CANADIAN ROCKIES 2000

Jan 15th, 2000: A rather uneventful flight from Manchester to Calgary (thankfully no 4 hour delay like the previous year). We arrived in Calgary and were promptly wisked away on the 4 hour coach trip to Fernie Alpine Resort. We stayed at the Wolfs Den Lodge, which is located at the base of the ski hill unlike the majority of the hotels which are in the town itself (10 minute coach ride away). We found that there were enough restaraunts/bars at the hill to keep us occupied for the week, although if you were stopping for any longer, I'd suggest bedding down in the town (there are loads of cheap hotels/bars in Fernie).

Jan 16th: It snowed all day, dumping over a foot of snow, which is not unusual according to the locals. The locals riders were always very friendly and willing to point out where the best runs were (after the customary enquiry- "Are you Australian?"). First impressions of the resort lived up to expectations, tales of the massive annual snowfall, efficient lift system and non existant queues were seemingly no exaggeration.
I spent the whole day doing powder run after powder run, mostly in the Timber bowl (you couldn't have found a groomer if you'd have wanted to). We found it relatively easy to find our way round the piste, it's quite hard to get lost as all the runs come out in the same place at the bottom of the hill. The ski area is divided up into 5 bowls; the newly opened Siberia, Timber and Currie bowls and the original Lizard and Cedar bowls , all of which are served by high speed chair lifts.

View of Mount Fernie from halfway down the Lizard bowl

Lizard Bowl

Jan 17th: Overnight snowfall, along with early morning flurries, gave way to blue skies about lunchtime allowing us our first view of the whole mountain and letting us actually work out where the hell we'd been for the last day and a half. A superb powder day was enjoyed by the almost non-existent crowd. We spent most of the day in the Lizard Bowl, which turned out to be our bowl of choice for the early part of the week. While I was on the chairlift, one of the ski instructors told me that the Face lift would probably be open tomorrow if the fine weather continued. The Face lift is a small drag lift which takes you the extra 100m or so right to the top of the Lizard/Cedar bowl, allowing you access to a whole heap of extra pow, however due to the weather it had only been open once that year. Continued on next page.

Weaving in and out of the massive crowds in the Lizard Bowl