Mount Norquay toon-ed into budget-minded skiers
Two dollars for a lift ticket. Two dollars.
Really, there’s not much more that this article should need to say to convince skiers and snowboarders to get to Mount Norquay for the next Toonie Day.
When a resort is offering a lift ticket for $2, the deal sort of sells itself.
For seven years now, the folks at Mount Norquay have been offering lift tickets on select days throughout the season for only $2 and it’s all in an effort to help people connect with a sport they might not know they love.
“It’s neat, it brings a lot of people out,” said Andre Quenneville, general manager at Mount Norquay. “It brings out people who haven’t skied in a long time, like a lapsed skier who’s got skis in the garage and maybe hasn’t skied in 10 years because life got busy and they forgot about it.
“Now he’s getting back out to try it because it’s such an amazing joy. We hope people find some joy in trying winter activities and getting outside. Winter’s a long part of our seasonal lives here in this area, so we might as well get out and enjoy it.”
The resort first started offering once-a-month heavily discounted lift tickets seven years ago when it sold them for $0.85 to celebrate Norquay’s 85th anniversary.
While the price has gone up slightly since then, $2 is still — obviously — an incredible deal for a day of skiing.
Of course, guests are encouraged to donate a little extra money to charity when they arrive and Norquay has raised over $30,000 over the years for organizations like the Bow Valley SPCA and Santas Anonymous.
While Norquay has already hosted two Toonie Days this season, there are still three more opportunities for skiers and snowboarders to take advantage of the deal. The next Toonie Day goes Feb. 7 and Norquay will also be hosting the events on March 7 and April 11.
For first-timers who are thinking this might be an affordable way to see whether or not they enjoy either skiing or snowboarding, Quenneville said Norquay’s decade-long effort to expand its beginner offerings should make it the ideal place to make that happen.
“We’re obviously a little smaller than Sunshine and Lake Louise, but we have amazing expert terrain and excellent beginner terrain that we’ve developed over the last few years,” Quenneville said. “We’ve worked hand in hand with Parks Canada, we’ve been able to add some new runs and modify some lifts so people can access easier terrain, so our beginner terrain has really increased significantly.
“Norquay was seen as a steeper mountain for a long time and it’s hard to get that out of the psyche of folks, but we’ve made a lot of changes.”
Of course, not every member of every family actually enjoys skiing or snowboarding and that’s something Norquay has also been working to accommodate. While tubing parks have begun popping up at resorts across Western Canada, Norquay’s tubing area has been around for years.
That’s allowed it to refine the park design and offer runs for everyone, from thrill-seekers to those who just want a relaxing time sliding down a hill.
“We’ve got a wealth of experience creating a tubing area,” Quenneville said. “We have a larger area we use, our lanes are longer and faster and (more fun).
“It’s just getting people to enjoy the outdoors, getting people out on those cold days and saying, ‘Hey, this is great! I’m layered up and I’m warm and I’m having a blast.’”