Fairmont Pacific Rim

I have always wanted to stay at this hotel and I finally got a chance. Matthew at front desk was excellent. He was able to accomodate my requests and was friendly and professional.The room was beautiful. Got a partial harbour view, which was great. The bed was one of the best I have slept in. Heavenly. Bathroom was amazing. Loved the tv and deep soaker tub. Nice surprise to see Sangre de Fruta products, which I never knew about., and that they support local (Bowen Island) businesses. Really appreciated that they are so environmentally friendly. Ipad to control lights/room and provide all hotel info was convenient. Room service was quick once I got them on the line. Will definitely book again.

I never had such a bad service in a Fairmont Hotel. The week before our arrival I left 4 messages before I was able to speak with the F&B Manager as I had questions about the menu in the Restaurant before making a reservation. During our stay, we tried to order room service for dinner with no success. I started calling at 4.30 pm and the answer I received was that they were really busy and someone will call me back in 30 minutes. It went on like this for the whole evening. I called back every half hour and they always gave me the same answer. By 8.30 pm, we ordered takeout from the Cactus Club across the street. We knew that the bar and restaurant were fully booked but not being to order or even speak to anyone about room service is over the edge. Not what you expect from a Fairmont Hotel. Rooms are very nice and comfortable, the guest service is zero.

I stayed at this hotel for a conference which was happening in the convention centre across. Given how most near conf centre hotels are, i was certainly not expecting much so this hotel was an absolute discovery! Stunning rooms with marble bathrooms and the most amazing le labo cosmetics, delicious room service and some of the best sushi i have ever had. The breakfast is a real treat, i cannot forget their eggs benedict with crab - divine! Very decently equipped gym. Wish I had some time to have tried their spa.

I have been eyeing to visit this hotel which is arguably the most expensive hotel in downtown Vancouver for years but have always opted to travel abroad instead. Given the current covid/pandemic situation, non-essential travel outside of Canada is not advised and so decided to splurge on a short staycation within my community. I’ve stayed at 3 other downtown hotels in the past few years. This is the most modern of the Fairmont hotels in Vancouver as well as the most expensive. The hotel is glitzy and in the prime location in between downtown and Coal Harbour. It is opposite the Vancouver Convention Center and close to Canada Place where the cruises dock. Depending on your room view you can see Stanley Park and seaplanes land and take off. Currently, the concierge and all hotel guests are required to wear face masks in the lobby and public areas inside the hotel. The lobby bar had a good number of patrons at any given time. I booked a Deluxe City View King room with a jetted-tub. When I checked in at 3pm I was given room 1117 on the 11th floor. The hotel itself has 20 floors and the gold rooms which were temporarily unavailable were on the higher floors. The room is a corner room that is fairly long and narrow and had large windows all around the bathroom as well. The jetted-tub was deeper than the regular tubs in their other rooms. It also had a control panel on the wall for several different settings. My little one loved the jetted-tub and had a fantastic time using it. Definitely too deep for a toddler to sit in. We were quite pleased as they had a crib in the fairly large closet and a diaper genie in the bathroom. They also provided a kids sized bathrobe and baby shampoo, moisturizer and bottle warmer which was a nice touch. They were nice enough to also provide us with a bottle of Prosecco to celebrate an anniversary. Some very unique features about the hotel’s room include a TV in the bathroom mirror which was very cool as well as a tablet you can use for in-room dining orders, turning lights on and off, curtains to open and close as well ask for the room to be cleaned or not to be disturbed. Here is where things fell short.. since the pandemic, guest occupancy has been low. Still double digits but not many people were staying. Because of this several things in the room had not been touched in a while. The Nespresso machine had not been maintained and needed to be cleaned/fixed to work. One of the hotel phones had to be reset it had not been used for so long, even the thermostat on the wall was acting up. The jetted tub actually turned itself on in the middle of the night twice. These things were minor inconveniences but getting someone up to fix things was slow because they didn’t have enough manpower. The noise level on the 11th floor was enough to be annoying. I could hear the crosswalk beep early in the morning every few seconds and people in office buildings across from us could see right into our room. The last straw was when one of the electric blinds in the bathroom broke. The maintenance person tried to fix it but told us they would have to come back when we leave the room as it will take 2-3hrs to fix. We had so many floor to ceiling windows but could not make use of them in the bathroom because of a broken blind. I went down to the concierge and made a complaint at 11:45am. Given we paid so much having 4-5 issues on the first day was unacceptable. I had Carla try and help me see what other options there were and she would call me in my room. Around 12:30 I got a call asking if I wanted a room transfer and they would upgrade me to a Harbour King view room (quieter) but it would not have a jetted-tub. I would of been fine with a room at a higher floor but decided the Harbour view room would be fine. Guest services said they were currently getting it cleaned and would call me in 45 min when it was ready. the whole process took to close to 2:30pm to complete. Thankfully we had no real plans till 3pm but it took nearly 3hrs for them to get us into a new room given the hotel was barely full. When we got in the room, none of the baby items were there and we needed them to bring it over. I even had to grab the kids bathrobe from the previous room myself as they had run out. The maintenance person said they don’t have enough manpower and were very busy. Several things to note. Lunch time room service isn’t available from Sunday-Thursdays. The BMW bikes and car service is also temporarily unavailable. Turndown service isn’t provided daily either. The hotel is running on a skeleton crew and that impacts on the service negatively with things in the room needing maintenance and overall service being slow or not available. The things I did like included the view we had in our new room on 1408. Right across from the Vancouver convention center and it had a small Juliet balcony. I preferred the privacy and layout of this room, especially the signature green tree lighting above the bed. I also made use of the outdoor swimming pool on the 6th floor. There is a towel area before you go outside so you don’t need to bring the towels in your room. The pool is heated nicely and there was also a hot tub. It’s open 6:30am-10pm daily and I didn’t even need to book a time to use it as the hotel occupancy was so low. Location was great and close to the Pan Pacific Spa Utopia which I prefer over the Willow Stream Spa and close to many of the great restaurants downtown. Overall a great staycation, but disappointed with the service. The room and Harbour view was beautiful. I would recommend the Deluxe king room at the Rosewood Hotel Georgia which had a beautiful 5 piece bathroom with a big soaker tub, his and her separate sinks, rain shower head, toilet and HEATED floors. The floors in this hotel bathroom were cold and I found myself wearing the slippers they provided constantly.

For our anniversary we wanted to do something special and The Fairmont Pacific Rim delivered. From the attentive service we received at check-in, the lounge and in-room dining to the room quality it was a perfect getaway. The heated outdoor pool took an edge off the evening chill and the proximity to walking paths and restaurants meant we could leave the car parked during our stay. The staff was friendly and kind and made our trip memorable. We will be back!