Sunshine Village Opens Wed. Nov 11

love that mountain. The dive is amazing, low skier density and tons of room to play, countless chutes. Still cant geta feel for the vertical drop in there felt less then silverton (~2k to 2.5k with hike) guide told me it was 3k, don't know it was not great vis. Also ran laps on back side of Goats head, reminded me of greely bowl at alta with no one there. I wis h I could ski Sunshine and the back of Lousie all the time. Enjoy it and if you go in the dive post some pics.
 
Enjoy it and if you go in the dive post some pics.
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The Dive is only reliably open in late season. Last year it opened on something like March 28. It was not open in early February of my 2004 and 2008 visits. There was one year they got a lot of snow early (3 years ago?) and it did open in late November. Sunshine is the Canadian counterpart of Loveland/A-Basin, at its best both on a an absolute scale and relative to other ski areas in March and later.

That said, the amount of early snow this year is much more than normal, so the drive-up locals should get on it.
 
I've been to sunshine twice, both times in late November. Both times it was pretty snowy, and I appreciated the good views and the terrain. The hotel in middle of the mountain reminds me a bit of what I imagine portillo is like. I like that it is definitely the type of resort that if you "see it you can ski it." As far as vert I don't think there is much, the longest trail shouldn't count as it is really just a long flat path to get you to your car and isn't really connected to the rest of the mountain. I liked Sunshine better than Lake Louise, but again it was late November.
 
The Wildwest is a collection of 6 or 7 tight chutes. Same rules as the Dive. Ski patrol use to say the Wildwest made The Dive look like a green run. Last year was a worse snow year than normal and the Extreme areas usually do open in Jan. They are very steep and being in a National Park they are very safety conscious in openning these areas. If the snow keeps coming they will possibly be open by Christmas. Keep our fingers crossed. There is another extreme area beside the teepee town chair that has been open , but not since it took out a Patroler doing Avy control. Beat him up real bad a few years ago. Maybe 4 or 5 lines with mandatory 20 or 30 foot air.
 
Tony Crocker":2r4vm4iz said:
You have a short memory. This detailed write-up from ChrisC was based upon a visit the same time you were at Sunshine in late March 2007.
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That's frightening... I scrolled down the thread thinking, "wow, these are great pix, why haven't I seen them before?".

Then I notice that I posted in it twice. :?
 
I thought I posted some pics of my visit there in Late march of 2006. Probably not now that I think of it I didn't find FTO till fall of 06. The weather was cloudy/foggy when I went with the guide and that added to the mystique/stepness of it all. Hit Bre X and delirum as snow conditions where excellent windblown 10" frech type on top of a deep soft base. Great for snowboards. It was pretty much untracked and with the wind condition it filled in every lap. Last run we did Galaxy 4 as I totaly freaked on the traverse to the Milkey way bowl. My old board boots where not sticking to a traverse packed by skiers and I almost slipped of the back side ( the traverse runs behind the ridge) I used my shovel as a ancor and proggresed slowly and eventually sadi to the guid e can we drop in here. He was like sure, we then scraped down a 20 ft goat track on a cliff band before dropping a mandatory 5 ft cliff into a tight coulior that lasted about 25ft that was maybe 5ft wide. It opened into some of the better bowl skiing I had ever had. Mid you I was to nervous to take any pics. wish I had. He did take me into Wheeler in Wild west, the weather was far better down there and I thought it was great also. I guess the time to go is late season 3-4 days after snow.
 
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