Trip report - Panorama BC 16th - 23rd Dec 2009

A snowHead

Well, here goes. Not sure how many of you will be interested, but this is helping me kill some time in the office and relive some fond memories!

We (my OH, my friend, two of OHs friends and I) departed on 16th Dec at silly o clock to make the 11:00 Manchester - Calgary flight. I find a 2 hour + drive from the airport is not ideal when you have a delayed flight on the way home, more about that later though.

Flight was uneventful - although we did get the bulkhead seats which kept my 6'6 husband quiet at least. It took 8 hours 30 mins exactly, which was less than I was expecting so it was good. The people at Calgary airport were really friendly too, they welcome you off the plane.

The 4 hour journey up to Panorama was a bit of a killer after the flight, although the scenery is really breathtaking (not sure if it rivals the alps etc, I've only ever been skiing in North America) but it was pretty awesome to me. It takes you throught the Banff national park and Kootenay national park. We seen some big horn sheep close to Radium Hot Springs.

We hadn't pre booked our lift passes with Inghams because we were considering hiring a car and trying out some other resorts - sadly that didn't happen. So we had to pay for them in resort WARNING - it is much more expensive to do this, it cost us about £520 for us both instead of £400 - lesson learnt on that one I guess. We had lessons booked for 3 days at a cost of £110 for us both, this turned out to be a huge bargain because we ended up with 2 full days of private lessons because there was only us in the group!!! You can imagine how much we progressed in those few days.

We stayed in the Pine Inn which is a stones throw away from the lift, literally. The hotel had ski lockers for you to use so you didn't have to lug your skis with you. The rooms were not so nice though, I imagine a lot of people would complain about them, we didn't because we had unpacked the case and are too lazy. There was a LOT of noise coming from the bar downstairs at 2 and 3 am, there was a mouldy patch on the ceiling and rotton windows. There was also this really strange garlic smell in the bathroom. Bizarre. It's a good job we didn't spend too much time in there!

The mountain, well. What can I say?? It has 4000ft of vertical? I didn't know what that meant really until I got there. It's rather steep. I was worried about this because we have only been skiing once before with a few goes at Xscape/Ski Dubai etc. I had read it was an advanced skiers paradise, and I think it probably is, although we had enough to keep us entertained for the week I guess. (I think the skiing was better for what I like at Winter Park though, they don't groom that many of the runs at Panorama really). We did progress a lot though, and were skiing black diamonds and moguls after a few days so I guess it has helped us a lot! I enjoyed it here, although the grading of some of the runs is a little bizarre, I didn't get it sometimes. I would recommend this place for adrenaline junkies looking for some steep runs and deep powder. There are not that many crusiers and the ones they had open got packed out quite quickly because they had racing on and there were only one or two runs to the bottom of the mountain open. Despite the racing, we rarely had to queue for the lifts, some parts of the mountain were practically deserted! It was really quiet.

The weather was really good, we had heard that it was -20 to -30 degrees the week before we got there so I was not looking forward to that, luckily it warmed up and was probably around -2 to -6 most days. We had snow on a few days too, but sometimes this was just in the village. It was awesome to ride up the Mile 1 Quad and break above the clouds and see the view. Apparently, according to the instructor, the conditions were the best they had had for a good few years at that time of the year.

The facilities in Panorama were OK, it lacked places to eat on an evening with there being only 3-4 options. Lunches etc were reasonably priced, it was about $6 for the canadian delicacy of 'poutine' aka chips, cheese and gravy. Sounds gross but it was actually really tasty. Burgers were about $8-9 at lunchtime and they had a canteen kinda place. It was most definitely cheaper to eat here than Winter Park. The Panorama springs hot tubs were fun to use after a days skiing.

Flight home was delayed by 5 hours - apparently due to the knock on effect of the delays earlier in the week, 8 hours in calgary airport is a LONG time. It made for an awful drive home from manchester with no sleep for a stupid number of hours!

