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Revelstoke Mountain Resort
9 reviews for Revelstoke Mountain Resort
9 reviews in English
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Review from Mitch L.
Edmonton, AB
2/25/2012
This is my favorite mountain. It's hard to get to, but that means that it's never too busy. A busy day by the standards of the locals I've talked to is what I'd consider a dead day at a mountain like Sunshine or Lake Louise.
The powder here is to die for, and there's so much terrain that you could probably spend years riding just this mountain and still not see all of it. As another reviewer noted, the hill is mostly geared towards advanced riders so novices will have a limited number of runs to choose from and may not have as much fun. But if you do know what you're doing on a snowboard or pair of skis, you need to come to Revelstoke. It is heaven on Earth. -
Review from Kevin K.
10/18/2011
DO believe the hype. I counted down the days till it opened and hightailed it over when it did. Revelstoke has glades, cliff drops, and loads of blower champagne powder. If you are an advanced skiier/boarder this place is heaven on earth. The vert is truly leg burning and there are loads of side hits. The bowls are huge and after a big dump you'll find pillow lines everywhere. The trees keep the snow light for days after a storm. They can get quite tight but that can be said for most glades and squirreling out of a tight situation is half the fun anyways. Hiking opens up much more the mountain and takes you to the big boy lines. Even inbounds, ski patrol will stop and politely suggest you come equipped with avy gear.
Due to the vertical, you can ride in total white out snow fall, epic pow, sun baked crust, sunny spring conditions, to mashed potato slush all in one run. Pretty intense stuff. I've spend two separate weeks here and it can seem like a different mountain from day to day.
Revelstoke lacks the development of Banff and Whistler which equates to short life lines (5 min max) and tons of snow to farm even a day or two after a storm. Amenities are sparse but the facilities are new and clean. The town is quiet and quaint and is about a ten minute ride from the mountain. Not much besides a few restaurants but locals are nice and most visitors are there for the snow. Revelstoke is a rare sleepy ski town with no scene and true powder hounds.
The remoteness, terrain, and lack of cutesy activities may keep some away, but that's what keeps me coming. -
Review from Dominique W.
Burnaby, BC
7/5/2011
First time I've ever experienced properly chest deep powder. Truly epic. I had two of the the best skiing days ever here this past season. I highly recommend this place to any who love N. American skiing. Definitely not for beginners, and still lacking most of the amenities of the larger resorts (Whistler, etc.), but if all you really care about is the skiing, then this place is for you. I was there on a very busy weekend and still only had lineups of less than 5mins.
The reason this doesn't get 5 stars is because it is pretty specialized for powder skiing. Not exactly fun for the whole family when the snow's deeper than most 10-year-olds are tall. -
Review from Casey T.
2/28/2012
Spent 3 days skiing at the resort. Great terrain, only 3 real lifts, but an amazing amount of mountain can be accessed from them. Good accessable out-of-bounds areas too. If you are a beginner or middle of the road intermediate, this may be a tough mountain for you to ski. Pretty steep and fair amount of trees and terrain. As of now, the village is not built out, so this is a ski vacation spot. No fancy shops like Vail or Aspen. The town is a mile or so from the montain and very cool. Some good food spots (The Village Idiot was great) also.
We spent 2 days heli-skiing also. If you are planning a heli trip do your research. We used Selkirk Tangiers and were very dissapointed with the service. The skiing was amazing, but the customer service was horrible. You "buy" a certain number of vertical feet. Once you are on the mountain, they apply peer pressure to make you buy more. Our guide was very rude to one of teh skiers who was not sure (after the 1st run of the day) that he wanted to pay for more vertical feet. After our 2nd day were were forced to wait over 2 hours for the other group to return (they wanted to do more runs). Our main guide left us and went to ski with the other group. The excuse for this was that -in case there was an emergency we would help with a rescue. They had been serving us beers for 2 hours (at $5 a can), we were in no shape to rescue any one. The bottom line is that Selkirk-Tangiers tries to milk every dollar out of it's customers. The price ended up being about the same as if we would have gone with a smaller company and paid for unlimited vertical up front. Our issue was the fact that none of the fine print was explained ahead of time. I filled out a comment card expressing my discontent as did our entire group and I waited to post this to see if they would reply and/or apologize. No response after 2 weeks.
I will definately go heliskiing in BC again, but never with Selkirk-Tangiers. -
Review from Jean K.
10/20/2009
Although the Revelstoke Mountain Resort may be new, people have been heli and cat skiing here for a while. So it's no surprise that I found the resort to be completely unimpressive. We didn't want to spring for any heli or cat skiing when it hadn't snowed all week so my thoughts are soley based on skiing the resort. I did hear from other skiers that the heli and cat skiing here is amazing when there's powder.
Despite what the wikipedia article says, this resort is not very big. You can easily ski the entire mountain in a couple of days then run out of things to do. Unless you have fresh snow, half the front of the resort will be very hard and icy and you will pretty much want to avoid going all the way down to the day lodge. This will limit your terrain to the upper half of the front (basically anything within reach of The Stoke quad) and the back bowl. Although the runs from the top of The Stoke are labeled as black diamonds they're just steep and not technically difficult. The back bowl is all easy blues except for the run right under the lift, Denver Dollars, which is all moguls all the way down. It's labeled a blue and it's not steep, but it is a lot of work.
