In the afternoon, on Saturday September 24th, after our hike in to Lille, we headed over to the Elk River Inn. This was the Third installment of the Beer Parlor Project and this one was much more successful. The owner of the establishment, Len, lives upstairs with his wife. The hotel is situated right beside the Crowsnest Highway, so I'm sure he gets some traffic from time to time. It was quiet when we got there.
We arrived in the late afternoon and made our introductions. While the light was still good I pulled out my big view camera and took some exterior and interior shots of the hotel. Then I switched to a smaller 35mm film camera and continued with some candid snapshots inside. There was some sort of beer shortage on the British Columbia side of the border and as a result stock at the bar was somewhat limited. But we stayed for a while and visited with Len and learned about the history of the building. While we were there three bikers from nearby Crowsnest Pass stopped in and had a couple of beers as well, and we visited with them for a while.
Len has a very dry sense of humor and he teased us and made fun of some of our questions. But he was very knowledgeable about the history of the hotel and told us a lot about it. It must have been a difficult time for his business through the Covid pandemic. He had a couple of nice pool tables there, and apparently there used to a Tuesday night pool league that visited his establishment. He tells us that the league is starting up again this fall, so that should be good for business.
Len, or someone, collected a whole bunch of pins and buttons. Many of the pins have been cast into a couple of the wood tables, and there is a large wall just covered with buttons, many of them quite old. We really enjoyed our time there and Chris and Connie and Margarit and I thanked Len for his hospitality, and for adding to our project. This visit certainly made up for the bust that we experienced at the Greenwood the night before.
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