The skiing system isn't far away for those in Saskatchewan. (Wapiti Valley Ski and Board resort/Facebook)

By Nick Nielsen

Wapiti valley and Little Red

Ski hills near Melfort and Prince Albert opening soon

Nov 26, 2024 | 1:33 PM

With the recent dump of snow coming down around Saskatchewan, skiers may be getting excited to get on the hill and start cutting their way through the snow. For skiers waiting for the hills at Wapiti Valley Ski Board Resort and the ski hill at Little Red, the near foot of snow doesn’t quite do the trick.

As Nathan Streger explained, the operations manager for the ski hill at Little Red, the fresh snow at the start of the season can actually make it more difficult to groom the trails.

“It would have helped if we had like a base down where it could get turned in, but when it lands straight on the ground, it looks good aesthetically but there’s no catch. It (the trail groomer) just chews right through it into the dirt, so the man made snow is what we needed first. But it helps, it looks great out there. I’m not complaining.”

The temperatures in the Prince Albert area weren’t staying cold enough over night to get started on snow making, and as a result they don’t have an opening day set just yet, but hopefully during the first of December.

As for the folks at Wapiti Valley, General Manager Eileen Shaw said that they will not be opening the hill any sooner than December 14. With the weather cooperating, they started to make their artificial snow on Monday. With the temperatures staying well below the required minimum –10°C to make their snow for the foreseeable future, conditions to get the hill running on time and with better snow conditions.

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“-10°C is the warmest that we you can make it, but it then it’s more slushy, more icy, and the colder it is, the bigger your snow that you can make. So if it’s anything warmer than that, then it takes a lot more water, a lot more manpower to make the same amount of snow, which is what we had to do a little bit of last year.”

With Wapiti Valley hosting 15 separate runs all connected to one chairlift, don’t expect all 15 runs to be open right at the start of the season. The plan is to get the runs on one side of the chairlift ready so that the can welcome eager skiers, and if the weather isn’t looking favourable for skiers, then they’ll keep the chairlift shutdown and adjust their focus to getting the other side ready.

“As soon as we can get it workable we will, but mostly we can’t make snow and run the chair at the same time. That depends on the weather. If it’s going to be a really good day for snow making and it’s going to warm up, but we wouldn’t open, then we’d make our snow.”

Although last year was a tougher one with less snow and therefore worse skiing conditions and more man-made snow needing to be made than usual, the interest in skiing seems to be going up by Shaw’s account.

“It’s a great family sport. It’s something that you can do at your own level, so you can bring a whole family here, everybody be at a different level, and they can still enjoy doing it. We’re seeing a lot of families come to it. A lot of the older kids can be dropped off here for the day and spend the day doing it. The interest isn’t going down, that’s for sure. The first year after COVID it was a little different, but everybody was still anxious to be getting out and doing it and it’s been gradually progressing since.”

In Prince Albert and Melfort, the forecast does show chances of more flurries to come over the span of the next week.

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nick.nielsen@pattisonmedia.com