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The Southway leaves behind a 25-year history as a “home away from home” for visitors from Nunavut and other areas of Northern Canada.

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The relationship began when crews from First Air, an airline that served the North, began staying at the Southway. That led to an invitation to attend a business fair in Iqaluit. The Southway has had a booth at the event every year since, said Stephen Zlepnig.

It was the first and only hotel in the area until the turn of the millennium, said Jo-Anne Saikaley Sparkes, the company’s director of sales and marketing, and its proximity to the airport and a shopping mall made it especially attractive to northern visitors.

The hotel recognized one the special needs for northern guests was a place to store fresh produce they bought in “the south,” because of the high costs of groceries in Nunavut.

“The northern community has expressed their sadness. We’ve been receiving tons of overwhelming expressions and media from the North and all over,” she said.

Famous guests include actor Jason Priestley, of Beverly Hills 90210 fame, who stayed at the Southway on his way North to film a television program, and Jordin Tootoo, the first Inuk player in the National Hockey League, and countless politicians.

Fred Zlepnig says the hotel’s tradition of hospitality will continue as it becomes a retirement home.

“I don’t see it as coming to an end,” he said. “I see it as a transition. The building will still be there.”

He said an elderly couple that has signed up to move into the home at the end of the year came to the Southway in 1958, when they first arrived to Canada. The then seven-room hotel was sold out, but his grandparents invited the new arrivals to stay in the basement of the Zlepnig family home until they settled.

The Southway will continue to book hotel guests until December.

With files from Glen McGregor.

Photo by Photo provided / .

Photo by Photo provided / .

Photo by Photo provided / .

Photo by Photo provided / .

Photo by Photo provided / .