# Vancouver - Rocky Mountaineer Train - Victoria - Seattle Trip



## John Cummings (Sep 1, 2007)

We just got back from our 2 week trip to Vancouver, Rocky Mountaineer Train Tour, Victoria, and Seattle. We flew on Alaska Airlines from Ontario, California to Vancouver on Thursday, August 9th, 2007. We stayed 3 nights in Vancouver at the Fairmont Waterfront Hotel. We then left on the train tour from Vancouver on Sunday. It was the Rocky Mountaineer circle tour from Vancouver - Kamloops - Jasper AB - Quesnel - Whistler - Vancouver. We stayed another night at the Fairmont Waterfront in Vancouver We then traveled to Victoria on Pacific Coach Lines. We stayed 3 nights in Victoria at the Marriott Inner Harbour Hotel. We then traveled to Seattle on the Victoria Clipper. We stayed 2 nights at the Grand Hyatt in Seattle. We then flew home from Seattle to Ontario on Alaska Airlines.

Unfortunately we were again blessed with bad weather as we were on our 2 week trip in Alberta in August 2005. I will just give our general observations as it would take a book to give all the details. I will post details later. If anybody is interested they can ask questions or e-mail me for more info. I took approximately 1200 photos on the trip. Seattle turned out to be the high point of the trip for us. We were told by the folks in Whistler and Victoria that tourism is off quite a bit this year which is probably due mainly to the rise in the Canadian dollar. Everything is certainly very expensive in Canada.

Vancouver - Our room at the Fairmont Waterfront was on the 23rd floor ( top floor ) with a view of the harbor. Our high point was watching the cruise ships come in each morning at 6:00 am. I walked out on the pier 3 times to watch them as well as observed them from our room. The service at the hotel was excellent but the room was not what I would expect for a deluxe room at a luxury hotel at $450 /nt. The room was average size with a tiny bathroom with a tub/shower combination. We walked all through Gas-town in the afternoon which we didn't find very impressive except for the steam clock. There are a lot of aggressive pan handlers there. We did the "Hop On Hop Off Bus Tour" which is a great way to see the city. As the name implies, you can get on and off wherever you like. It is a 2 day pass. I don't know what it costs as we had a voucher for it. We took the False Creek ferry to Granville Island. The ferry is included in the bus tour. We walked around Granville Island which was nice and visited the Market where we consumed a number of delicious scones. We walked all over downtown and went to the top of the tower which is great for viewing the city and taking pictures. We took the Grayline 6 hour tour to Capilano and Grouse Mountain. It was included as part of the Rocky Mountaineer package. I do not recommend this tour.

Rocky Mountaineer - We booked the Gold Leaf Service with Luxury Hotels which is their top class of service. We were quite disappointed with it. The service was hit and miss and the trip was very exhausting with having to get up at 5:00 - 6:00 am every morning to go from the hotel to the train. The meals left a lot to be desired. The train only travels during the day. The first 2 days were good. The Jasper stop was not good at all. We arrived at 6:30 pm where we stayed the night at the Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge. The Jasper Park Lodge was a major disappointment and we were hustled out of there at 5:30 am so we had no time at all in Jasper. We did see some large Elk grazing on the lawn at the lodge. The most scenic part of the trip was from Whistler to Vancouver. We stayed at the Fairmont Château in Whistler. The service was not nearly as good as the Fairmont Waterfront and the room was about the same. We walked all around the village at Whistler which is very nice. In retrospect I would definitely not recommend taking the Rocky Mountaineer. This was pretty well the consensus of most of our fellow travelers.

