[twitter]Best Western Sicamous Inn
806 Trans Canada Highway E, Sicamous, BC, V0E 2V0, Canada
1.800.485.7698
Room with 2 Queens, $192/night (taxes in)

We don’t do the Vancouver-Calgary route in one shot. It’s 10-11 hours, and while I know many who tackle it, we’re not brave enough yet.

When coming back from a vacation, or heading out for one, we always divide the Calgary-Vancouver trip in half and stop somewhere around Sicamous or Salmon Arm. The past few years we’ve stopped in Salmon Arm, but after a music festival sold out all the rooms, I had to look further up the road for a room and found the perfect halfway stop in Sicamous.

The Best Western Sicamous Inn has just received the 2014 Trip Advisor People’s Choice Award for Best Family Hotel. It is deserved. The staff at the hotel were cheery and smiley. The hotel’s location is extremely convenient set just back from the Trans Canada enough to be quiet while still being *right there* to get on your way.

The hotel has free wifi, and offers a free buffet breakfast featuring those DIY waffles my kids love. There was also a selection of cereals, pastries, yogurts, fresh local fruit, juices, and coffee. I love when hotels include breakfast. It’s just such an easy way to travel when you can saunter in for a free breakfast.

The hotel also has a small pool. It was fun to splash in for a few minutes with the boys after our day of travel, but the water was quite cold and the chlorine smell was a little overpowering. We chose a few minutes in the hot tub and then headed to bed.

The rooms are nicely appointed (sorry for not taking a picture when they were made), but I found them to be a little small for our family of four. The rate was a little high, I feel, but that might have been because of the festival in Salmon Arm. When we checked in the sign read No Vacancy.

The hotel has an open layout with each room directly accessible from the outside, meaning if you get a ground floor room, you’re able to park directly in front of your room for super convenient loading and unloading.

The hotel shares a parking lot with a Tim Horton’s, there’s an A&W across the way, and D Dutchmen Dairy is nearby if you need a sweet treat.

We went in town for dinner and ate at Moose Mulligan’s pub right on the water. It was a great location, and the restaurant is listed as the best to eat in Sicamous, but remember – this is a small town. The menu goes everywhere from Thai to pizza to steak. The joint is expensive too – $14 for a plate of wings, kids’ menu at $10. Really though, people are eating here because there’s not much to choose from. (Note to self: open a decent restaurant in Sicamous upon retirement.)

Sicamous is exactly half way between Vancouver and Calgary. If you’re driving either direction and need to break up the trip, take a stop at the Best Western Sicamous Inn. There’s even a convenient place to charge up your Volt, Tesla, or other equally advanced electric vehicle.