Sunday, September 18, 2011

Fairmont Hot Springs: The Vacation Guide

So we decided to get the hell out of Dodge this weekend. 

So it was off to Fairmont Hot Springs.

We left fairly late on Saturday and stopped in Anaconda for lunch.... at Pizza Hut.

It was one of those lunches....  Milk, please.... we only have chocolate milk.  Ok.  A sandwich please... we don't have sandwiches.  Salad bar.... nope.  Ok.  Well.  What DO you have?  And, also.... this Pizza Hut does not have the classic (and iconic) Pizza Hut Ice.  (Side note:  I just googled to find an image of the ice and I can't find one.  That's a first.  Google failed me.)

We checked in (early) and hit the pools.  The kids decided to do the slide.  The water slide is $8.75 for a half-day, $10.75 for a full-day or $1 a ride.  The pools are free if you have a hotel room. 

Lots of fun.  I recommend bringing a few floaties and life jackets.  We also travel with googles and snorkels.... but we are those people.

In a perfect world I would get to the pools earlier, swim, then get out and have lunch and rest and then swim again later in the afternoon.  I'd also pack a delightful picnic lunch of crackers and fancy cheese.  And some microwave soup for the kids.

Alas... I don't live in a perfect world... but I did remember a giant bottle of red wine AND a corkscrew.

We had dinner at the cafe.  We could have done the dining room.

Everyone was pretty beat so we went to bed.  The next day we soaked early, showered and got ready and hit the Sunday brunch before it closed at 11:30.  Then we visited the little animal menagerie (horses, goats, ducks etc) and played on the playground.  We didn't do folf or golfing or mini-golf (although we would have done mini golf if we had realized it was there).  It was a little chilly and windy.

Cost breakdown:
Fuel:  less than a tank ($60)
Lunch:  Pizza Hut $34.96
Hotel:  $145 plus tax
Dinner:  Fairmont Cafe... we probably could have done the dining room so Hot could have steak but it was still pretty tasty.
Lounge:  ?  Hot had a drink or two while watching football scores while the kids and I "rested" in the hotel room.
Waterslide:  $20.50 (2 kids 1/2 day at $8.75 plus three single rides for Hot)
Brunch:  ?  ($10.95/adult and $5/96 for kids... but I think they gave us free coffee and I think the girls both ate for free....)  Also... I totally snagged three chocolate chip cookies from brunch and fed them to the kids on the drive home.... is that awful??
Snacks:  Pretzels, chips, water bottles in the car.  A bottle of wine for the hotel room.  Some microwave popcorn would have been good and maybe some other snack foods for in the hotel.

We drove home via Anaconda-Georgetown Lake- P-burg.

I recommend the fish hatchery at Washoe Park in Anaconda.  Great visitor center and for a nickel you can feed some GIANT trout.  Very cool.  We wanted to visit St Timothy's at 7 Gables and the candy store in P-burg but kids were conked out so we didn't stop.

Our next grand adventure may be to P-burg to do sapphires and the candy store

2 comments:

Christal said...

Sapphire hunting is fun there, but wet work, so be sure to take a change of clothes (& do it on a sunny day). You can also buy "concentrated" dirt out at Spokane Bar mine. We did that with a granddaughter & used our equipment, but you can do it at their location too. (I think they were on Treasures a couple of years back.)

Shanae Buckner said...

Oh, pretzels, chips and water bottles for snacks? I remember the time when we had almost the same picnic when I was a kid. We ate chips and pretzels too! It seems that everything went well, and all of you had a good time in the pool. :)