In all, it was a good holiday, although I'm not sure if I would go back here (but that might be because I like to try new places)

Can anyone help me to add pictures? I have a few here to share Very Happy

A snowHead

I was hoping to add the pics into the post - Ooops, clearly my technology skills are not good!

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

Thanks v1cky24, I'm off there later in the season, so it's good to hear a bit about the place.

THIS PAGE should explain the pictures in posts bit.

Cheers

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I went in Jan 2007- from what I understand the Pine Inn is one of the cheaper places to stay- popular with many younger travellers, and as such- not exactly first class.
I stayed in a Gold rated studio- forget the name, but they're all pretty much ski to door which is a nice benefit for whichever place you stay at.

Would concur about a general lack of facilities, not really a big tourist destination (yet), I guess the bulk of it is fairly new development. Without a car its a bit of a pain as to sensibly get any shopping done you have to go to Invermere, and the bus ride is a drag as we ended up stuck in Invermere for well over 3 hours- theres not much there either! You have to shop up, as the places to eat are lacking and only a couple were really any good.

Sure I've probably posted much of this before NehNeh

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Marcia,

Sure you'll have a great time.

The Pine Inn is not great, but I've stayed in worse. We had a group of 5 people and our room was definitely the worst out of them, we were expecting it to be really bad after reading the reviews etc. It wasn't as bad as they make out.

Rooms are spacious enough and clean and warm. We just had the noisy one near to the stairs and closest to the bar. The rep said something about the reviews being mostly from guests staying above the T Bar (Inghams guests do not stay there now for this reason) out room was literally the closest one to the bar. It only kept me awake enough to annoy me on one night though.

Hope you have a fab time Smile

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Thanks, Vicky - that's reassuring!

Yours is one of the more up to date reviews, so I'm glad to hear that Inghams are aware of past problems and are trying to improve matters.

Will let you know how we all get on ..... the children are really excited because we didn't think we'd be able to afford to go skiing this year!
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Best wishes from Marciahttp://snowheads.com/ski-forum/images/smiles/icon_cool.gif

After all it is free

Marcia, well done, you got a great deal. Have fun. snowHead

Marcia,

We'll probably be there when you are there- mid Feb. Looking forward to it. Not at Pine Inn though- we alawys find it easier and cheaper to sefl-cater. WE are in a gold condo, we have stayed in them before

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Marcia,

When we used the ski school (2 years ago) it was very good.

Children in restaurants. Really not sure about the 8pm business - canadians do everything with their children so would be surprised about this. That said Canadians also do everything earlier than Brits (get up , breakfast, lunch, supper, bed). Most canadians would go for a family evening meal at a restaurent between 5pm and 6:30pm. After 8pm they could be quite dead (the restaurents that is..............) so tehre could be an unwritten rule.

We arrive evening of the 10th and stay until the Monday. Monday is a bank holiday in Alberta (Family day) and so expect the resort to be busy that weekend - it will be busy Sat and Sun but will have calmed down by the monday. Also a lot of schools in Clagary are shut thursday to tuesday. Restaurants will be busy that weekend. People who have been there the same weekend in previous years have said the queues are fine (the same can't be said of LL etc.).

We last went 2yrs ago at christmas (when we first moved here) and had a nice time. We would have gone to Fernie this year- but I didn't book and was keft with very pricey choices. Panorama has some cracking deals , even for locals. We have paid $1050 and are getting 5 nights in gold condo, 1 free kids ski pass for 5 days (other kids skis free anyway), 2 adult 3 day passes, some sort of daily breakfast voucher and a free build a bear workshop . I couldn't get anywhere near that equivalent in Fernie for accomodation only for this weekend.

