you have to read and sign off your contract, which outlines the rules of staff housing.  After that they called down 2 girls to take me over to Human Resources to get my picture taken for my staff card (which acts as your meal card). The girls showed me where the staff cafeteria (a.k.a the bean) was located and how the meal system works. Each day I get $4.00 onto my meal card and one “on duty” meal. There is free food also available to the staff which include, soup (very tasty), salad bar, cereal, beverages, bread, rice, and fries. So far I have not paid anything for meals yet, but tonight for dinner I’m going to have to eat some protein so I don’t die.  After the girls showed me around they took me up to my room and filled out a damage sheet to test and make sure things were working.  I spent the rest of the night unpacking and settling into my new home.

My sleeping area (photo taken as soon as I arrived)

Living room/ dining room/ bathroom hallway

Kitchen (with a book on what places deliver in Banff)

On Saturday morning I woke up at 7:30am because the intense rays of light coming through the window were blinding me. (the views from the staff housing are AMAZING you see the mountains in one direction and the hotel in the other). 

First view from the window

Second view from window

After a shower (worlds smallest shower I kid you not is in my room) and a trip to the bean for my breakfast of fruit loops (which tend to taste better when your not paying for them) I took a stroll into downtown Banff. The walk from the hotel to down town is about 10 min).  I ended up walking into the town twice that day.

Walking down Spray Ave. into town

After sorting things out with my roommate on Sunday morning we took a walk to Safeway (its quite a lengthy walk, don’t want to do that too many times) to pick up some groceries (we did get lost, but as soon as we pulled out a map a very helpful guy (from quebec) told us that we had gone too far and we needed to go back and turn the corner). For now we just picked up some snack items because our fridge isn’t working properly and we don’t trust things like milk and eggs in there due to health issues. We also took a trip to the dollar store (which has like everything you could possibly think of in it) to pick up items like towel racks, bath mat, garbage bins, and a juice jug.

We got our internet hooked up by shaw today because we signed up in the staff housing office to have it done because they were already coming to a bunch of other peoples tv and internet.  You can also pay $25 for a tv (which we did) and they will come deliver it to your room and hook it up with cable. The hotel covers the cost of your cable in the housing price, which is fantastic.

So far so good here in Banff National Park! J