 Poster: A snowHead
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Just back from a fantastic, long awaited 10 day trip to Canada:
Day 1 – Landed at Calgary mid afternoon and skied the Canada Olympic Park(!!) on the outskirts of the city for a couple of hours. Snow was very hard packed (slick in places) but it’s a great little ski hill, with two fast chairs and a vertical drop of about 150m. All good fun. It's also the site of the ski jump where Eddie Edwards flew to glory. Overnight was in Canmore.
Day 2 – Did a fantastic ice canyon walk (Johnston Canyon) near Banff before driving south. We skied for the afternoon at Fairmont Hot Springs Resort, which is a tiny locals’ area. It’s an excellent little mountain – one slow chairlift and one draglift but great snow and fairly steep cruising runs. The lift ticket includes a dip in the resort’s natural hot springs, which was great – until you had to get out and walk back to the changing rooms in sub-zero temperatures – which was sheer Hell....Overnight in the one horse town of Radium Hot Springs.
Days 3/4 – Drove to Kimberley Alpine Resort to ski there. It’s billed as a family resort but we struggled to see many runs other than a small nursery slope that would be suitable for beginners and kids. There are great cruising runs and most of the skiing is fairly steep – some very steep. There are some challenging glades and bump runs too. Snow was mainly excellent but Kimberley is the only place we’ve ever skied where every run finishes with the same 300-400m run out, resulting in a very slick/scraped run back to base. Overall, a great area and we really enjoyed our two days there. Despite it being a weekend and there being only three main lifts, queues were minimal and we often had runs completely to ourselves. Night 3 was in the town of Kimberley, about five minutes’ drive from the ski hill and night 4 was spent in Fernie.
Day 5 – Skied Fernie. We’d skied there for a couple of days six years’ ago but it was much better than we remembered. The snow was excellent (packed powder) at the top but softer lower down. Conditions were very good overall. Fernie is basically a ski where you like mountain over four or five alpine bowls, with wooded terrain below. Runs are challenging to very challenging with some pretty poor directional run signage and virtually non-existent marking of individual runs. All fine in good visibility but potentially dangerous in bad weather – as is the fact that a number of hazardous features (gullies, edges etc) that we would have expected to be marked or secured by nets just aren’t. Again, okay in good weather but dangerous in poor visibility. Despite these shortcomings, we loved the area, which was virtually deserted, and were looking forward to a second day there later in the week. The town of Fernie, which is five minutes' drive from the ski resort, has a fairly pleasant, old fashioned, main street and a fair selection of restaurants and bars, so we enjoyed our nights out there.
Days 6, 7 and 8 – Were spent catskiing with Fernie Wilderness Adventures (FWA) and staying overnight in Fernie. Each day we drove to FWA’s lodge, which is located about 20 minutes out of town. After a forecast of warm weather and freezing levels above the tops for our first day of catskiing we were fearing the worst. However, despite sunny weather and a near-tropical 3.5C at 2000m (in mountains topping out at around 2200m) we had an amazing time. Despite the warm temperatures, the guides were able to find us loads of powder on shady and wooded slopes (plus some spring snow and very heavy snow too). I can’t speak highly enough of FWA – it’s a great set up, with great guides and staff and an economical (as catskiing goes) way to ski fresh tracks in powder. Highly recommended.
Day 9 – We had planned to ski a second day at Fernie resort. However it was raining heavily below 1800m so we aborted that plan and drove to Castle Mountain in Alberta, where the forecast was better. Despite high winds and a morning of light rain, we had a great day. There’s a big vertical of about 900m and some very challenging skiing, albeit served by two old, slow chairlifts. The resort is a bit out of the way (the last 10km is on a gravel road) and was virtually deserted, it being a week day. Afterwards, we drove on to Okotoks, just south of Calgary, to spend the night there.
Day 10 – We drove to Nakiska to ski the morning before our late afternoon flight home out of Calgary. There was fresh snow over hardpack, so conditions were excellent. Fast chairs and great cruising runs. There’s some fantastic glade skiing too (the Monster Glades) that were great fun in untracked snow. So we had a great hour and a half – until 11am when the chair we were on broke down....After being stuck for 90 minutes we were finally evacuated by abseiling down. By that point, with our departure time from the ski area having come and long gone and our flight departure time looming ever closer, stress levels were off the scale. It was a truly awful experience, followed by a mad dash back to Calgary to make the flight – about an hour late than we intended to leave. Fortunately we were already checked in online and there was no queue to drop off the bags – once we had packed them at the airport. We rushed through the airport, cleared security, got changed and found boarding was underway just as we reached the gate. Phew....I will do a separate post on the evacuation, which was excellent and really well handled. Under ordinary circumstances it wouldn’t have been an issue (although we did get very very cold) but the flight-related stress turned it into a nightmare.
