HARRISON HOT SPRINGS, BC: This “resort municipality” (this is an official term, apparently; that’s what the government road sign says) is a throwback to the days when people drove a heck of a long way out of town to stay in a fancy hotel and dress up for dinner, a place where the line between luxury and excess is, at best, uncertain.

The main resort still carries elements of that high-end-slumming-in-the-Catskills aura; guests in elegant evening wear are constantly rubbing elbows with other guests who are wearing hotel-issued bathrobes and heading for the hot pools. Whenever you find yourself in the lobby searching for pamphlets with discount coupons, you figure it’s only a matter of time before some of the characters from Dirty Dancing come chugging in through the main doors.

QUESTION: How do you get there?

ANSWER: From Vancouver, you can either take Highway One, which is the express route, or Highway Seven, which is the scenic route. The express route features a variety of traffic jams and vehicle emissions, while the scenic route offers a slower pace and the haunting aroma of manure.

QUESTION: What does it look like?
ANSWER: The town site overlooks a pleasant lakefront with mountain vistas. Most of the carpets in the main buildings are red, obviously. There’s a huge fireplace off the main lobby. The lamps aren’t made of sterling silver, but everything seems to be kind of glitzy and sparkly, especially after you’ve been soaking a little too long in the hot pools.

QUESTION: How’s the weather?

ANSWER: The clouds rolled in about an hour after arrival and the local television weatherperson is predicting that the storm system will have played itself out by the scheduled morning of departure, so it’s keeping pretty much true to form.

QUESTION: Aren’t the prices a little expensive?

ANSWER: Heck, no; they’re downright brutal, but as we all know, that’s part of the charm. A cashier at a nearby gas/food store explained this to me. When a loaf of bread costs six dollars and a can of pop costs three, it’s so special that it just HAS to taste good, and so it does. Of course, you can imagine that the locals get a little overwhelmed by all this relentless goodness, so they take regular field trips into Chilliwack to buy much less special foodstuffs at plain, unadulterated supermarkets

QUESTION: How many people actually live there, by the way?

ANSWER: There are two kinds of people who are acutely aware of local statistics: mayors and liquor store/pub owners. According to one of the latter, the permanent population has skyrocketed from 400 or so to over 1800 in the last twenty years. This growth has prompted a surge in “combination” businesses which cater to diversified tourist interests, like the woodcarving/fruit store, the hamburger/sushi restaurant, and the cell phone/gun shop (Actually, I made up the last couple, but you can be sure if they had them, they’d be thriving.)

QUESTION: How’s the entertainment?

ANSWER: To be honest, I was expecting a spate of old school stand-up comics bouncing around the stage saying “how-eye-yah-how-eye-yah-how-eye-yah?” and telling disparaging stories about their spouses. Instead, there is a reasonable complement of bands all doing their best to find a balance between skill and corniness. People don’t come here expecting the latest offerings in electro-techno punk fusion, so the musical fare tends to lean towards covers of those endearing songs that turn up on the play lists at wedding receptions. This allows everyone a chance to get dragged up to the dance floor to shuffle around and bump into everyone else.

QUESTION: Do the local stores offer a vast selection of tacky souvenirs?

ANSWER: Rest assured that you won’t be disappointed.