What’s It Like To Groom Trails At Night? They come out at night and do their job. You can see their lights progressing across the ski slope and occasionally hear their roar. And the next morning, they’ve left this delicious set of corduroy tracks across the ski hill. I’d always wanted to go on-slope with a snowcat groomer. And so,[Read More…]
74 Year Old Long Time Ski Host Books 120 Ski Days A Year At Big White. Jealous? It might seem strange that an American from the Spokane area knows this sprawling British Columbia ski resort better than just about anyone. Carlan Silha has been serving as a snow host at Big White for 20 years, longer than anyone at the[Read More…]
Ski And Snowboard Show Impresario Bernie Weichsel Reports On The Down Under Scene. For most of us in the international ski community, whether here in the US and Canada, or within the Alpine countries of Europe, there is good news to be found in Australia and, to a lesser degree, New Zealand. Over the past three weeks, I had the[Read More…]
We Have Hurricanes And Wildfires. Oz Has Big Snow. Sound Like A Theme? The news from Down Under is that the snows are prodigious, the depths of which haven’t been seen in 17 years. The snowpack in Australian snow fields is up to 97 inches, eight feet, which sounds awfully similar to the monster snow this year in the North[Read More…]
Run After Run Of Perfect Powder For Five Straight Days. Snowcat Skiing At Its Best. Do you dream of skiing in untracked powder? Of course! We all do! And most of us get one or two runs at resorts that offer “fresh tracks” early in the morning before the snow cats groom the trails. But soon you’re plowing through broken snow[Read More…]
Big White Found The Right Formula To Attract Seniors For A Special Week Just For Them. Like so many things of yesteryear, ski weeks are making a comeback. And not surprisingly, they’re aimed at the same folks who went ski trips back during the ski week heyday in the 1970s and early ‘80s—the Boomers. The original ski week hit when[Read More…]
There’s More Than Ski Clinics For Seniors That Make Big White’s Master’s Week Unique. [Editor Note: Correspondent Yvette Cardozo also reported on Big White’s Master’s Week focusing on the ski instruction elements. Here, she shows us the social side which really looks like a lot of fun.] The social part of the Big White Ski Resort Masters Week is what made[Read More…]
Big Choice Of Intermediate Runs, “Master” Lessons, Bring Seniors Back Each Year. It’s hard to find a resort better suited to older skiers than the popular British Columbia destination of Big White. Located in Okanagan region of B.C. near the bustling, fast-growing city of Kelowna, Big White is indeed big, with a sprawling village that boasts the most ski-in, ski-out[Read More…]
Synchronized Cruising In The French Alps Captured By Drone. This reminds us of the coordinated swimming events we see in the Olympic Games, minus the gel in the hair. Well, kind of. A group of skiers cruises down and around the slopes at Les 2 Alpes (aka L2A), an amazing resort which actually has a short summer season we reported on this[Read More…]
Arc’teryx And The North Face on YouTube With Top Cinematography And Music That Doesn’t Blow Your Eardrums. In 1990 China had zero ski resorts. Today there are 568, including Jackson Hole, a residential and ski community a few hours north of Beijing. Iran is a land where, for many, skiing offers escape from state control. Skiing in China, Iran, Japan[Read More…]
Les Deux Alpes, France: Seniors 72+ Ski Free. Editor’s Note: This Resort Review was written by Val E., a reader who has an interesting background in the ski industry. Val used to work as a ski slalom course supervisor, snowboard technician, ski/snowboard clothing consultant, ski engineer, ski/snowboard writer and photographer in the U.S. and in Europe. He traveled to 25 countries,[Read More…]
North America Swelters, NZ Freezes. In case you missed it during this hottest summer of all time, the ski season is in full swing down under. Here’s a clip from Whakapapa Ski Field, New Zealand’s largest winter resort. Located on the North Island, Whakapapa is on the north side of Mount Ruapehu. You really have to give the crew credit for[Read More…]
Picture Used as Lillehammer Games Logo. The world’s oldest known image of a person on skis — a 5,000 year old petroglyph on the Norwegian island of Tro — has been destroyed by vandals. The image was used as the logo for the 1994 Lillehammer Winter Olympics. This is a tragedy for those interested in skiing history. It also[Read More…]
A Small Area Enchants Seniors, Offering Bargain Skiing In Big Powder. Editor Note: This review was written by Jim Barber, a long time skier and ski business veteran. He lives near Mt. Baldy and loves his retirement home in BC. Here’s his story: “My wife and I started our life together in the ski shop business at Hunter Mountain N.Y. in the[Read More…]
Yes, It’s An Ad, But—Wow—Some Awesome Videography. Okay, okay, this is a video ad for CMH Heli Skiing, but it’ll do for a bit of a visual fix for these mid summer days. (BTW, we weren’t paid to show you this.) Back in the early 70s, we wrote some captions for high-quality pictures sent into SKIING magazine by Hans Gmoser,[Read More…]
