This marker relates the story of the grandest hotel in Penticton, the Incola Hotel, now just a memory. The time is sometime after 1912, not long after the railway arrived in Penticton.
The marker stands on the north side of Lakeshore Drive between Winnipeg and Martin Streets, across Lakeshore Drive from where the hotel once stood.
THE INCOLA HOTEL
The site between Winnipeg and Martin Street was once the home of the Canadian Pacific Railway's Incola Hotel. Built in 1912, at a cost of $50,000, this grand Tudor style structure commanded a panoramic view of Okanagan Lake. Across Lakeshore Drive was a fine sandy beach, with the Aquatic Club. On its west side were located tennis courts and croquet lawns. Across the drive, and just to the east by a hundred feet, were the CPR'S Kettle Valley Railway station and docks, connecting the worldly traveler with rail and steamship lines of the great railway company.
The hotel was the social focal point of the town, with gala balls and important events inside its rotunda, ballroom and elegant dining room. It was removed in 1980.