Lost Ski Resorts of British Columbia
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- Опубліковано 29 чер 2024
- British Columbia is a vast province. With over 944,000 square kilometres of land, British Columbia is Canada’s third largest province. And this very large province hosts some of the world’s greatest ski resorts. However, unknown to many skiers, British Columbia is home to a host of abandoned ski hills, completely forgotten in time. Some of these places have been closed for decades, virtually nothing remaining of the original skiing operations. Other hills have left behind traces - rusting t-bar lifts, old ski lodges and ski runs barely visible on the mountain. These places, though now quiet, were once bustling enterprises, many being the heart of the communities they served. One by one, they all closed for various reasons, their memory slowly fading away. In this video, I will take you through most of British Columbia’s lost ski areas.
Please note that there are many more forgotten ski areas in British Columbia, but including all of them would have been incredibly challenging, so what I have here will have to do.
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
1:18 Morning Mountain
2:28 Crystal Mountain
3:51 Forbidden Plateau
6:05 Green Mountain
8:40 Kelowna Mountain
10:42 Kitsumkalum
13:11 Lac Le Jeune
13:59 Mt. Arrowsmith
16:37 Mt. Hays
18:19 Silver Tip
19:50 Snowpatch
20:34 Sparwood
21:14 Tabor Mountain
22:35 Tillicum Valley
23:49 Stewart / Granduc
25:23 Beaver Valley
26:28 Grandview Ski Acres
27:43 Akloo
29:01 100 Mile House
30:02 Timberland
30:56 Kamloops Ski Hill
31:52 Burke Mountain
32:41 100 Steps
33:43 Mica Creek
34:32 Cassiar
35:45 Blue River
36:19 Mt. Ida
37:01 Clinton
37:44 Mt. Diadem
38:24 Northlander
39:37 Outro
Music by Lakey Inspired
/ lakeyinspired
Wow! Great job. I am the current owner of the Beaver Valley abandoned skihill. I have been working extensively on it and am currently building a nutcracker style rope tow from scratch. I have found remnants of the old towers, the concrete top station and counter weight and several big lights. I even found an old toque.
I'm curious where you found the photos? I believe I took the last photo before I started slashing brush
@@kdranch77 Thanks for your comment! I received my info (and photos) from someone on Facebook named Jack E. LaRocque
Great Job. Yes I know Jack it was from his era . You are welcome to come check it out .
Hope it all goes well for you
godspeed
Hi Skier 72 - I'm part of Mt Maichen, a small community hill in the town of Watson Lake, Yukon. We were established in 1969 and are still open each and every winter. The last few winters have been challenging between 'world events' and manpower shortages, but we persist thru the hard work of a stubborn volunteer base. We have 8 runs, 1 of which is night lit, 3 beginner 3 intermediate and 2 expert, 2 T bars, chalet with bar kitchen and rental shop, and are 6km from the town of Watson Lake with a fantastic view of the lake and airport of Watson Lake. Our overall vertical drop is 214m with our longest run just touching 1600m. We are 1600km from Edmonton. If you ever get a chance to come north, look us up! Oh, and Whitehorse has a hill too, Mt Sima.
Thanks for your comment! Mt. Maichen looks like an amazing ski hill and community asset. I believe the upper t-bar there was formerly the original lift at Sunshine AB. Would love to check it out if I'm ever in the area
@@Skier72 I believe you are correct! One of our Tbars did come from Sunshine if memory serves. Im hopin to make a vid, if i can ill let ya know!
Fantastic historical dissertation. Clearly a tremendous effort. The stories documented trends in the ski business that reflected nearly identical ski resort histories in the Sierra Nevada mountains in the latter half of the twentieth century: the stories of operations starting after WWII, hanging on for a while, and then dying off.
A documentary like this focusing on the failed ski areas in California and Nevada would be wonderful.
Excellent video thanks for all your research and documention!
