Snowsure: 3.8
- Occasionally gets enough snow for skiing
- Is often closed due to a lack of snow
- Occasionally suffers from a lack of snow
- Rarely suffers from a lack of snow
- Castle Mountain Resort is snowsure even in the poorest seasons
Visitor reviews for Castle Mountain Resort Ski Resort
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(NOTE: Reviews may be edited by our content team for the purposes of ensuring accurate and relevant information)
(NOTE: Reviews may be edited by our content team for the purposes of ensuring accurate and relevant information)
Latest
December 19, 2013
Snow Angel
Snow Angel
Castle is a mix of good and bad just like all other hills. Here are my goods and bad of Castle:
Good:
-Staff are friendly! A lady gave me a hug before I get on a chair! Where do you get that, free hug!
- Great long runs, great snow condition (bit windy)
-lots of vertical and steep runs!
- Cleanest hostel I've ever stayed at and it's right on the hill! Staff were so nice too.
- Easy access, road is clear and easy drive in and out.
- T-bar has a great atmosphere and is a great spot to meet locals; locals are very friendly.
Bad:
- Food was terrible; I had a burger at the cafeteria and it was a frozen processed burger. Menu is limited; suggest bringing your own food. Soup looked old, nothing made my mouth watered so I went for a burger. Big mistake.
- For what they offer (food, service, terrain) everything is, overall, over priced.
- Lifts are slow and one stopped a few times.
- Windy.
- Not much to do after skiing,
December 05, 2013
steele
steele
Small on the resort but big on the mountain and even bigger on the quality of skiing.
This place rocks!
Skied Castle for the first time last year. Went once in February and got hooked. Returned several times over the rest of the season and never had a bad day.
The place isn't big on facilities and lifts but what is there is more then adequate. Great atmosphere that you won't find in any of the big resorts.
The ski terrain for experts is massive. The other viewers who felt there was limited terrain must have limited their skiing to the front side and failed to explore fully into the chutes and the far north. Drifter is a must ski run that should be making this place world renowned. It has so much terrain it could be a resort all to itself.
This is a mountain that will give you the most memorable ski days of your life. Don't miss it.
April 05, 2013
mike blamb
mike blamb
March 19, 2013
tony gomes
tony gomes
Amazing snow; best to visit February and early/mid March when the powder starts. The most reliable weeks are the last week of February and first two weeks of March. The season can be short (mid December-beginning of April). Terrain is wide open in the South with Chutes and Drifter having up to 800 meters of uninterrupted fall line skiing. The North has steep tree skiing with deep soft powder that stays for days after the usual 20-30 cm snowfall. Alpine touring (weekdays Monday-Wednesday) and Cat skiing Thursday - Sunday off the Haig chair complete the resort. On weekdays, and not too busy weekends, you can reliably put in 8000-10000 vertical metres in a full day.
If you are not a good skier looking to improve and shred, this place is not for you. It is ALL about the skiing. You will find old lifts (usually reliable), a good pizza place and pub, and adequate but basic base facilities. Economical and comfortable accommodations are at the hotel/hostel on hill, and many of the cabins can be rented by large groups. As dining options are limited, you will want to do some of your own cooking.
Staff and locals are friendly, and you can usually find someone happy to show you around the mountain. Runs are huge, and it can take a few days to get the full experience. A day here by yourself will leave you a bit lost and unsure of where to ski, a few days with good snow are guaranteed to make you come back. It isn't Banff, Fernie or Whistler, but you'll find the average skier at 'Castle' is better than some of the best at any other resort, and friendlier too!
If you are visiting from afar, combining this with the 'powder highway' resorts is a great option, since you can follow the snow (Castle, Fernie, Red mountain, Whitewater, then up to Big White or Revy, Kicking Horse, and back to Calgary-do yourself a favor and skip Banff-except for shopping and restaurants).
January 20, 2013
Goliemoi
Goliemoi
I had mixed feelings about Castle when I visited last December. So I decided to list both the pros and cons of the resort as I see it.
Pros:
- Unbelievable snow: I don't know if I was just luck or something but in most places the powder was knee deep and it hadn't snowed in days! When I first arrived, I was astonished to find completely untracked powder right underneath the chairlift! This alone made my trip worth the (relatively) long travel.
- Great steeps: I fell in love with the steeps at this resort, especially those leading off the top bowl and the south side chutes. Wide, fast, fun steeps, coupled with brilliant snow makes for a good time indeed!
- Good scenery: I was especially enamored with adjacent mountains, which are very beautiful
- Lots of vertical: Going from top to bottom is a pretty big run, rivaling that of Lake Louise and others.
Cons:
- Slow chairs: I know this is probably a lot like beating a dead horse, but anybody coming to this resort should know, the chairs are painfully slow and small. For me this did not detract from the overall general experience, just know you probably won't fit in as many runs as you would at other resorts
- A lack of run options: I myself found this very perplexing, but by the end of the day I was having trouble finding runs I had not already skied. I attributed this to a number of factors. First off, the mountain is really limited to the runs serviced by the Tamarack Chair, as those were the only ones with decent powder coverage. Runs near the bottom tended to be hardpacked and not worth the slow trip back up. Secondly, the trip back up the mountain is a slow ascent, so I tried to stay up high to pack in as many runs as possible.