Victoria - The Marriott was just OK. Service was good but the room again was average with a small bathroom. The Marriott is boxed in by high rise apartments and new construction. I would choose the Grand Pacific with a view of the inner harbor. We were quite disappointed with Victoria after all the hype. Bear in mind that I was born there but hadn't seen it since 1968. I feel it has lost a lot of its charm due to the high rise apartments etc. There are a lot of tourist souvenir stores with big sales. We did the "Hop on Hop Off' bus tour which was just OK. I would probably just take a city bus. We also did both the Gorge and Harbor Ferry tours which was interesting. The ferry tours cost $80 ( $60 for seniors ) for 2 people. We walked all over downtown. It was very cold in the evening even with sweaters and jackets on. I was amazed to see that the old Odeon Theater on Yates Street was still operating. I used to go there to the movies back in the 50's. We did see a lot of homeless and some aggressive beggars especially on Yates and along Quadra. We took the Grayline Butchart's Gardens Illumination Fireworks tour on Saturday evening. The gardens were awesome and the fireworks display was spectacular. However, I definitely would not recommend taking the tour. You do not have enough time to see the gardens properly. You can take a regular bus and stay several hours.

Seattle - We stayed in a deluxe room on the 23rd floor at the Grand Hyatt. The service was excellent and the room was very nice with a large bathroom with separate shower and tub. The Grand Hyatt was what we expect in a hotel of this class and the price was $185 cheaper per night than the Fairmont Waterfront. We had an awesome view of the Space Needle, Harbor, and Union Lake. We were very impressed with downtown Seattle. Very nice stores, tree lined streets with hanging flower baskets. There is a lot of history. We did a city bus tour that was great. We also did the "Ducks" tour which was very entertaining and a great tour of Union Lake. We also rode the Monorail to the Space Needle and back. You get the Ducks tour right next to the Space Needle. We walked all over downtown and visited Pike Place Market where we had breakfast at Lowell's. Pike Place Market is awesome. It is an absolute must see. In retrospect I wish we had cut our stay in Victoria and added the time to Seattle. To be very honest, we would have preferred just traveling to Seattle for a week.


----------



## Steamboat Bill (Sep 1, 2007)

John

That was an interesting report. We did a similar trip two summers ago but booked everything on our own and drove our own car. We also spent MORE time in Whistler and really enjoyed it. It sounds like you did Cliffs Notes Canada vacation and should have spent more quality time at one or two locations. This area of the world is simply too large to do in a week or two. Also, we only spent a night or two in the big cities and thought the gas lamp district was overrated and felt the Mountains were too nice in the summer to pass up. There were no street people in Whistler.


----------



## John Cummings (Sep 2, 2007)

Steamboat Bill said:


> John
> 
> That was an interesting report. We did a similar trip two summers ago but booked everything on our own and drove our own car. We also spent MORE time in Whistler and really enjoyed it. It sounds like you did Cliffs Notes Canada vacation and should have spent more quality time at one or two locations. This area of the world is simply too large to do in a week or two. Also, we only spent a night or two in the big cities and thought the gas lamp district was overrated and felt the Mountains were too nice in the summer to pass up. There were no street people in Whistler.



We did a 2 week trip to Alberta in August 2005. We booked everything ourselves and drove over 2000 miles through the parks, Calgary, etc. It was much more enjoyable.

We did not see any street people in Whistler neither. We only had time to walk the village in Whistler. Another day would have been nice. Except for Vancouver, Victoria, and Seattle, this was a package tour by Rocky Mountaineer so we had no choice on how long we had at each place. Our biggest complaint was paying so much and not receiving first class accommodations nor service. We paid over $11,000 for this trip and it did not begin to live up to its price. Of course having bad weather also put a damper on things ( pun intended ).

I lived in BC and have covered about every square foot of the province. In fact I have traveled all over Canada and have spent a lot of time in Toronto, Montreal and Alberta as well as BC.  My favorite area by far is the Windermere Valley where I lived from the age of 8-14 and revisited 10 years ago.


----------



## philemer (Sep 2, 2007)

Hi John,
Thanks for the interesting travel dialogue. My DW & I have thought about taking that train trip but now we probably won't. Living in ID we could probably see a lot of BC by car in a two week period. 

What areas of BC would you recommend seeing via a 10-14 day car trip originating in ID?

