Echoes of the Past in a Historic Hotel

I took each of my kids on a one on one trip over the course of 3 years. Bannon was about 6 and was totally into airplanes. If there was a plane in the sky to be seen, he’d see it. So for his trip I knew I wanted to fly him somewhere and I thought he would enjoy the Cirque Du Soleil show that was playing in Vancouver, so that’s what we did.

I booked us in to stay at a historic hotel in downtown Vancouver which was an old boarding house back in the day and was close to 100 years old. We were on the second floor and had a room that had a water radiator below the window, a single sink and a tall wardrobe in the corner. The room was simple and felt old.

I asked Bannon if he’d like to explore the hotel with me and he said yes. We were enjoying our lighthearted exploration until we came to the 3rd floor. The vibe instantly changed. We barely took 5 steps off the elevator and we just stopped. I felt a lady ghost moving in our direction. I didn’t want to scare Bannon so didn’t mention it. But even Bannon’s tone changed when he said to me “mom, let’s go…”. He picked up on it.

I felt her still moving in our direction as if she meant to follow us. I put my hand out and told her no. She stopped. But it still rattled me.

Checking out the next morning the desk attendant received my key and asked how our stay was and I said it was brilliant, but that I was happy that they had set us up on the 2nd floor rather than the 3rd floor. I then leaned in and whispered behind the back of my hand “because the 3rd floor has a ghost”. The attendant looked at me very strangely which made me question if I should have said anything at all but then with a decent amount of discomfort on his face he told me; “you aren’t the first person to say that.…”