Snowsure: 3.2
- 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
- Cerro Catedral is snowsure even in the poorest seasons
Visitor reviews for Cerro Catedral Ski Resort
Click here to submit your own review of Cerro Catedral
(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
August 09, 2008
Agustin from
Argentina
Agustin from
Argentina
I´ve boarded Cerro Catedral in Bariloche for 6 years now. At least 2 weeks every year. I´ve read many comments and not all of them are true. Most of them are though...
Pros:
-Great city for cheap lodging and restaurants. Lots of cabins for rent, hostels, five star hotels and much more to fit any budget.
-In the past 4 years they have added more and newer lifts. Nothing like the kind you´ll find in a big resort in the US but still acceptable.
-Excellent scenery! Great lake and mountain view...
-Friendly people and great food (you´ll find this all over Argentina).
Cons:
-Employees in general are not service oriented!
-Very crowded during school winter holidays (2 weeks between late July and early August).
-Runs are very poorly groomed! Don´t expect Colorado corduroy, just not gonna happen.
-Too many moguls (sucks if you snowboard)
-Not high or cold enough for powder conditions to last more than a few days. Bad grooming doesn't help.
Resuming, Cerro Catedral is a great place to go if you are looking for a reasonable priced vacation (compared to US or Europe) but don´t expect the same quality of snow, lifts or service!
Other than Cerro Catedral I boarded Chapelco and Las Leñas in Argentina. Also: Heavenly, Sierra, Kirkwood (Lake Tahoe, CA) and Aspen (Colorado, USA).
August 07, 2008
Hugo from
Pakistan
Hugo from
Pakistan
I have skied in Catedral since the late 70’s or early 80’s. It is a very nice place with wonderful views and short but excellent runs, at least in comparison with other South American ski resorts. During the last five or six years, a huge investment was added to the mountain. More and newer chairlifts were added to the resort giving us more and better options. Consequently, after years of choosing Las Leñas or Portillo (in Chile), I was delighted to come to Bariloche again.
Unfortunately, I am currently skiing at Catedral and it seems as if all the worst practices of the 80’s have started again: Poorly groomed runs; closed lifts; boring rows due to slow lifts and lack of personnel are back.
For example: Nubes, a chairlift that carry skiers to the best runs is not running; an avalanche happened two days ago due to lack of safety measures; etc.
Hopefully, the management of Alta Patagonia will focus on all these problems. If that’s not the case, unfortunately, I will have to choose other resort, as I did before.
August 05, 2008
Patrick from
Argentina
Patrick from
Argentina
Hi everyone... Ay Nicolas , please, Bariloche does have one of the best views in the world, but to say it's one of the best ski centers in the world , ah, funny funny. I've been skiing here for 20 years, here is my description.
Food great, beautiful and friendly people , great views, good nightlife, regular snow, very, very badly groomed, good but somewhat dangerous off-piste. Only one major problem . It is extremely badly managed by its owners and employees, making it even very, very dangerous place to ski. They are a bunch of very cheap people....., VERGUENZA NACIONAL !!!!!
August 05, 2008
Louisa J. from
Argentina
Louisa J. from
Argentina
I have skied Bariloche for the last 40 years. The mountain is fantastic, with breathtaking views of the lakes. The runs are rather on the short side but challenging and varied. The actual operator, Alta Patagonia, has invested in lifts but all of them are used and old. They keep breaking down and are very hard to fix (or so it seems since it usually takes days and sometimes weeks to have them running again). Runs are scarcely ever groomed and a good snowfall is seldom put to work by means of a good groom which would pack the snow and ready it for the next snowfall and so avoid your skis being hurt by stones. And as I mention this, how about working during the summer to make the pistes more friendly by removing some of the most obvious stones and flattening the parts where queues will form?. Usually they are uphill!! Amazing the things you have to do to reach your chair unhurt... While lift operators are friendly and easygoing, the people employed for selling tickets are not service oriented. Their hours are ridiculously short. The information provided by the mountain information service is usually wrong. And it is very tiresome having to show your ticket every time you take a lift... Locals have very rude manners, they push each other in queues and step on their neighbours skis or snowboards without a second thought. Food is great. Avoid school vacations!!