Weather could be doing anything at this time of year so do come prepared for chilly weather (eg face masks etc)

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Marcia,
PS the journey is spectacular (or at least from Canmore area onward). Hopefully you will do it in the light. Its possibly better on the return. It is quite an isolated road - nothing much but wilderness from Banff to Radium. You should see big horn sheep in Radium- they are often there. They look a bit like what we thonk goats look like- the males have long curly horns, the females straighter horns. Look out for them as you are coming out of town , eg after the springs and after the t junction , once you have turned left. Around Banff area keep your eye out for elk.

It will , as Vicki says , be quite brutal journey after a flight and jet lag. But it is spectacular- hopefully you will get a classic blue sky sunny day. Even the jouney from Calgary to Canmore can be a pretty drive- just think about all those cowboys etc. You will see trains with more carriages than you can imagine. We travel that bit every weekend and see coyotes about 1 in every 3 journeys. Deer are possible too.

Hello again, Gryphea!

Sounds as if you got a really good deal, too! Presumably you're driving from Calgary (about 4 hours?) - I think just the flights from London to Calgary could cost more than we've paid for the whole package! I didn't realise that the local schools were on holiday as well. Hope it's not too busy. Someone else told me it could be quite cold, so I'll make sure I pack lots of layers.

I didn't know about this SnowHeads website until the other day and am finding it really friendly, helpful and interesting!

Hope you and your family enjoy your holiday too!

Thanks and best wishes from Marcia

You know it makes sense.

Marcia, I wouldn't worry about the school holidays making it busy. In 2008 we were there on what was apparently the busiest day in the resort's history, but queues weren't a problem. If it does get busy at any time, just avoid the Mile One Quad - if you want groomers, the Sunbird runs are much better.

We've spent three weeks in Panorama, and the ski school is the best that our children have ever used. However, brace yourself to support your kids - class groupings are often reorganised and demotions are common if the class is of an unusually high standard; if your offspring are as competitive as ours, this can sometimes lead to attitude issues. The school sets a pretty aggressive tone, too. Two instructors have separately told our kids that if they're not scared at least once a day, they're not pushing hard enough. Another instructor (Derek, if he's still there) kicked off a lesson with a long lecture about the need to have sharp edges for ski-school - "We're going to be skiing past some pretty big cliffs and I don't want any of you falling off" was the line I remember - and my lad set off with a fantastic look of terror on his face. But, to be fair, it was the best lesson that he ever had.

The Pine Inn was adequate when we stayed there. We had no trouble with noise, and the rooms were clean but a little shabby. On the other hand, its location is probably the best on the mountain.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

what do the rooms in pine inn consist of have they got cooking facilities
regards to alll

bj

A snowHead

A snowHead

gryphea, We had one of those blue sky days you mention coming back to the airport. Wow is all I will say. Scenery is awesome. And we seen the sheep at radium too, just after you turn and go through the kinda gorge. th ebus driver had to shoo them off the road.

RE: ski school - we booked a package and it cost £110 for 3 days of lessons at 3.5 hours each for 2 of us. I thought this was a cracking deal.

We had marked ourselves as level 4 I think (the one that said you could ski greens) and 2 instructors took us up horseshoe with 2 other couples (who had marked themselves as either level 5 or 6) and asked us to ski down a bit. OH fell on the way down (he says he did it on purpose, although I think not) and we were split from the other 2 couples and effectively had a private lesson with the instructor for 2 days - some others joined the group on the last day. We then paid for another 1.5hrs with him (which cost about £100) for him to show us how to ski moguls. His name was Brody, I thought he was quite good, he brought my OH on loads! He was very easy on the eye too.. wink

haha, hope my OH doesn't read that or I'm in trouble.

Some people were complaining about one of the other instructors though, as Jonny Jones, said, he had promised to have them out of their comfort zone at least once a day and I don't think they were happy with that - it being their holiday and all - I can see why they might be annoyed if they didn't want to be pushed too much and scared. It's great if you don't mind that though, will bring on your skiing loads.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

v1cky24, we were on the flight out of Manchester on 23rd Dec, the plane had to be serviced when it landed making it an even longer delay so we never saw the scenery on the trip, it was dark all the way from Manchester to the hotel. We had hoped to see the scenery on the way back, but the bus windows were so dirty we couldn't see out. We paid about £580 from Inghams for 9 days lift pass, 2 adults , 2 teens, thankfully we found the section in the Inghams brochure after we had booked to say the kids skied for free, there was no charge to add the passes.