Thanks for putting this together! Crazy how many of these hills closed due to fire. Imagine trying to start one of these ski hills up today. The impact studies alone would make it impossibly expensive. Sad.
It seemed to be easier in the 60s and 70s to start a hill. Just clear a few runs and throw in a t-bar lift. The thing is, many of the closed areas had a lot of potential (e.g. Arrowsmith or Hays), and if they made it through the hard years, could've been viable businesses.
But good luck bringing back any of the places on this list.
I was about to comment on the fire thing too! scary what fire can do
Despite living in an area with no snow and therefore no skiing, I watch your videos.
Glad you do!
It would be such a craving of mine to just get a bunch of people that love skiing and trying to reopen one of those T-bar only ski resorts.
Yes exactly! So many of these places had a lot of potential. What would you re-open if you could?
@@Skier72 probably the one by Cranbrook, they need one there.
My favorite place to ski by far
I miss the great snow and the great people that came to ski there.
So many abandoned Muller Lifts
Gratuliere zum Video, sehr schön 🥰
Appreciate it!
Great video! I've driven by some of these abandoned resorts many times but I haven't yet explored them.
Great job!
Lillooet ski club and rainbow mountain (in Whistler) should be added to your next series!
Great video! I got super excited when i found out Cassiar was on this list, since it is not talked about much. Keep up the great content!
Tillicum!!!
I learned how to ski there and really enjoyed that place.
I know it was never super busy there, but it was steady. Lack of snow also limited its season. We used to get almost a months more of weekend skiing at silver star after Tillicum melted out
Good job !
Tabor was my home ski hill, we had a great community there with the race programs and winter events, I think it was 1978 when The tabor mountian Ski team won the Nancy green BC/Alberta. Championships, glad to see it's opening again, it was the only local hill ( Purden is about another 20min down the road. ) however with the population slowly becoming a majority East indian, i suspect the ski hills in the whole of central and north BC are going to be in financial trouble.
Great Video! I thought I knew about some of this history but clearly there are more lost ski hills. My parents operated Lac Le Jeune for a few years in the mid 70's.
Thanks for your comment! If you have old photos of LLJ in operation, I'd love to see them.
As a Brit I love the history of these places very well put together def sub to your channel
Great video!!! Years ago me and some friends went backcountry skiing on the Rogers Pass with the U of C. Our guide showed us where the rope tow was. The snow up there was unbelievable. It was cool to stay at the old hotel as well.
Glad you enjoyed it! I still have yet to find more information on the old hill in Rogers Pass, but it's sad that it's no more. Still a great backcountry spot though.
@@Skier72 if memory serves me correct our guide said it was built by the hotel staff or roads maintenance for them to have something to do. I got the impression the rope tow was free and never a money making venture.
Great Video! Although I'm never setting foot in a ski lodge again in Canada, they have a tendency to just burn down for no reason ;-)
Hey Skier 72, thanks for the reference to this new video! This is awesome! Really appreciate the bits on Forbidden and Green Mountain. So many people are unaware just how many resorts have been on the island.
Arrowsmith is still such a mystery to me. It seemed like the access road was a problem but this video really explained all the other issues the resort faced.
I really have to ask why, since 2002, there hasn’t been any new proposals to build a new alpine resort with a revised road. People on the island will go there and it would promote so much business now. I can’t be the only who’s thought the same thing!
It appears the Ontario based company who shut down the ski resort were also the ones who closed the lower half in the 90's. Which is really ashame. As you said, the vertical drop would've been huge. It's also strange how the closure of Mt. Arrowsmith Lower didn't make any news headlines.
As far as I know, the 1999/2000 ski season didn't see that many people, and paired with the cost of clearing a dangerous access road, it made the most sense to shutter it. To be honest, if any of these places could come back, I could totally see Mt. Arrowsmith. The problem would be clearing all the environmental hurdles though. But we can dream.
