Cars topped with skis and snowboards are a common sight in Nelson at this time of year, but is it just great snow that makes a renown ski town?
“Nelson makes it into our best of skiing awards every year,” said Iain MacMillan, editor of the Ontario ski magazine Ski Canada. “We probably get almost as many people — whether they are readers, contributors or PR people commenting on things around Nelson as we do from Whistler, and there are slightly different populations there.”
MacMillan sees a lot about skiing, ski towns and resorts through his job, and as an avid skier often gets a chance to see them first hand.
He recently returned from a ski trip which took him from Silverstar, to Red Mountain and Whitewater (even though it was only for 24 hours.)
“It was my first visit,” said MacMillan. “And even though I’ve been with the magazine forever and read and edited so many stories so many times about Nelson and Whitewater — and I have friends who have moved there — I don’t know why it’s taken me so long to get there and why my visit was only 24 hours. I absolutely loved it.”
Ski destinations like Fernie and Revelstoke draw what MacMillan calls “weekend warriors” from big communities like Calgary.
“You’re in Nelson because you want to be there on purpose,” he said. “It’s not like you just happen to be driving through from one big city to another.”
MacMillan said Nelson offers a different ski experience from places like Whistler.
“What people look for when they go looking for a good ski hill is often great powder, good steeps and good tree skiing,” he said.
But what sets Nelson and similar ski towns apart is the town.
“A purpose-built village may not be as popular as one that already existed,” he said. “Those two are just very different products and personally I prefer getting in the car and driving out from some mining town or Nelson-like town to the ski hill and coming back to town at night, but I’d say the majority of skiers are the opposite, they like to ski back to the door and unfortunately — in my mind — the condo has ruined the ski experience.”
For the Best of Skiing Awards, the magazine relies heavily on anecdotal information from readers, contributors and public relations people because MacMillan said without it they would always see the same results.
“Nelson would always win powder, Rossland will always get best trees and Whistler will get the best infrastructure. These numbers don’t change,” he said. “Certainly when you add up all sorts of things like history to the general vibe of people who live in the town, Nelson is right up there in the top two or three ski towns in the country.”