GC
Garden of Crystals
Apr 26, 2026
Best Western Fergus – My Stay
The second I walked through the main door to register, I got hit with a smell so ripe it had its own Era. I was mad before I even got my key. It was the kind of smell that makes your sinuses want to file a complaint with the Ontario Ministry of the Environment.
I asked the front desk what that was. They assured me, completely serious, that it was just pizza I’d passed through. Pizza. Sure. If that’s pizza, then the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles must’ve DoorDashed it straight from the sewer and forgot to tip the driver. Pretty sure I saw four guys in green shells later by the ice machine arguing about extra cheese. I was just standing there waiting for autographs like an optimist. They vanished toward the breakfast area yelling about a maintenance hatch and my childhood walked out with them.
The room itself was an adventure. There’s a chair in the corner that’s probably as old as the building, and the dirt stain on it looks like it graduated with the building too. The carpet is very questionable — if it could talk, I think it would just apologize. The bathroom setup is special: there’s about an inch and a half of space between the toilet and the actual door, so you’re basically playing Tetris with your knees. The toilet lid doesn’t stay open either, so hopefully you don’t get trapped mid-thought with only that “pizza” smell for company.
And if that wasn’t bad enough, we left for a bit and came back after housekeeping had been in. Suddenly the shower was dirty, which it wasn’t before. There was somebody else’s black hair stuck to the shower wall, which definitely wasn’t there before unless the drain grew a toupee while we were out. Thank God I carry my disposable latex gloves and antimicrobial sanitation wipes when I travel lol. The real kicker was trying to rinse shampoo and conditioner out of my hair. Took me 30 minutes because I would’ve had more water pressure standing under a garden watering can. At one point I thought about asking the Ninja Turtles if their sewer had better flow rate. To top it off for the night, I used the hairdryer. It was going slow the whole time I was drying, but the real speed showed up when I powered it off — a two-second rough burst of air like it was coughing its last breath right in my face.
So yeah. If you want your check-in to smell like a sewer’s rejected pizza, your room to double as an antique stain museum, your bathroom to feature competitive legroom, and your hair routine to become a part-time job with a jumpscare finale, this place is for you. Me? I’ll be booking somewhere the turtles stay in the cartoons, the wipes stay in my bag, and the hairdryer doesn’t wait to attack until you turn it off. For the price you pay per night, Best Western — do better.