(Canmore, Alberta, Canada)

I’ve now completed three days of skiing at Banff Sunshine Village. The weather continues to be overcast and gray, but it really hasn’t affected my skiing enjoyment. I’ll take it over the -29’C temperatures I experienced the last time I was here!

Even though I have been active every single day of the pandemic, it often took the form of a walk or a relatively low-intensity sport. Hockey and soccer were severely curtailed. So I can’t overstate how good it feels to actually push myself to be seriously active for the entire day…multiple days in a row.

Although I have only skied for 3 days so far, it probably works out to be more like 5 or 6 “typical” days. There are only two of us skiing, lift lines are non-existent, and we ski at about the same pace…so we manage to get in a lot of runs. With the iffy weather, there also isn’t much incentive to linger over a beverage or have a leisurely al fresco lunch! While those things can also be enjoyable, it’s just not in the cards this year.

At Sunshine Village, we spent most of our time in the “Goat’s Eye” area. There are basically two halves to Goat’s Eye Mountain (see photo above): the upper half is almost tundra-like, with fast, direct pistes. The bottom half is wooded, with terrain ranging from treed glades and mogul fields to steep powder stashes and leisurely cruising pistes. Our favourite piste this year was probably “Rolling Thunder”, which successfully combined a steep pitch with deep fluffy snow.

Sunshine Village also includes a couple of “hard core” areas for extreme skiers. Delirium Dive (access point pictured above) is one of them. You are not allowed to ski here unless you have avalanche equipment (digital avalanche transceiver, etc.) and a skiing partner with you. It’s rated a “double black diamond”, and the rating is certainly deserved. You can read more about Delirium Dive here.

We also spent some time on the areas serviced by the “Great Divide Express” and “TP Town” lifts. The TP Town chair lift is one of my favourites: not only is the music non-stop reggae (ideal for sports), but the seats are heated and there is also a “bubble” that you can pull down to shield yourself from the elements. The slopes are a little busier here, but my ski partner knows the area very well and was able to find hidden gems that the crowds completely ignored.

Once again, my base for the week is the town of Canmore. I heard today that Canmore is the fastest-growing town in Canada. With the increasing popularity of telecommuting, more and more people are choosing to live here in the mountains rather than in big cities.

Stay tuned – I will be moving on to Lake Louise! Until then, here is a link to some highlights from the last time I went skiing here.