Canada: a topsy-turvy land where bacon is ham, the health care is gratis and the mountains are blanketed with snow (real snow). Herewith, a few new reasons to bring your slopeside talents across the border.
Note: Canada has wonderful glade skiing (all those trees really come in handy). Footnote: the resort built to host the freestyle at the ’88 Olympics has just doubled the width of its infamous tree-lined Monster Glades. Which obviously means 50% more monstrosity.
Snowfall in this Western Alberta section of the Canadian Rockies has been mind-boggling (156 inches this season). You’ll confront this scenario with a new high-speed lift that carries you to the same 1,331-foot peaks—only 70% faster. (Sadly, not counted in your downhill time.)
Ziplining over a frozen rain forest canopy at 50 mph: nothing could make you hungrier. The remedy: Ziptrek’s new four-and-a-half-hour super tour—a combination of two existing tours, with a catered lunch at a mountainside cabin in between. Here’s hoping your harness has a baguette holster.
You’ve ridden all sorts of trains: boxcar. Commuter. Soul. But never a French-Canadian ski train with gourmet chefs onboard to cook your breakfast. Well, at least not one that will drop you at the base of Le Massif de Charlevoix for a daylong ski jaunt. Not yet, anyway.
To cut all this downhill action: eight days of smooth cross-country touring in the Canadian Yukon, led by an Olympic vet. Prepare to follow groomed trails through moose country and stop at the world’s biggest (non-polar) ice cap to catch the northern lights. The moose are big fans.
