This week I attended the #LetsGoRama Blogging Conference at the Casino Rama Resort in Orillia, ON. It was put on by SJ Consulting, a Canadian public relations, social media and marketing agency. This conference was marketed as a retreat and I desperately wanted to attend. I am constantly working too many hours and over-scheduling myself. I knew that this event was just what I needed!
Everything fell into place perfectly. One of my business partners, Colleen O’Dea, and I were accepted to attend the conference and arranged our travel within two weeks of the conference starting. It felt like fate had arranged the entire thing for us. I LOVE to travel, but I haven’t travelled with a girlfriend in a long time. I usually travel alone or with family. This was a welcome change and a lot of fun! The moment we got on the first plane we relaxed and started brainstorming ideas for our business. There’s nothing like leaving all of your worries behind to get the creative juices flowing!!
The Casino Rama Resort is about two hours north of Toronto in Orillia. It’s a beautiful mountain style resort with waterfalls at the entrance and the natural setting promotes relaxation right away.
The hotel rooms were incredibly spacious and comfortable, with huge washrooms and soft beds.
The Rooms
The hotel spoiled us completely by treating us to snacks every night before bed. The chocolate covered strawberries were my favourite!
The Food
Our first meal was at the St. Germain’s Restaurant and it was a four course mouthwatering feast! Many people were a little wary of the foie gras but I have to admit I loved it and all of the other courses, especially the steak! The pairing of flavours from banana bread to avocado was perfect in each of the dishes.
In fact the food at the hotel, casino restaurants, as well as at breakfast in the conference rooms was all incredibly delicious! Just look at the fruit!
The Conference
The conference itself was just what I needed. It had the right amount of learning, mixed with socializing and relaxation. We learned photography tips from Femke Photography.
Karen Sterling, Vice President of Giant Tiger Stores talked about staying relevant in an always changing market.
Gabriel Mederos of Telus talked about how brands are working with You Tube creators.
I learned a lot from Panel Chantel Bedward, Casie Stewart, Garrett Tonge and Julie Elsdon-Height about earning income from blogging, how to get organized with Hailley Griffs of Buffer, and how to make my blog topics more exciting from with Kelly Atyeo of Chicken Farmers of Canada.
We were spoiled rotten by all of the sponsors! FujiFilm gave us their awesome new instax SHARE smartphone printer and let us play with a bunch of their cameras during the conference.
Giant Tiger gave us gift cards and shared with us their awesome kids clothing. Casino Rama spoiled us rotten and we couldn’t have done it without Chicken Farmers of Canada!!
I couldn’t be more grateful to Julie Elsdon-Height, Stacey Martin and Kristen Paskus for organizing this fantastic retreat and inviting me. I came home with a wealth of new knowledge, made new friends and thoroughly enjoyed the casino and hotel accommodations.
Don’t miss the #LetsGoRama twitter party on August 24th at 9PM EST!! Click the picture below to go to the RSVP page.
Disclosure: I was invited to the #LetsGoRama Conference by SJ Consulting and received my hotel room, some meals and my conference fee for free. No review was required and all opinions in this post are my own.
such a lovely review, summed up the time perfectly
Thank-you Linda!