Lapdog of Luxury: Wandering into The Empress on all fours near midnight, red-eyed and slobbering, with no money and no identification isn't a surefire way to get a hotel room -- unless you're lovable basset hound

Peter Cowan
Times Colonist
Friday, August 26, 2005

If you want a free night at The Empress, you'd better have big brown eyes, long velvety ears and four legs.

That's how Lucy the two-year-old basset hound did it.

She came wandering in the front door of the hotel just before midnight Wednesday with no owner in sight. With her "aw shucks" demeanor and wagging tail, she had a pack of guests and staff fawning over her within minutes.

She didn't have a credit card or a reservation, but night manager Jose Guidoriagao checked in Lucy anyway.

Only Guidoriagao had no idea her name was Lucy. She had no name or ID tags, only a pink ribbon that said "my groomer loves me."

Guidoriagao started calling her Sunshine -- as he does the other women in his life -- and the name stuck.

A quick call to housekeeping, and a shiny silver water bowl, a bed, blankets and dog treats were all waiting for Lucy in the hotel's front office. To accommodate guests who bring Fido or Fifi with them on vacation, the hotel keeps all the pet necessities on hand.

Lucy is not the first animal to visit the Empress unexpectedly. A couple years ago a pair of ducks wandered through the front door of the hotel but they didn't get the same royal treatment Lucy did. Looking like a couple on vacation, the ducks wandered around the second floor until staff were able to herd them back outside.

There was even less hospitality for a cougar found roaming around the hotel's underground parking garage more than a decade ago. It got a tranquillizer dart and was shown the door.

But Lucy received the sort of attention staff normally reserve for royalty. They all managed to get their work done with enough time to pet Lucy or take her for a walk. A list of people ready to adopt her was growing quickly.

Jeff Hanson, the reception manager, has always been jealous of the resident Labrador retrievers who are available for walks at the Fairmont's two Vancouver hotels. A basset hound, originally a French breed, seemed fitting for The Empress, which was designed to look like a French chateau.

Everywhere Hanson took Lucy, she was treated like a princess. Spying a man sitting on a bench, Lucy hopped up next to him and put her head in his lap.

By Thursday morning, there was still no sign of Lucy's owner. Charmaine Ross, who has worked at the front desk for many years, started putting in calls to the SPCA, the Capital Regional District, local veterinarians and other hotels, but no one was missing a lost basset hound.

The only lead was an illegible identification tattoo on Lucy's ear, but that led nowhere.

After a whole day of walks and tummy rubs for Lucy, there was still no sign of an owner.

After she spotted the dog on the TV news, Haley Wilson raced down to the Empress to claim Lucy.

Wilson's boyfriend Mike Murphy, who owns Lucy, had the dog tied up outside his restaurant Pescatore's. He was inside doing paperwork and when he came out Lucy was gone. Murphy figured someone had walked off with her and he was hoping that she would turn up soon.

By Thursday afternoon, Lucy was back outside Pescatore's, where she was attracting just as much attention from passersby as she did from guests at The Empress.

The staff at The Empress are sad to see Lucy go but plan to stop by the restaurant to say hello.

Now they're thinking maybe it's time for the hotel to have a dog of its own.

CREDIT: Bruce Stotesbury, Times Colonist
Jeff Hanson, The Empress's reception manager, snuggles up to Lucy, a basset hound that wandered into the hotel late Wednesday night and enjoyed a day of pampering courtesy of the front office staff and porters, in background. The hotel stay was brief. Lucy was claimed by her owner Thursday.