There are more difficult runs off the ridges, these are not easy to get to. In the back bowl you will have to hike up to the ridge from The Stoke quad then you'll have to hike back out at the bottom. And don't think you'll be the only one on the mountain because everyone hikes up to do this run due to the general lack of easy accessible runs that are interesting.
Although you can also go off piste into the trees, this is not the easiest place to do this. The trees can get very tight. I went with a group of what I consider to be expert skiers and we had to traverse out a couple of places. Other skiers had to hike out in places.
My favorite run is off The Stoke quad then off to the right with a slight traverse before dropping into the trees (Vertigo and Separate Reality Glades). When you hit the Ripper Connector you can choose to go back to the front or continue on through the trees to the back bowl. This drop is steep through the trees with moguls. You have to really know how to pick your path or it's going to be very slow progress. The run off The Stoke into the trees (Clyde's Secret Glades) is also pretty good as well as quiet.
So unless there's fresh powder or you're willing to to a lot of hiking, there isn't that much skiable terrain.
As for the resort itself. The "village" at the bottom is wishful thinking. There are condos there but no actual village. A small lobby contains the lift ticket office, ski rentals, and 2 bathrooms (1 men stall and 1 women stall). There are no shops or food here yet. A few small tables in the lobby. Not even a souvenir shop. The parking lot is still a mud lot. I've never been anywhere that's been so overhyped.
The Day Lodge is slightly better. The cafeteria here is very nice with big windows. There's a small souvenir shop. This is pretty much where everyone comes for lunch as there is no where else to get lunch on the mountain.
At the top of Kill the Banker gondola there's a warming hut (and I mean hut) where about a dozen people can fit for lunch as long as they pack their own lunch. They don't sell food here.
As of last season (2008-09) there were no bathrooms above the Day Lodge on either the front or back bowl. Despite the bathroom symbols they show on the trail map there were no bathroom at the top of Kill the Banker gondola or The Stoke quad. You basically had to ski down the mountain (or ride the gondola as we chose to do) to the Day Lodge. Don't bother with the extra ride down to the "village" as they only have 2 stalls.
When I asked around Revelstoke (the town) the future of the resort was uncertain. I guess they've been having a tough time making money so I'm not sure how long it will take them to expand and build up the resort. Also the locals were not on good terms with the resort group. Apparently the resort group were not hiring the locals for any of the work and being really stingy with the licensing the name and logo. I got the feeling they were not well liked in town.
The town is probably the best thing about the resort. The actually village of Revelstoke is very nice with restaurants, bars and anything else you could need aprés ski.
I would probably only consider coming back if they made major upgrades to the resort or if I wanted to go heli/cat skiing. -
Review from Mischa I.
3/2/2009 1 photo
Revelstoke offers the largest lift-serviced vertical drop in all of North America. It's true.
It opened just 2 years ago and everything is brand-spanking new and to boot, no one seems to know about it quite YET! Perfect runs with hardly anyone around, it was absolutely awesome. They doubled their terrain by opening up the North Bowl and plan on going from the current 3 lifts to over 20 over the next few years. I suggest getting in your fill or riding and skiing before everyone else heads out that way.
The views off the top are absolutely amazing. The song in my head the last time I was up there: Beautiful Day by U2. -
Review from Daniel L.
12/29/2010 2 Check-ins Here
No line ups and almost all advance style runs, fresh powder runs all day long unlike Whistler.... Some of the best vertical drop, off piste skiing in BC this mtn totally rocks, so sweet, .. They are lacking in money for small upgrades like mountain top wash rooms, and snack bars, trail signage not to mention only one Apres drinks bar. The mtn is a 14 min car ride from the small historical town of Revelstoke located on Hwy#1 fews hours east of Kamloops. Back to the mtn.. it doesnt set up well for beginners or intermediates but has endless runs for advance, trees, steeps, and a couple of bowls.. I had some gnarly runs here and will be back.
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Review from Paul B.
12/15/2010
I have been a few times to Revelstoke and each time gets worse. The mountain itself has tremendous potential. But it is that. The resort appeals very heavily to the powder hounds. For very good reason. They barely groom the mountain so any intermediate skier is left wanting. Although it has great vertical there are just three lifts, a gondola and two hi speed quads. The on mountain services are almost non-existent as they are at the base. Do not come here for a family holiday, nor for intermediate skiing. STAY far away. Come back in 10 years when they have developed the place more.
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Review from David T.
Calgary, AB
3/7/2011
Brilliant day here today. New soft snow from 2 days ago and still not skied out. Massive vertical - this mtn is huge. Much more to develop as stated by others. Kinda like Castle Mtn but much bigger. Not a place for a family or extended holiday... Yet. Trees are tight but i get the impression that the best glades are kept secret. This will improve over time but then it will be skied out quicker. In the meantime, an awesome place for pow skiers.
