Tuesday, March 18, 2008

7th Anniversary Fiasco! To write a letter or not?!

Monday was our 7th anniversary, so we decided to go to Vancouver from Sunday to Monday since Clay took the day off and I was on Spring Break. We wanted to go somewhere fancy, since we had never stayed in Vancouver before, so we booked the Fairmont Hotel Vancouver ---we only could afford the "two queen" guest room, but they put on the account that it was our anniversary and that we would like to upgrade to the king if an opportunity opened. Anyways.... that was cool and we had sitters... so on our way we stopped by Megan's to drop off a CD. I called the Macaroni Grill to make a reservation for 6:45. Why do I tell all this, you ask? This is why: Trying to get to the freeway from Meg's we ran out of gas at the top of the Mission Abby Highway... we coasted down the big hill and didn't make the light, so we had to stop at the bottom by Save-on-Foods only a block away from the gas station. Clay, being the great husband, gets out and walks to the Mohawk, but when he gets there, their computers are down and he can't pump any gas! He then proceeds to the Chevron, where we had to BUY, not deposit, a gas can. Needless to say 20 minutes later, we are on our way. We laugh and say to each other this is something to laugh about .... needless to say this was just the beginning.
We make it to the Macaroni Grill in right on time and are escorted to our table right away. Where I had a really good salmon and grilled potatoes and bellini and Clay had grilled prawns, and sirloin steak with mashed potatoes. YUMMY! We then decided it was time to check into our hotel. I had only been for brunch at the hotel and Clay had never even walked through the lobby. What a beautiful landmark! When we got to the hotel front desk, they had upgraded our room to a King size suite! Yippee! Beautiful City Views in the rain...but really nice Victorian style.
Well, we settled down to a comfortable sleep and 2:15 a weird noise awakens us. "What is that?" I ask Clay.
He is already out of bed getting dressed. He says, "I think it is the fire alarm".
About 2 minutes later, a voice over the loudspeaker says, "Please leave your rooms and evacuate your floor!" So, we get up put on warm clothing and SHOES and head to the stairs.(The reason I emphasize shoes is that some people were on the street in their Hotel robes and bare feet! It's Vancouver, not Maui!) Luckily we were only on floor 6 out of 15. The building is set up really weirdly and we exit at pool level and to get to street level we have to go down bunker stairs. We proceed to enter into the building in the lobby to see what is up. There are 3 firemen and the manager on duty standing in front of the panel. It turns out to be a faulty smoke detector and there is no fire. (this the the ladder truck that showed up at the hotel)
They send us back to our rooms about half an hour later. We just about fall asleep and the fire alarm rings AGAIN! YES AGAIN! We think to ourselves, this is just another false alarm, but the annoying voice comes again, so we leave our room, this time we hang out with 50 other people at pool level. We get sent back to our rooms, and try to fall asleep, this time a little annoyed! Anyways, we get to sleep in until 10:30, have crepes for lunch (reminiscent of Paris) and have an awesome stroll along Robson. Very memorable! So, the question still remains...should we write a letter complaining? Hmmmm....

1 comment:

  1. I can't believe they didn't offer you a discount to begin with. sheesh it is the Fairmont not Hotel 6.

    Sound like you made the best of it and some wonderful memories!

    Happy Anniversary, 7 years! Yippee!

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