Red Shutter Inn

There’s a wood stove and comfy couches in the shared room, plus coffee. A handy bonus is the downstairs space for ski gear. The room itself is basic and a bit cramped, especially the small bathroom, but the price is budget friendly.

Brandon and Meg were really helpful and welcoming, and you can use the hot tub and sauna whether you’re in the inn or a separate cabin. There’s a barbecue too. I preferred staying in the cabin, where we didn’t have to share the common space, though that room was lovely and cozy when the other guests were nice. It’s about a five-minute walk to the chairlift. Sweet place to stay.

The location and the guy working there were the only good parts of our stay. For what they charged, we could have found something much better. The rooms were cramped for four people, with our bags and boards taking over the living room because the narrow staircase made bringing them into the bedroom impossible. On the first of our three nights, something crawled on my arm in bed, so I slept on the couch. There were cobwebs all over the ceiling joists. The other three people in my group also came downstairs at different times that night and ended up on the couch for various reasons. We eventually moved to the Best Western in Trail. When we told the woman at the Red Shutter Inn front desk what happened, she said she’d e-transfer us a refund for the remaining two nights. After our vacation, once we were home, she said she wasn’t sending it. She accused us of making up the bugs to get money back. Why would I choose a couch over a bed if nothing was wrong? The others tried to sleep there too, and we left even though the place was only a minute from what we’d come to do. We even paid more for another hotel for two nights despite already having somewhere to stay. We left because it was a terrible experience. The shoveling was also awful. They’d cleared something of a path, but it was dangerously icy, especially on the stairs, and people slipped a lot. Be really careful. The back door doesn’t lock from outside: there’s a bolt, but the shifted frame means it doesn’t line up. Their answer was to leave the snow unshoveled back there, but someone could still get in through that door if they didn’t mind wading through knee-deep snow.

The back entrance wouldn’t latch or lock, and the long stairs up to the front door were an icy hazard. They were chipping ice and shoveling outside our bedroom window at 2 a.m., too. There was nowhere to store boards or luggage, and the oven was basically outside. If you’re over five feet tall, good luck getting to the bedroom. The cabin and hot tub water were filthy. Bugs crawled on us while we slept, and cobwebs got in your hair just trying to stand up. When I raised these problems with the owners, she accused me of lying to get a refund. Don’t stay here.