Bow View Lodge — Hotel in Banff

I absolutely adore this place! The location is fantastic. The main Banff street is right around the corner. Corner stores a few steps away, but the hotel is set in such a beautiful QUIET corner of the town next to the river. Set off to the back where theirs no real traffic to speak of. Huge walking trails and river right off the back step. Canoeing rentals on the river a few steps away. Absolutely wonderful views. I wish I had taken more photos of the room itself for this review. Rooms were super cozy and welcoming. The entire hotel has such a warm feeling. Beautiful art in the rooms. I know their are many more upscale hotels in Banff, but I find those feel cold and cookie cutter. If I spend money to stay in a hotel I want it to be memorable to that area. Not the same hotel you see everywhere. I would choose this hotel over those in Banff any day. I love the building layout and the room setup is fantastic. The bathroom off in it's own area and the sink in its own little nook has such character! It's so charming! The rooms have HUGE wall to wall windows! natural light is my favorite part, and with views like that why cover it up. Rooms were super clean and the beds...omg the beds! Super super comfortable! Everyone in our party commented how much we loved the beds. I loved the layout of the queen bed with the twin next to it. Extra blankets (the soft ones I LOVE) and fans provided in the rooms. Great internet connection. Adorable little table and chairs in the room and seating out on balcony and TVs and mini fridges in rooms and microwaves in common areas and coffee station in rooms and front lobby. Stay here and you'll want for nothing. Opening the balcony door let in a wonderful breeze off the water. The birds and sunrise and view! If you can, try and get the river facing room. The hotel has everything you could possibly need for your stay. The staff were super wonderful, honestly. Having never been to this area, I had to call a few times and clarify some things and confirm other things and each time the people I spoke to were fantastic. Friendly and approachable. I didn't feel rushed or like I was taking up their time. The woman checking us in was so helpful and nice, I wish I had her name. My son had to go down several times to ask a question and he said he really liked her and said she was "so nice!" And Isa! who I first spoke to on the phone and again at checkout; she really went above and beyond and was so kind to really make my trip happen by helping me with my booking issues was fantastic! 😍 Even just passing staff in the hall they were smiling and saying hello. It really made my stay to be in such a positive environment. I will always recommend this place for a memorable stay! A fantastic night sleep in a wonderful safe area of town, with terrific staff! I'll...

A hotel needs to be a quiet place. With that said, we were on the main floor in a wheelchair accessable room (#111 no balcony), 1 queen bed (which was very comfortable) with a view of the river. The staff were amazing! Always helpful, well trained and friendly. The hotel is quite old but you never see because it has been extremely well maintained, unless you happen to notice the retro elevator buttons (which were cool and in pristine shape). It is the only hotel we could find in a decent price range in Banff (Hello! Tourist zone!) that included a fridge (it will freeze your food if you don't keep an eye on it). Kettles are available upon request and I saw a microwave on a carrier so that might be a possibility as well. The hotel is nicely renovated and I was pleasantly surprised by the high standards of cleanliness (because I can be picky about that), hats off to the cleaning crew, well done! The bad news: the walls (on the 1st floor at least) are paper thin, you are going to hear pretty much everything; babies crying down the hall, neighbors doing their thing, everyone's conversations. The doors have no cushion, they close very loudly (this one thing can easily be remedied with felt between the slabs and door frames, management?) so you will hear the doors slam of everyone who comes and goes from their rooms. If your window is open at night you will hear the train as well and there is no A/C that I am aware of (I don't use it anyway). Surprisingly there where no partiers in our vicinity though so we got a decent sleep. Nothing can be done about most of these things; the walls cannot be changed, babies will cry, children will play and your neighbors will have drinks and sing songs after being out and seeing all the sites. You have to decide if you can block out theses things if you stay here. I could, I sleep like the dead. My husband? Meh, he's a light sleeper. He may want something different next time. But I would stay here again for the price and am pleased with what I got for my money. Again, shout out to the amazing staff which helped make...

Horrible experience for stay in Banff. Would not recommend.

As soon as we showed up to Banff we went to check in, which was already 1 hr after check in time. When we asked to check in they told us that our room was not ready yet mentioning that it was due to covid and would be ready at 530pm. If the room would not get ready I would have preferred for them to call us and let us know ahead of time, or change their check in times for now due to covid. When we got back to the hotel to receive our room they did give us a coupon for the restaurant on site, but it was expired.

Getting into our room, the floors were not clean even though they needed extra time to clean it. Makes me wonder how good of cleaning they did for covid measures too. When we tried to open the balcony door it did not open either. Went to the front desk to let them know, they said that it was likely dirty in that area of the room as it was behind a curtain and so missed. Unacceptable! They had to get maintenance to come and fix the door before we could even start relaxing on the balcony, which was not really fixed as it could not be locked from the door itself but only with the stick lock at the bottom. The screen door had no handle. Due to the fact we did not realize the coupon was expired for the meal we didn't get to use it and so asked at the end of our stay if we could receive the same amount off the room price or a discount of some sort for the inconvenience. The front desk clerk didn't even care and said that all he could do was give us that coupon or another 2x $10 off coupons for the restaurant even though we were LEAVING today.

In addition, there was not enough parking in the parking lot to accommodate all guests, some people were double parked. And the staff had really no answer as to where else to park except in overflow and hope not to get a ticket. This happened every night of our stay for 2 nights there.

Horrible experience, horrible hotel, not well cared for, not well staffed, and free parking is a joke. Do not...