- South Side chutes can be a pain: I wasn't particularly irked by this, but unfortunately my father was: the South Side chutes can be a pain to ski. First of all, in order to access the chutes, one has to travel a relatively long traverse. Again, this didn't bother me that much, but it seemed to frustrate my father. Furthermore, and even more importantly, after skiing a chute, you have to traverse a long, flat run that brings you back to base, where you begin your long trip back up to do it all over again. Ultimately, you're spending a long time traversing and riding the chair, just to ride one really good run.
Misc:
- I did not find that the winds were much of a hindrance, one or two wind stops, normal for any resort. Also, they tend to blow all the powder back into place, which is probably the reason for the amazing snow.
- This may not be the best place for beginners; I saw several newbies plummeting face first down the groomed, icy trail under the lift, humorous for me, bad experience for them.
- This is not a con against the resort, more of a humorous observation, but I seemed to encounter a lot of strange people at the hill, including a very excited homosexual, a senile old bat hitting me with her ski pole, and an elderly lifty with a burning desire to move my ski ticket from my zipper to my coat pocket.
In conclusion, yes I would definitely recommend Castle Mountain to anybody, but you may want to try a more modern resort if you aren't into old lifts.
December 10, 2012
Big T
Big T
Life at Castle is great, tons of snow and tons of terrain. On a pow day any part of the mountain is amazing, especially the chutes or drifter. On a day where no fresh snow has fallen the northern gladed areas provide astounding boarding. The lifties are friendly and the atmosphere is great. Although the lifts are a bit slow it gives you time to plan the next run and to rest your legs from shreddin hard. Castle is the place to be. But don't come, because I want the mountain to myself.
October 23, 2012
cmcginc
cmcginc
October 04, 2012
Brent Waldo
Brent Waldo
Mollycoddling does not belong at Castle. Unless you meet Marie in the lift line. She checks your ticket, brushes the snow off your face, gives you a hug and shoos you off to catch the chair. (True story)
The rest is just good skiing and good fun.
Talk about it in the T-Bar at 4 (that might be AM)
A day/weekend at Castle can become an addiction.
Be careful.
March 06, 2012
Calgarian
Calgarian
Castle Mountain Resort, at 2833 vertical feet, with runs that are up to 2300' of uninterrupted vertical, is as good as it gets... anywhere. Sure, you can complain about the slow lifts and the wind stoppages and compare this "co-operative owned" operation to the larger resorts like Sunshine or RCR. I ski Castle at least 40 days per season and have for many years. I have skied most of the major (and smaller) resorts in Canada, the U.S., and New Zealand. To those of you who complain about the snow and the terrain, I say to you that you are either very inexperienced or very negative (or both) and it's quite likely that you'd complain about wherever it is that you happen to be. Alberta and B.C. have many great ski resorts and Castle Mountain ranks right up there with the best of them. On any given day, including most weekends, I can ski over 32,000 vertical feet. Try that at Lake Louise or Sunshine; even with their plethora of high-speed lifts, you'd be hard pressed to surpass that number. Of course there are wind stoppages from time to time at Castle, just as there are at any ski resort that has chair lifts. I have been stuck on chairs, due to high winds, at Lake Louise and Sunshine; this is a safety issue that all resorts take very seriously (and so they should) and if you don't understand this point, then perhaps you should stick with X-country. If you don't like wind, then stay away from all resorts in the Alberta Rockies, not just Castle; it doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that the interior B.C. resorts like Whitewater get less wind. This doesn't make them better - it makes them different and that, people who complain too much and understand too little, is a big part of what makes skiing such a wonderful sport. So learn to enjoy the deep powder, the wind sift and the terrain at Castle, just as you might enjoy the pillows at Whitewater, just as you would as you cram yourself into a tram with 124 strangers at Snowbird. If you cannot wrap your head around this point, then please endeavour to keep your negativity to yourself so that you do not ruin the potential for others to enjoy this great "diamond in the rough" resort in Southwest Alberta. It truly is a great place to ski. And to end, I suggest that to all those who see this glass half empty, perhaps the problem lies not with the terrain, nor the snow or wind, but with your attitude. As one New Zealander once said to a Canadian complaining about the wind and snow at Mt. Hutt, "Mate, you're a right bloody moaner, aren't you!"
February 26, 2012
Corpsey
Corpsey
Honestly, Castle is what it is. Don't expect anything fancy, people go to Castle to ski/snowboard. If you want comfy go to Fernie. If you have beginners in the group it's probably gonna be a pretty rough day. If you like powder, tight trees and natural challenges this is your hill. Forget the trail map, find a friend who knows it and go explore. If it's raining in Fernie it's snowing at Castle. Lifts are older except for Mount Haig, which is not the most challenging but does have some fun stuff if you know where to look. Accommodation is nothing fancy but it does the trick; a few hotel rooms which are very clean and well priced for being on the hill plus there is a very clean hostel on hill which is an unreal deal considering it is on hill with a full kitchen, showers, and a fire pit. In my opinion Castle is the best hill in Alberta hands down and I'll ride here over Fernie any day but I do get why some people complain about it. Which is cool, more for me.
Nearest