Also, there appears someone has created a website for "Arrowsmith Mountain Resort". Page has nothing on it though.
skiarrowsmith.com/
Wow I cannot believe it. The website makes me wonder if some investor may also be eyeing up the prospect of a comeback.
You’re correct about the environmental hurdles. Simply put, a portion of Arrowsmith-Massif area is in a United Nations Biosphere reserve and good luck ever trying to change that! That being said, the park area that the resort was in still is a regional park and is in a legal grey area where it’s hard to tell if there would be those same environmental impacts. Nevertheless, the biosphere is only one of many environmental hurdles.
The big question being is even if you get past the environmental approval and approval from the neighbouring communities, etc., can the business bring in enough people to ski from the mainland and South Island to draw away from the other major resort rival. That vertical drop would still make it hard to compete with on paper at least.
Great video again.
@@islandskiercanada2840 Didn't realize that the old Arrowsmith ski area was still in a regional park. Yeah, good luck changing the UN Biosphere area, but with a provincial park, there is hope. As far as I know, the t-bars still partially stand on Arrowsmith, so, maybe? Not sure what the website is about or why it's completely blank.
In many ways, Forbidden Plateau was quite similar to Arrowsmith. The nail in the coffin for both were the lodge fires. But Forbidden was a respectable ski area with a decent vertical drop. But the competition with Mt. Washington probably didn't help. Also, Forbidden has it's own website documenting the history very well.
www.forbiddenskihill.ca/
Anyway, really enjoy talking lost ski areas with other people! If you want to continue this conversation further, shoot me an email and I'll definitely respond (thebcrockiesskier72@gmail.com)
geez, I remember grass skiing at Grandview summer of 1981 when I was working near Kamloops.
Fantastic video. Thanks for putting this together. Have you come across Azu Mountain Village? I recall skiing across the old lift lines while at Powder King. Love to know the history.
Thanks for your comment! Yes, I have come across Azu. I was considering putting it in this video but decided against it. I'll probably eventually make a video on the history of Azu, though I definitely need to do more research.
I remember Forbidden Plateau above Comox/Courtenay. Was a good alternative to Mt. Washington
I have a full-length video on the history of Forbidden Plateau on my channel
The photo of the T-bar at Morning Mtn is actually from Burke Mtn in Coquitlam.
a long one, but just as good if not better than the others
I no you didn’t include all of them. But there is this old totally forgotten ski resort on Hollyburn Mountain right beside cypress ski resort. There is still Reminence of the old chair lift that brought you up and there and some photos and stuff about this forgotten ski hill on the internet.
Yeah I debated including the Hollyburn chair on this list, but it was more an access lift for homeowners (and more or less is on the same mountain Cypress is).
@skier72 Sunshine mountain Bralorne!!!
Watching these series,, kinda surprised how much stuff burned down. Lodges, lifts...those early ski decades were kinda crazy.
Dude. Why the eff did everything burn down?
B.C has alot of "confrontational environmentalists" per se.
Bull mountain is $10 donations to go hike/tour for a ski. They also have a bunch of dope rails at the bottom to hike with shovels so you can build anything you want.
Glad they're letting people onto the property. Hopefully they can re-open fully soon
Everything burned down. Weird.
Oh! By the way, @Skier72, there is one long-abandoned ski hill in the Yukon Territory that i know of - the Faro Ski hill. Long, long gone, very little is known of it outside of the long time residents. May be worth looking into?
Why is it that fire is attracted to ski lodges? Its paradoxical!
Ya, seems like every other one of these vinettes ends with "....then ski lodge burned down, and the resort went under." Fire insurance anyone?
Look there is a pattern to the closing of some of these areas. Notice when you watch how many burn down. Just saying, good video.
Arson? Eco terrorism? The greenie's hated ski resorts...
but skiing attracts reasonable environmentalists
LOL like 90% of these ended with a fire WTF?
Coulda just been drunk slednecks in many cases too.
Seems to a lot of Jewish Lightning around these old lodges. Weird