Overall, a fantastic 1400km road trip. Due to the current excellent exchange rate (of around $2CAD to the £) prices are very reasonable in Canada – eg big burrito meal $11; 8oz steak sandwich and chips $20; bottle of local beer $5.80. We went for the skiing so mainly used budget motels, which all turned out to be fine. Even when including posher digs on the first and last nights, hotels averaged a bargain £48 a night.
Can’t wait to go back:D .
Olympic Park:
Johnston Canyon - Upper Falls:
Easy driving on the open roads of BC:
Settlements along the way:
Kimberley Mountain Resort:
Kimberley:
Fernie:
Fernie Mountain:
FWA Catskiing:
Fernie ski area from FWA's catskiing terrain:
Castle Mountain:
Nakiska:
The prairies of Alberta:
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Thanks for the trip report @mountainaddict, sounds like a great trip.
Off to Banff in a couple of weeks and trying to decide whether its worth an early start (and extra expense / hassle lugging ski's) to travel back to Calgary early on our final day to try out the Luge / skiing at the Olympic Park, before heading for the airport around 4.
I'd almost ruled it out and decided that we'd relax in Banff and take the tour operator transfers, but your report has got me thinking about it again...
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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@SLB79, If you're going to get an early transfer I can heartily recommend the Banff Airporter service. Nice new clean busses, on the dot punctuality and they came into the hotel lobby to ask for us by name. All round great service.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Thanks @rogg, will give it a look.
My reservation was that once we get to Calgary / Airport, what to do with the suitcases etc. My other thought is we could come back to the airport on the evening before, stay in a hotel there and leave suitcases there whilst we head to the Olympic Park..
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Hi@SLB79, not sure why you would want to leave the mountains early to head to the city to ski on patchy man-made snow! If you have half a day to spare out this way there are a ton of things you could do, even a couple of hours at Norquay. Also, there's an extended warm spell in Calgary right now-it's even supposed to rain there today. Things could be looking pretty messy by March. I'd say squeeze every last minute you can out of the mountains...just my two cents/two pennies. 
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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^^^^
Can see why you would do it SLB79 - especially if skiing was an add on to the bobsleigh - though I can also see the appeal of a few extra hours on snow at Norquay.
Must say though, I once checked out the Olympic Park bobsleigh & luge to find it was sold out well in advance of the date I was looking at.
Also, is the track open at the moment? Two weeks ago (the day after we skied the park) there was an awful accident there - with twin brothers who broke in and sneaked down the track in the small hours both killed. Tragic.
If it is a goer for you, there is a hotel directly opposite the park. Don't know the logistics of a bus transfer - would they let you off as the bus would be passing the hotel door on the Trans-Canada Highway? A tip for the driver could possibly swing it...A stay there on the Friday night would make it easy for you, assuming you could then sort out getting to the airport, which is only about 20 mins from the Olympic Park. There's a great pic on the following hotel link that shows its proximity to the park:
http://deals.fourpoints.com/Four-Points-Calgary-West-Hotel-304/special-offers?language=en_US&localeCode=en_US
One final thought...Assuming that you drive, you could do a one way car rental - pick up in Banff, drop off at the airport. Possibly pricey but would make the logistics a doddle.
Enjoy Canada! (Wish we were going back....  )
Last edited by You'll need to Register first of course. on Wed 17-02-16 21:11; edited 1 time in total
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Yes, that's a good point, adding the bobsleigh would make it more of an experience. Maybe do that rather than ski there, especially if the warm weather continues. Whatever you decided I'm sure you'll have a fab time.
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Joules2210: I booked us a ride on the Salt Lake City Olympic Bobsleigh as a surprise for Mrs MA's birthday a few years back. One word:
WOWWWWWWW!! 
An incredible experience.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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@SLB79, @mountainaddict, it was a horrific accident. A group of boys , 6 injured, 2 dead (twins). They hit the gate separating the moving tracks. Very sad
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Yes gryphea - horrific indeed. Read all about it while we were in BC, then saw a Calgary newspaper with the funeral coverage too... . Just awful.
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FAQ
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