Another incredible season for Big White
Ski resort closes with 11 feet of snow
It happens every year. Big White Ski Resort, southeast of Kelowna, closes for the season after the Easter long weekend with a mountain of snow left.
“We close because people have moved onto spring activities like gardening and golf and boating, not because of lack of snow,” said Big White communications manager Natalia Jastrzab.
“In fact, this year we are closing with a huge achievement of having a snow base of over 300 centimetres for the second year in a row.”
To put that in perspective, this season’s 330 centimetres is 3.3 metres, 130 inches or almost 11 feet of the white stuff.
Don’t know if this is a scientific calculation, but Big White estimates all that snow is almost four quadrillion snowflakes deep. That’s a four with 15 zeros after it. “Amazingly, this happened after a slow start to the season as far as snowfall goes,” said Jastrzab.
“We got the most snow in March, so really we had champagne powder conditions right to the end.”
As much is outlined in Big White’s final daily snow report issued Monday.
In the past 24 hours, there had been a skiff of new snow to add to the 50 centimetres or 20 inches that had fallen in the past week. The temperature was 0 C, there was no wind and all 14 lifts serving 118 runs were open.
The reality is Big White could stay open for skiing for weeks yet.
However, interest dwindles for skiing and snowboarding as the weather warms up in the floor of the Okanagan Valley. Big White had an incredible season. After kicking off Nov. 30, the resort saw skiers and boarders enjoy 2.4 million runs over the next four-and-a-half months.
All those guests were hungry and thirsty too, bringing in extra revenue.
In the Happy Valley Day Lodge, 51,000 pounds of French fries were served, along with 9,800 pounds of chicken and 12,000 hamburgers.
For vegetarians, Black Forest Day Lodge served up 2,130 meat-free lunches and 822 black-bean burgers.
The resort also hosted the 2017 World Para Snowboard Championships, a qualifying event for the 2018 Winter Paralympics in South Korea, and its first Peak Pride parade in support of the LGBTQ community.
An early spring visit by a lynx caught on video on the Millie’s Mile run went viral when Big White put it on its Facebook and accumulated over 1.8 million views worldwide.
Big White reopens for the summer on June 23 with hiking trails, scenic chairlift rides, a Craft and Country Festival and restaurants and hotels serving up snacks, meals and drinks and offering overnight accommodation.
Work is also underway for a network of mountain biking trails that will ultimately cover 32 kilometres.
Just as ski runs are rated green for easy, blue for intermediate and black for expert, the mountainbiking trails will be similarly colour coded.