We spent the night at Radium Hot Springs after a nice night of soaking our smells away in the springs and rested up for a bit of a drive in the morning. While it wasn’t necessarily on our way, Nakiska Ski Area, a small area on the eastern portion of the Canadian Rockies, was on our list of places to explore. With lower average snowfall than places like Banff, Kicking Horse, and Revelstoke, we knew it wouldn’t be exactly the resort we were looking for but what we did find were incredible views of the Canadian Rockies.
Overlooking the base area.
The drive in to Nakiska.
Nakiska, being Calgary’s closet resort (61.5 miles from the resort to the city center) is literally the perfect place to head for a weekend if you have a family. Mellow terrain, fun glades, and a laid back feel in the base area is the perfect combination for a family resort. Being both of those things, close to Calgary and a family oriented resort, we got caught up in some long lift lines on Sunday afternoon. It was ironic to us that we stood in lift lines to ski groomers longer than we did to ski 10 inches of pow at previously visited resorts.
Views everywhere you look.
We weren’t in a hurry, though, so the lift lines didn’t bother us. The sun came out and we enjoyed staring at the awe-inspiring mountains that surrounded us. Aside from long groomers, Nakiska recently expanded their glade skiing, which was inviting. Their gladed area seems like a great place for kids to explore and acquire tree skiing skills without the consequences.
There is a terrain park at Nakiska but bear in mind that you must get an additional terrain-park specific ticket. It was $5.00 in addition to the day ticket and we didn’t have any money on us so we skipped it. There turned out to only be a few features in the park so we were happy to not spend the money.
While Nakiska is different than most of the skiing we’ve been doing on this trip, it was really neat to see so many families out enjoying skiing and the outdoors. Nakiska makes getting your family on the hill accessible without much of the overwhelming logistics that come with much larger resorts.
Looking east.
This T-bar looked like a blast but was unfortunately not running.
With the MAX Pass, you receive 5 days of skiing at all 39 participating resorts! They even have options like add-on passes, which is what we did for our Rocky Mountain Super Pass Plus. For more information, visit the MAX Pass website.