Phil


----------



## Keitht (Sep 2, 2007)

The comments about the Rocky Mountaineer make interesting reading and also leave me in something of a quandary.  My next door neighbour is keen to the RM as he doesn't want to drive himself because of (a) driving on the righthand side of the road and (b) the distances involved.
I'm not sure whether to let him see the comments about the RM and possibly put him off, or to let him go and enjoy the scenery in blissful ignorance that some people think it's overpriced and poor service


----------



## philemer (Sep 2, 2007)

Keith,
There might be more reviews on www.tripadvisor.com 

Phil


----------



## Parkplace (Sep 2, 2007)

Never make a decision against something simply on one person's views.

Personal biases show up in the strangest ways.  I felt the reverse regarding Seattle.  So go figure........


----------



## Keitht (Sep 2, 2007)

Parkplace said:


> Never make a decision against something simply on one person's views.
> 
> Personal biases show up in the strangest ways.  I felt the reverse regarding Seattle.  So go figure........



Absolutely right.  It would be a boring old world if everybody liked and disliked the same things.  My neighbour worked on the railways in the UK for over 40 years so I suspect he would enjoy the trip irrespective of any problems.  His wife on the other hand.....  If she won the lottery she would complain that it wasn't more


----------



## philemer (Sep 3, 2007)

Keitht said:


> His wife on the other hand.....  If she won the lottery she would complain that it wasn't more



ROTFLMAO.


----------



## BevL (Sep 3, 2007)

Don't we all know people like that?????


----------



## John Cummings (Sep 3, 2007)

philemer said:


> Hi John,
> Thanks for the interesting travel dialogue. My DW & I have thought about taking that train trip but now we probably won't. Living in ID we could probably see a lot of BC by car in a two week period.
> 
> What areas of BC would you recommend seeing via a 10-14 day car trip originating in ID?
> ...



Ten years ago when I was consulting in Spokane WA, we drove in a circle up into BC and back. We crossed into BC at Eastport ID and then went up to Windermere where we stayed for a few days. I wanted to visit this area as I lived there when I was young. It is a very scenic area. From there we drove up to Banff, Lake Louise and then across to Golden. From there we went through Revelstoke to the Okanagan and back into WA.

I would suggest that you follow the same path to Banff and Lake Louise. From there I would travel up to Jasper. From Jasper you can either drive back south and then go east and back down through Glacier Park or you can go the same route we took. I don't suggest going west from Jasper to Prince George as that is not too scenic and you would be hard pressed for time. I would avoid going to Western BC because of time. Save that for another time. The route we took plus the extra trip up to Jasper will more than occupy your time as there are many places to stop and visit. If you are interested, I can give you details on accommodations as we did it all on our trip through Windermere and our Alberta trip in 2005.

You will enjoy the scenery a lot more while driving than taking the train because you will set your own pace. Most of the trip, the train track paralleled the road.

Rocky Mountaineer has several tours. My observations only apply to the one that we took which was the classic circle tour. One big problem is I like to take a lot of photos and that is not too easy from a train that doesn't stop. Much of the time your view is blocked by trees. The level of service is somewhat dependent on your attendants. In the Gold Leaf Service you have assigned seats in an assigned dome car. You have 3 attendants. The seat/car assignments and attendants change for each leg of the trip. We had good service for the first 2 days because we had very good attendants and the train would slow down for taking photos. The attendants would let us know when a point of interest was coming up so we could be ready. The next 2 days were just the opposite with poor attendants and the train never slowed down for photos. We were never told of any points of interest.


----------



## John Cummings (Sep 3, 2007)

Keitht said:


> The comments about the Rocky Mountaineer make interesting reading and also leave me in something of a quandary.  My next door neighbour is keen to the RM as he doesn't want to drive himself because of (a) driving on the righthand side of the road and (b) the distances involved.
> I'm not sure whether to let him see the comments about the RM and possibly put him off, or to let him go and enjoy the scenery in blissful ignorance that some people think it's overpriced and poor service



These are just our observations though some of our fellow travelers were in agreement. Take them for what they are worth. I have also read very good reviews of the Rocky Mountaineer tour. A lot depends on what your expectations are and what you have to compare it with.

I simply report on what our experiences are, both bad and good. How people take it is not my concern. It is just our opinion based on our personal preferences and our other travel experiences.


----------

