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  5 of 5 12/01/2004 @ 18:15 |
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| Price Paid |
| £370 |
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| Booked Trip Through |
| Cant remember |
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| Times Visited |
| Just Once |
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| Review Detail |
I spent 10 days in Inns of Banff 1999. This was my first visit to North America (sun+snow), and f**k is it cold in the Rockies! A large group of us stayed in Inns of Banff and booked it through a travel agent, which was great as we were used to previously sorting our holidays out independantly.
The accomodation was superb and the Canadians are some of the friendliest people I've meet, although they did seem a bit slow/stoned! - which was funny!
Unlike European resorts, the slopes are not on the door step, so a bus to either Sunshine, Norquay (never went) or Lake Louise is required.
Sunshine had fantastic snow, in fact too good as it was a white out at least 2 days (at -25C or so!). But when the sunshine came out the boarding + powder was great, although the terrain could get a bit too similar.
Lake Louise was my fav, 'cause the terrain was more mixed, the resort was larger and it had some lovely bowls full of powder to board through (although again a white out).
Night life in Banff was ok, seemed to be far more restaurants than bars and clubs, but then thats usually the case in N.America. We did however manage to goto the Town Party in the massive Banff Springs Hotel - man, you gotta go to this place not just for the great party, but also the Hotel is amazing, absolutely huge! This was well worth spending out for.
Also highly recommended is the snow mobiling, which we had at least 2ft of completely fresh powder for! Be warned, this aint a easy day off!!
Overall, I'd say this place was fantastic for snow, which to me, along with the terrain, is the most important aspect about resort. It get wound up if one day you get a lovely dump of snow, only to find the next day is 13C, which has happened to me in Alpes and Sierra Nevada (USA).
Highly recommended, and very cheap to book holiday. |
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| Strengths |
Fantastic snow
Cheap bookings available
Friendly people
Not too busy
Choice of resorts
Town character
Nice and cold |
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| Weaknesses |
Can get lots of white outs
snowboarding not on "doorstep" |
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| Similar Resorts Visited |
| Many French resorts, Austria, Swizterland, W.USA |
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| Reviews: 2 |
| West Yorkshire |
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| 5 of 5 23/04/2003 @ 13:13 |
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| 1 of 1 people found the following review helpful: |
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| Price Paid |
| 350 |
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| Booked Trip Through |
| airtours |
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| Times Visited |
| Just Once |
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| Review Detail |
| Just back from Banff. Spent a week in Soldue and wanted more before the season ended - Carol found a cheap deal for 7 days at the travel agents so we thought "feck it". What can I say. The transfers from the airport was 2 hours, the hotel "inns of banff" was faultless. Jet lag does get to you the first two nights - just stay up as late as u can. 3 ski areas accessed by a bus from smack outside the hotel. Easier than walking to the lifts in a morning. Snow still good in sunshine although lake louise and norquay were getting a bit slushy at the bottom in the afternoon. Club Snowboard is good value for money at £96 for 3 days (they say 4 hours a day but the instuctors will keep going as long as you want). Learnt lots - now getting down reds confidantley after only 2 weeks of boarding, even beed down the half pipe. Night life is okay - foods cheap - but its not a lets go out and get w*nkered very night sorta place. People freindly and can't seem to do enough for u. Check out rude boys/girls for cheap kit. |
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| Strengths |
| Great snow/school/hotel/food/service |
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| Weaknesses |
| Not fantasticly livley - at least the bars we tried. But hell I went to board not get p*ssed. |
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| Similar Resorts Visited |
| Zermatt, Soldue |
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