Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise

First, about the hotel. Check-in and parking was a breeze. We were booked for 5 days 4 nights. At first, we were shown a room in the "new" wing which had a great view. However, I was surprised to find out that this is a PET FRIENDLY hotel and we had a rather large dog staying in the room next to us. We didn't even unpack the bags before we could hear a lot of loud barking. The dog had been left in the room by itself and was barking up a storm. We called the front desk, they apologized, and assigned another room immediately. They said, "you'll like this one better...it's air conditioned!" That was not something I had thought about, but not all the rooms (new or not) have A/C. At this time of year in late July, it was certainly warranted to have A/C. You had better ask! The next room we were shown was nice - actually larger -- and we had more space. However, there was something wrong with the A/C - I don't think the filters had been regularly changed or cleaned and there was a large amount of thick dust covering everything. We had to get housekeeping to come up and dust everything in the room. The next day, when we came back to the room after being out most of the day, the dust was back. We learned to put up with it. But housekeeping should have taken care of this. This room was fine except the bathroom was tiny! However, the bed was very comfortable and I slept fine. My girlfriend suffered from allergies presumably from the dust. We booked dinner in their 5-star dining room. When we called the day before, they were willing to take our reservations, but only at 5:45 p.m. or 8:45 p.m., saying the restaurant was full. We booked for 5:45 but advised that I wanted something more like 7 p.m. Upon arrival and after we sat there for a few minutes we noticed many of the tables were empty. I inquired and was told they had a lot of cancellations that day. The staff could have called and stated this to us and re-booked us for a later time. I roundly gave the hostess my opinion about this and displayed my dismay. They didn't have many people in the restaurant until around 8 p.m., so most of the best tables went unfilled. We could have easily been seated at 7 p.m. before anyone began arriving. The meal itself was very good. We both had main courses, me the Tenderloin at $44, and my girlfriend had Salmon $38. Again it was very good. With 2 wines and 1 mixed drink the tab was $170.00. Save it for a special occasion. The hotel has a deli/pastry shop that is open in the mornings for breakfast. Fruit, coffee and a pastry for two will be approximately $25 USD. The real beauty of the hotel is its location and proximity to the lake, which is gorgeous. You can canoe for $40/hour (early bird special). This is a relaxing place to visit and you can drive to three different national parks with easy access. To be sure, in this area, you should try this hotel at least once. It is an older hotel, having been built in 1885 and it has been remodeled and added too since its inception. We found others hotels we want to visit next, but for this moment we were generally satisfied. The hotel is somewhat dark inside and needs updating. I also forgot to mention that we were provided with free covered parking. This is a 3-star hotel...it does not approach the level of refinement and service that the Beverly Hills Hotel has, or another other 4-star hotels. Don't be fooled by ratings that are over the top. Go see for yourself.