We had no problems with the kids in the restaurant after 8pm on the one night we ate out, we got there at 6:30 but the meal didn't arrive till well after 8pm, there was certainly no pressure for them to go, we left as soon as we could as the youngest was asleep at the table.

There's some benefit in self catering at Panorama, but the shop is very limited in what it sells, there's no raw meat (fresh or frozen), no ham or other cold meat except a smoked meat range, often no vegetables, cheese, eggs, pasta - we lived for 10 days on cereal, toast and bacon sandwiches. These weren't cheap with bread at $5.99 a loaf.

There were queues for all lifts most of the time we were there, but nothing over 10 minutes, mostly under 5 minutes except the mile one quad. It's not likely to be as busy when you go. The biggest problem we found was the queue to buy lunch on the mountain, we gave up and went back for lunch in the apartment.

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v1cky24, my kids heard the catchphrase about comfort zones from their instructors most days... "we're going take you out of your comfort zone today but we'l avoid your danger zone." Perfect for aggressive kids like mine, as it helps them to progress at a phenomenal rate. But I can imagine others being intimidated.

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Hello everyone!

Back from Panorama and reporting in, as promised!

We had a wonderful week's holiday. The Pine Inn is basic but clean and warm. We were lucky to get all four rooms sharing a balcony on the top floor of the north building and overlooking the piste. We watched the wonderful firework display from the comfort of our balcony! Some noise from the T Bar at night but not too bad. The Pine Inn's layout is confusing, though. I found my way to our rooms quickly via the lift and following the rep's directions, but my husband and children were following on and ended up in the wrong building, dragging heavy bags. One of our rooms had a leaky roof and window but we were moved to another room on the same floor on request. It's a bit strange, not having a reception desk downstairs, but you just dial 0 on your phone and speak to someone if you have any issues. The housekeeping was better than expected. Fresh towels every day and the room was cleaned, bins emptied and beds made up most days. Didn't try out the sauna/gym/hot tub or launderette facilities, as they were in the south wing of the Pine Inn.

The boys had four days in ski school and have come on in leaps and bounds! My husband and I skied with the Mountain Friends most days, sometimes in the same group, but usually with me skiing in the "blue/green" group, which was supposed to be easy but still ended up skiing black runs and bumps, and him in the more advanced group.

Some of the "easy" runs are quite steep, so I'm not sure how complete beginners would get on. My friend hadn't skied for a long time and didn't really enjoy the morning she spent skiing with her husband and us, even though we only took her on runs we'd already skied with our children on our first day .....

Ate lunch on the mountain at the Summit Hut one day, but most days we were down at the "Great Hall". There was a live band one day, which was nice!

We ate in the T Bar most evenings. The staff did mention that the children are supposed to be out by 8pm, as it's officially a pub, but they didn't actually throw us out. On our last evening, we had a delicious meal in the Wildfire Grill, more expensive but worth it!

We only bought milk and orange juice in the little shop. It did seem quite expensive, but I'd brought cereals and bowls/spoons with me, as well as coffee and tea and hot chocolate and a travel kettle (which took ages to boil!). There was a coffee maker in the room and fresh coffee was provided for us on some days.

13/14 Feb was supposed to be one of the busiest weekends of the year, due to public/school holidays and "Family Day" (15th) in Alberta and some of the other regions, but the slopes weren't crowded and we didn't have to queue for long at the lifts. Quite a difference to French lift queues - it's all very polite and well organised!

We visited the outdoor pools at Panorama Springs a few times but didn't do any of the other apres ski activities offered by Inghams. I suppose if you're travelling without children, it's probably quite easy to catch the 6.15pm dinner bus to Invermere, which returns at about 9pm. We were told that the restaurants in Invermere were better as well as cheaper than those in Panorama itself.

