The Internet Lies

(revised with pictures 6/23)
As I sit in an incredibly bad honeymoon suite in a bright yellow hotel in "downtown" Watson Lake, I question, for the first time, what the heck I'm doing here. So far, I haven't had this problem. And tomorrow night when I hit Whitehorse, I might not have this problem anymore. But for tonight, I am seriously considering turning around.


So here's where it all went wrong.


Remember that website I posted last time, about where we were gonna stay? All lies.


We called this morning from our safe Super 8 Hotel in Fort Nelson to make reservations at the Watson Lake Hotel in Watson Lake, YT. The call was forwarded, but we were not told who it was being forwarded to. A room was reserved, a credit card number was given, and the call was ended. We pack, we leave, we go on the most horrendously boring drive imaginable for 7 hours, and we arrive in Watson Lake. Now the website, for those of you who haven't visited the site'o'lies for yourselves, says that the hotel is right downtown. The pictures even make it look kinda cute. So we go through the town, which consists of about 12 buildings, and come to the end. To the right, we see a giant building that says in very fading paint Watson Lake Hotel. We get a little closer. It begins to look a little rundown. We get a little closer and it begins to look deserted. We get a little closer and we begin to realize that all the doors and windows are boarded up, except where the local hoodlums have pulled them off. So I'm beginning to wonder if maybe the hotel has been rebuilt somewhere else. So we stop at the grocery store and I run in and ask where the hotel is.


Nope, that was it. The clerk even gave me a funny look and was like, "I don't think it's open." Well honey, that's cuz it ain't.


So we decide to drive to the Belvedere, the hotel where we are currently sitting, and see if they know what's up. I go inside and I tell the front desk clerk the story, and he says that the call was probably forwarded here. So I ask if he has a reservation for me. Nope. Does he have any rooms? Sure. He gives me 311. His last room. He wanders around lost and aimless, he finally gives me the key, and he writes down directions on how to get to my room. See, 311 isn't in the building with the office. It's down the street 6 buildings and behind another closed hotel. We drive up and I look upstairs to find the number and see where it is. I find it.


The door is open. Not unlocked, no. Standing open to let in a breeze. I get out, I walk upstairs, and peek in the door at the guy who's staying in that room already. I turn around, I walk downstairs, I get in the car and start laughing. So Amanda and I drive back to the Belvedere office, and I tell the guy that there's already someone in that room. He gives me a blank look, then gets mad, pulls a key out from a different place than the last one, and throws it down on the counter, muttering "They never tell me nothin." I go collect Amanda, and we head upstairs to check it out. At first, I wasn't sure that the key was working. Amanda had to make it work because I do not have lockpicking skillz. We finally get the door open...


And it's the honeymoon suite. Seriously. The first thing you see when you walk through the vestibule (yes, it has a vestibule) is the GIANT bathtub in the corner of the room. The bathtub is bigger than the bed (which, by the way, is two twin beds shoved together). There's a gap under the front door, and there's a conjoining door with the room next to ours which does not lock (we currently have several chairs shoved up against it). And we can hear the people in the next room, and they aren't snoring...


We were hungry when we got here so we decided to go eat at the dining room downstairs. I'm fairly certain that I just paid $13.45CAN for Tyson frozen chicken strips and Ore-Ida french fries. At least there was a jimmy (you woulda loved him, Michelle). We were debating about whether we needed to go get a couple drinks in the lounge just to dull the horror, but a large group of locals (all men, of course) walked in as we were paying. We decided not to go in the lounge. We then decided as it was 10pm and still bright as noon outside that we would go take pictures of the Watson Lake Hotel and the Watson Lake sign forest. We drive up, and three teenagers on bicycles ride out from behind the sign forest. One of them is drinking from a flask. I am not making this up. So I don't stop, we continue on and turn onto a side street and go back to the hotel, where I am typing this saga.


We've decided we'll be checking out long before 11am tomorrow.


Please, oh please, let Whitehorse be better than this.