The Outback Resort

Hotel description

It’s not as familiar perhaps as certain other destinations in British Columbia — and that’s a good thing. Okanagan Lake is about three or four hours inland from Vancouver (or a brisk half-hour from the airport at Kelowna), a distance that separates the day-trippers from the determined. Those who make it, though, are amply rewarded: the aptly named and splendidly secluded Outback Resort comprises some 40 units, ranging from cottages to cabins to three-bedroom houses, spread over 60 acres by the scenic lakeside.

This is clearly something more than a traditional hotel: in truth it’s a collection of high-end vacation homes, and while it may lack the communal atmosphere of traditional hotel-guest living, it more than compensates, with a measure of privacy and self-sufficiency that most hotels, however luxurious, can’t touch.

These modern homes lack for nothing in terms of comfort, with full kitchens standard, and floor-to-ceiling windows facing either Okanagan Lake or the smaller Trout Lake. The landscape of pine forests and granite bluffs is temptation enough, and the hiking, skiing and golf don’t hurt either — nor does the fact that the Outback’s bluff-side accommodations connect via a granite tunnel to a private beach and marina on Okanagan Lake.