Weather was much warmer than anticipated - I think it was about +6 one day and only +1 at home in England! The pisteurs did a great job of grooming the runs (well apart from the advanced bump runs!) and made the most of the snow. Apparently it hadn't snowed for about 7 weeks and some rocks were starting to show through in a few places. The hard packed snow sometimes felt icy and I asked for a pair of rental skis with sharper edges! Only one ski rental shop in resort, so I thought that was quite expensive, due to the lack of competition. We usually shop around and ask for SCGB discount .....

Our flights were pretty much on time and the 4 hour coach transfer wasn't as bad as I'd expected. Getting through customs at Calgary airport took a long time, though. I think they were trying to deal with additional flights due to the Olympics. None of us slept well on the return flight, though.

I think I'd already mentioned that I'd managed to pre-book the lift passes with Inghams. £416 for the two adult 6 day passes so the two kids' passes were free. Under 7's ski free anyway. But another couple on the coach ended up paying well over £500 for their two passes. I think most people staying at the Pine Inn had booked late on the same deal as us (£299), but I didn't go around shouting about it! I've been in the situation previously where I've paid top price and someone else has paid considerably less by booking at the last minute, and it can be irritating .....

If I've missed anything out, or you're visiting Panorama later in the season and think of any questions I haven't answered, do feel free to ask!

Thanks to everyone who replied to my original query/concerns about the Pine Inn/Panorama.

Best wishes from Marcia and family

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Marcia, that sounds very successful. I suppose they were getting the same kind of weather, in big picture terms, as Whistler - warmest for 100 years and all that.

The breakfast cereal bowls etc sound a good idea. snowHead

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hi marci
could you give some indication of costs of food , meals etc would really be appreciated ,we go on the 3rd march are there films on the flight , how many meals were provided
regards
bj

After all it is free

Hi bradleyjoes!

We flew from Gatwick on the Wednesday Monarch flight, leaving at 9.15am and arriving at about 11.30am local time. The food on the plane can't have been that memorable, cos I'm scratching my head to remember what we got! Breakfast and lunch were provided on the way out and on the way back we had dinner, and breakfast about an hour before we landed at 6am (11pm body time). Coffee/tea is free after the meals, but you'd have to pay for any other snacks or drinks. I kept asking for glasses of tap water instead! If you have an empty water bottle, you can ask for that to be refilled instead. I also brought my own snacks/biscuits/chocolate bars with me. The restrictions on carrying liquids through customs still apply, but you can buy two bottles of water for £2 at WH Smith in the departure lounge and carry them onto the plane with you. Hope I don't sound too mean or stingy!!

Yes, there were some films/TV shows during the flight. We took a couple of sets of headphones with us, otherwise Monarch charge £2.50 per pair! Two of the films were "Cloudy with a chance of meatballs" and "Shorts"; not sure what the other ones were called, although I don't remember sleeping through them! But maybe the schedule will change in March? Pillows/blankets are provided, but don't count on sleeping much, especially if the plane is fully booked ...... would suggest packing a set of earplugs too, just in case you do find the T-Bar noisy. It wasn't too bad while we were staying in the Pine Inn, but we didn't sleep particularly well due to the change in time and jet lag - and are still struggling to recover, now we're at home!

Prices of meals in Panorama: the delicious meal at the Wildfire Grill on the last night cost about $100 for the four of us. The evening meals in the T Bar cost between $50-$70. The first evening we just ate pizza in the takeaway, which was about $45 for two large pizzas and four soft drinks. Lunches vary - I had soup at the Summit Hut for about $6. Burgers are about $9. Try the daily special in the "Great Hall" - I had a big plate of slow cooked beef with mash and gravy for about $8-9, which was delicious and very filling! The sign outside the Cappuccino Hut said it was $6 for a coffee, but we didn't actually stop there.

