Casual in Calgary

My trip to Canada was absolutely amazing and I couldn’t have asked for better weather! I heard a lot of locals complaining about it still snowing, but I was loving every second of it. There’s the freezing slushy snow that can ruin all your plans and then there’s the soft fluffy snow that makes everything look beautiful, we got the second!❄❄ I didn’t bring my real camera with me so everything I have is from my iPhone, but I’ll be posting pictures of our actual trip next week. These pictures were taken on my last day in Canada- I had a 7am flight the next morning so I stayed in a hotel near the airport. It was just my mother-in-law and myself on the trip and since she lives in another state, she met me in Calgary.

Before I talk about my day in Calgary, let me vent about my flight on the way there because it was a complete disaster, lol. So basically the ticket I purchased to fly to Calgary was double the price of other flights leaving that day because I wanted to arrive fairly early, by noon or so, so that we had time to do a little site seeing and drive to our Airbnb in Banff, which was roughly 1.5 hours away. Well, my flight was 7 hours delayed and in order to get to Calgary that day, they added 2 other flights to the itinerary, one of which also ended up being delayed. It was almost 11pm by the time I landed (I was supposed to arrive at 12p) and they were having a huge snow storm, so it was too dangerous to drive to Banff. ? We ended up staying in a hotel in the actual airport that night, while still having to pay for our Airbnb room.  My MIL didn’t have any issues with her flight so she had arrived about 10 hours before me, so thankfully the room was already booked when I landed. Honestly, anything can happen when you travel but I’m still upset at United for their crappy customer service and not even offering a reimbursement of the hotel we had to pay for. Not to mention that I should’ve just gone with the cheaper ticket because those were all arriving around the time that I ended up arriving. I did call and try to sort it out but they take no responsibility for any of it. BTW, the plane was not delayed because of maintenance, it was because the airport I flew out of was small so it gets last priority over planes and a bigger airport ended up needing the one that was originally supposed to take my flight. Anyways, what’s done is done! That was honestly the only issue that we had the entire trip, which is a huge blessing because you just never know.

So back to me staying in Calgary on the last night… my MIL left the the day before I did because the only flights available for me were all leaving really early, so I just stayed another night so I could be by the airport and so we had a little more time. I was also excited to have some time to actually see Calgary since we didn’t get a chance when I arrived and I like visiting new cities.

I was looking forward to doing some shopping and find some good coffee shops, so I took a taxi down there around 10:30a and it was a ghost town. ? I almost just went back to my hotel but then I asked around and got the scoop that most places are only open from 12p-4p on Sundays and there’s a lot that don’t open at all. Luckily I found one coffee shop open and waited out of the freezing cold for the rest of the stores to open. I spent most of my time in a mall right down town where I found a few cute things. I also found this delicious place to eat for lunch. It was kind of a walk to get to from downtown… okay maybe it wasn’t that bad, I just wasn’t used to the cold, lol. It probably took about 12 minutes to walk there from the mall and it was one of the only food places open, but even if it wasn’t, it was worth trying out because their food was SO good. I got a caesar salad and tomato salad that came with some bread. It sounds boring but it was really good, I’ve actually craved it a few times since then.

Now that I’ve seen how beautiful the area is in winter, I can’t wait to go back during summer! I would definitely recommend visiting around March because we had just missed the really really cold temperatures that make doing anything outside miserable. Don’t get me wrong, I was cold, but it wasn’t bad as long as I bundled up.?

My trip to Canada was absolutely amazing and I couldn’t have asked for better weather! I heard a lot of locals complaining about it still snowing, but I was loving every second of it. There’s the freezing slushy snow that can ruin all your plans and then there’s the soft fluffy snow that makes everything look beautiful, we got the second!❄❄ I didn’t bring my real camera with me so everything I have is from my iPhone, but I’ll be posting pictures of our actual trip next week. These pictures were taken on my last day in Canada- I had a 7am flight the next morning so I stayed in a hotel near the airport. It was just my mother-in-law and myself on the trip and since she lives in another state, she met me in Calgary.

Before I talk about my day in Calgary, let me vent about my flight on the way there because it was a complete disaster, lol. So basically the ticket I purchased to fly to Calgary was double the price of other flights leaving that day because I wanted to arrive fairly early, by noon or so, so that we had time to do a little site seeing and drive to our Airbnb in Banff, which was roughly 1.5 hours away. Well, my flight was 7 hours delayed and in order to get to Calgary that day, they added 2 other flights to the itinerary, one of which also ended up being delayed. It was almost 11pm by the time I landed (I was supposed to arrive at 12p) and they were having a huge snow storm, so it was too dangerous to drive to Banff. ? We ended up staying in a hotel in the actual airport that night, while still having to pay for our Airbnb room.  My MIL didn’t have any issues with her flight so she had arrived about 10 hours before me, so thankfully the room was already booked when I landed. Honestly, anything can happen when you travel but I’m still upset at United for their crappy customer service and not even offering a reimbursement of the hotel we had to pay for. Not to mention that I should’ve just gone with the cheaper ticket because those were all arriving around the time that I ended up arriving. I did call and try to sort it out but they take no responsibility for any of it. BTW, the plane was not delayed because of maintenance, it was because the airport I flew out of was small so it gets last priority over planes and a bigger airport ended up needing the one that was originally supposed to take my flight. Anyways, what’s done is done! That was honestly the only issue that we had the entire trip, which is a huge blessing because you just never know.

So back to me staying in Calgary on the last night… my MIL left the the day before I did because the only flights available for me were all leaving really early, so I just stayed another night so I could be by the airport and so we had a little more time. I was also excited to have some time to actually see Calgary since we didn’t get a chance when I arrived and I like visiting new cities.

I was looking forward to doing some shopping and find some good coffee shops, so I took a taxi down there around 10:30a and it was a ghost town. ? I almost just went back to my hotel but then I asked around and got the scoop that most places are only open from 12p-4p on Sundays and there’s a lot that don’t open at all. Luckily I found one coffee shop open and waited out of the freezing cold for the rest of the stores to open. I spent most of my time in a mall right down town where I found a few cute things. I also found this delicious place to eat for lunch. It was kind of a walk to get to from downtown… okay maybe it wasn’t that bad, I just wasn’t used to the cold, lol. It probably took about 12 minutes to walk there from the mall and it was one of the only food places open, but even if it wasn’t, it was worth trying out because their food was SO good. I got a caesar salad and tomato salad that came with some bread. It sounds boring but it was really good, I’ve actually craved it a few times since then.

Now that I’ve seen how beautiful the area is in winter, I can’t wait to go back during summer! I would definitely recommend visiting around March because we had just missed the really really cold temperatures that make doing anything outside miserable. Don’t get me wrong, I was cold, but it wasn’t bad as long as I bundled up.?