July 23, 2008
Robin from
Argentina
Robin from
Argentina
You`r right Marco, this is a monopoly, they can do what they want and nobody cares about it.. Today I asked if the ski lift at plaza was open and 4 different employs said yes, also the cashier who charged $155 each said yes it is open, but when we got there (1 hour later as you said) we noticed very surprised that the lift was NOT working. I did put a sign up being conscious that makes no difference for them anyway.. Alta Patagonia did make us waste our time and money. Really bad..
Also the few lifts they have working stops so many times on one way up that you get bored of skiing, 5 minutes down and waiting for hours to get up again. It`s a shame.
I also hate to say this but is the very truth.
July 21, 2008
Marco from
Argentina
Marco from
Argentina
Yes Robin, nice amount of snow since Friday. That means 4 days ago now. A pity the "operator" AltaPatagonia still keeps more than half of the mountain closed for skiing, including the "Bosque" and "Liure" runs which have more than enough snow to make runs. Maybe they want to save if for next summer? No off-piste lifts, no terrain park, no natural half pipe... They make people stand in line waiting more than an hour (This is NOT an exaggeration) for the lift tickets, then another hour for the Amancay-cablecar to find out there are no runs open there, still NOBODY puts a sign up! In the afternoon only 2 of the lifts work to discharge all the people from the mountain, although it could easily done with 6. Add another hour or so to descend. That is 155 pesos (50 $US) for skiing from 10:00 - 17:00 minus 3 hours = 4 hours of skiing, or 130 pesos (42 $US) for 13:00 - 17:00 minus 3 hours = 1 hour of skiing if you decide to use a pass for half a day.
I hate to say this because the mountain is beautiful, but the operator AltaPatagonia makes it a waste of time and money.
July 19, 2008
Robin from
Argentina
Robin from
Argentina
July 07, 2008
Aida from
United Kingdom
Aida from
United Kingdom
Dear people, Unfortunately you are wrong! I live in Bariloche and I've got a season ticket. I wish I were in Cerro Catedral skiing no matter how easy the piste! The few lifts that are open are only for pedestrians; there is
only one lift open to skiers provided they are beginners and go up with an instructor.
I sincerely hope we get snow soon. You mention a "Thursday", again. If you are talking about today you're wrong. Blue skies, only a few clouds and warm.
It is not easy to keep your spirits high, is it?
June 23, 2008
Martin from
Argentina
Martin from
Argentina
Excellent place to ski, probably one of the best in the world!
I know each ski resort has it's own pros & cons, but in this one, most of them are pros!
A few bad ones:
Too many trails and little long runs.
Chairlifts are slow if you take the beginners lifts (Princesa, Esquiadores), if you take the others (there are like 29 more) you'll be ok.
Lot's of moguls!
April 30, 2008
Kim from
United Kingdom
Kim from
United Kingdom
Living in Bariloche and skiing in Catedral.
I skied most of the 2007 season. I had a great time but the place is certainly not without problems. Here´s the good and bad of the place.
GOOD:
Scenery: Really some of the best scenery in the whole world on a clear day.
Snow: We had a dump of 2-3ft every 10 days or so. If you stay for 2 weeks you´re almost certain to have a few spectacular days at some point.
Off-piste skiing: The areas La Laguana and La Palmera offer some pretty challenging options as does the out of bounds section under Nubes. Be careful though. One guy died in an avalanche while I was there.
Food: Incredible (assuming you´re not vegetarian). Have the 3 course steak meal of your life with views of Chile from the top of Catedral for about a tenner.
Get good at moguls. They´re everywhere.
Bariloche morning bus connections are excellent and Bariloche´s a pretty decent place to live with some nice hostels. Getting back you may need to queue a while to get on the bus but there´s plenty of them. Journey time is about 40 mins.
BAD:
Random Argentinian factors. Stuff happens in Argentina that you´re not used to if you´re European. A few examples I recall include the resort being closed due to a catering strike, resort closed due to local elections, resort closed due to a gondola falling of the cable, day being ruined by incompetent staff in some unexpected way.
Grooming: Despite owning many snow-cats, they are rarely used.
Lifts: Nubes works well and when the queues aren´t long so does sextuple. Many of the other lifts are a complete joke, e.g. Princessa 1,2 and 3, Condor 1,2 and 3 which have been scavenged from US and European resorts and crawl up the mountain at an unacceptable snails pace.
Cat tracks are everywhere and are a pain if you want to do long continuous wide runs. You can work them to your benefit if you can work out the good points to use them as a jump.
Nearest