Good question Ron! Maybe this'll help...
The official classification for Eagle Lodge in Bella Coola is "Country Inn". So what's the difference between a Country Inn and a B&B?
A B&B is a private residence (the owners) with a business in it. The business is 2 -3 bedrooms rented by the night. Often shared bath, often seasonal. The owners main income is derived outside the B&B.
A Country Inn is a business with a private residence in it (owner/manager). Anywhere from 4 - 14 rooms with private bathrooms, usually year round. The owner/manager's main income is derived from the business.
Here at the Lodge it get's a bit confusing because we are operating under the classification of B&B. Not because we only have 2-3 rooms, and not because it's our private residence. Though it could be - pretty nice private home! But for a whole host of reasons around the Canada Select Star rating.
So for now we live in a Four Star Country Inn, in this beautiful Valley, working hair straight back for four and a half months of the year, and then take the rest of the year off.
.... so once in a while I have to say .... remind me .... why are we selling?
Addendum:
The fire has been all but put out, and the former Dormitory turned high-end Lodge has survived yet another assault. To give you some sense of this amazing building, let me fill you in on some little known secrets from its past.
The Lodge started out as a Dorm
The lodge was built in the mid 1980's as a dorm for boys attending the Seventh Day Adventist Academy. The school created a mission focus of taking all kids including ones that other SDA schools kicked out - the drug addicts, the alcoholics, the unloved children, everyone was welcome. However, this wasn't very politically correct (a pregnant teen standing under an SDA school sign, smoking). In 1993 the BC Conference gave up trying to force the school board to toe the line, and they closed the dorms and eliminated grades 11 and 12.
A Church, then low-income apartments
The dentist, Wendell Danielson, who had been the principal funder and driving force in building the Church, the School and the dorms, bought the building back from the Conference, intending to open it again. But the spirit had gone out of the staff and they slowly trickled away. The building went through several morphs, housing an open door style church, Wendell's dental clinic for a while, even low income housing. Finally, in 1998, Wendell sold the building to us and moved away.
A Group Home
We weren't sure what we would do with the building so for the first four years we operated a group home (that's like an orphanage only the children's parents are alive, just can't take care of them for one reason or another).
We conducted test marketing, identified that it would make a good tourism accommodation - with a lot of work - renovated including putting bathrooms in all the bedrooms (wouldn't those boys be envious now!) We did not renew the Group Home contract in March of 2003. Towards the end of the years as a group home, it was the only group home in the province where every teenager had their own bathroom!
In the end, a Country Inn
In May, we opened Bella Coola's Eagle Lodge as a Country Inn with a Canada Select rating of four stars. As part of the grand opening, we had the local Nuxalk twins Lance and Chris Nelson come and do a cleansing ceremony, releasing all the painful spirits that had found refuge in this rambling home. The lodge has always provided welcoming shelter in an inviting and warm atmosphere. The most often heard phrase after, “This is so beautiful” is “It feels like home!” We take that as a complement.
We operate from May to late September, and relax for the rest of the year. We have it for sale, as I'm a travel writer and would like to be a little more central to my writing projects. In the meantime, it's a very nice place to live. Oh yes - in the end, we adopted one of the children from the group home. I've attached our most recent family picture taken during our family reunion this winter. Patrick (front and centre) came to us straight from the hospital at birth. He is now nine years old.