As a very rough guide, we took about $1000 cash as spending money for meals and ski rental, as we'd already paid for the lift passes and ski school. The ski rental for 6 days for two children with boots and helmets and one adult skis only was nearly $400, which seemed expensive. There's also a coffee shop at the ski rental place with nice looking snacks/treats, but I felt they'd already taken enough of our money! You're asked to provide credit card details at check in and you can charge most expenses to your room, if you prefer, although cash and credit cards are obviously acceptable too. We were told that tipping is expected at 10-15%.

If you take the free dinner bus down to Invermere, there is a wider choice of restaurants and apparently the prices are lower too. We met a nice couple who were also staying in the Pine Inn and they said they'd eaten at all the local restaurants, including Grey's, the Helicopter Landing, and Portobello's (?) in Invermere, as well as the T-Bar and Wildfire Grill. There is also the option of an evening at the Elkhorn Hut or the Summit Hut and then skiing down afterwards. If you like sushi, there's a place which delivers to your room as well as serving it at lunchtime on the mountain.

Have you read the other comments on Panorama on this snowheads website? I think the forum is called something like "Cheap Deals to Canada with Inghams".

I really enjoyed our week's holiday in Panorama and wish we could go back soon ..... hope you have a great time as well, bradleyjoes!

Do let me know if you think of any other questions and I'll do my best to answer.

Best wishes from Marcia and family

Marcia,

Glad you had a good time. We did too. Although the snow was a bit bare.

WE too ate in WIldfire Grill which was around $100 for the four of us (although think this was partly cos the kids meals were cheap)

We too had lunch at Summit hut, which I loved. Canada isn't full of places like this, independant on mountain eateries. We thought the cappocino hut sign said $6 a coffee but on close inspection it was $6 a smokie (like a hotdog).

More British in Panorama than anywhere else we go! For family day the queues were fine, better than Fernie last year which was OK, way better than Kimberley at NEw year and in a different League to LL on family day

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Hi Gryphea!

Glad your family enjoyed yourselves too! I was thinking about you while we were in Panorama - we should have exchanged descriptions of ski jackets, so we could look out for each other!!!!

I agree it would have been nice to have more snow, but I've seen much worse conditions in Europe in previous years.

Yes, lots of Brits staying in Panorama - and not many Canadian staff either - lots of Kiwis and Aussies running the lifts. I think the only locals we really met were the brilliant Mountain Friends - a bit like Hell's Grannies and Grandads! When you see them sitting down at lunchtime, they look as if they should be knitting or smoking pipes or reading bedtime stories to their grandchildren - then they put on their helmets and yellow jackets and it's practically impossible keeping up with them on skis!!!!! Would definitely recommend joining them - the only problem is fitting it around ski school, which runs 10.30am to 3pm, while the Mountain Friends guiding groups leave at 10am and 1.30pm. But if you catch up with them in the morning, they're usually happy for you to join in, dependent on size of group. And provided you let them know, you can leave the afternoon group early to collect kids from ski school.

Haven't tried Fernie or Kimberley or Lake Louise, but will definitely consider visiting this area again in the future. Last time we visited Canada (about 5 years ago), we skied at Sun Peaks and Silver Star.

Thanks again for your helpful advice and comments before we travelled to Panorama.

Best wishes from Marcia and family

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Marcia, Sounds like you had a great time!

I heard it hasn't snowed much there since just after new year, which is a shame really, the conditions were so great when we were there in Dec.

You summed up the mountain guides well I think - they seem to love what they are doing though!

I liked the wildfire grill - we ate there probs 3 times in a week, the slow cooked bison was amazing. Quite pricey though as you say. I've enjoyed reading your report there, (just wish I could get skiing again this year!)

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marcia
thankyou for your input really cant wait now, but noticed there having a bit more snow at the moment so fingers crossed and will report in on our rerturn
regards
bj

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Trip report - Panorama BC 16th - 23rd Dec 2009

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