FRESH POWDER COVERS FUN RUNS AT FERNIE
Weeklong snowfall creates ‘perfect’ conditions at mountain resort
There’s a certain type of powder that only comes around every once in a while.
In the West, there’s never really any worry about it snowing. That’s just a fact of life in the Rockies.
But there’s something different about the powder that blankets a mountain when the temperatures drop beyond a certain point and the word ‘powder’ suddenly seems very specific.
Usually, deep freezes mean the snow slows down a bit, but that’s not what happened last week at Fernie Mountain Resort.
“It’s the sort of snow the locals can just wipe off their car and go, no problem,” said Matt Mosteller, the senior vice-president of marketing and resort experience at Resorts of the Canadian Rockies, which owns Fernie.
“Once you’re on the mountain, it’s really the perfect powder.”
Conveniently located on the Powder Highway that stretches along southern Alberta and B.C., Fernie has become famous for its huge snowfalls throughout the season.
But the past week was something special, even for those lucky enough to live in the idyllic mountain town and who can drive the quick couple of minutes up to the ski resort on a truly epic powder day.
With temperatures hovering around what can credibly be called “way too cold” last week, though, even the most hardened skier or snowboarder must have been having second thoughts about going on the mountain.
The problem was that sweet, glorious powder we were talking about? The truly fluffy white stuff? It was falling hard.
Despite the frigid conditions, Fernie was hit with 45 centimetres of fresh power over the past seven days, which brought the season total to 428 cm.
With temperatures now jumping up to a much more tolerable level, it means Fernie is something of a winter wonderland for skiers and snowboarders who have survived the busy — and frigid — holiday season and are eager to make the most of the good times ahead.
And Fernie happens to be a pretty ideal place to spend a day ripping down the slopes. If you happen to be an advanced skier or snowboarder, there are few mountains that provide the variety of expert terrain that Fernie does. The resort boasts five bowls, and this writer can assure his readers that taking them all on in one day is not for the light of heart.
But while Fernie’s most challenging runs are what’s made it famous, there’s a lot more to the resort than deep powder and extreme terrain.
“Every bowl, there are green runs at the bottom,” Mosteller said, explaining that families with a variety of levels of skiers can make it to the top of Fernie’s lifts and then go their separate ways for a couple minutes before meeting up and skiing back to the bottom of the mountain.
And at the bottom of the mountain happens to lie some of the best ski-in, ski-out accommodations that guests can find anywhere in Western Canada, along with the Griz Pub — which consistently ranks among the best ski pubs on most publications’ lists.
There’s also the Town of Fernie, which is an attraction unto itself.
It’s the sort of snow that the locals can just wipe off their car and go, no problem. Once you’re on the mountain, it’s really the perfect powder.