A Guide to Ski Resorts near Vancouver

February 12, 2025December 10, 2025 / Maria / Leave a comment

I’ve been living in Vancouver for over 10 years now and I’ve been downhill skiing every single one of those years. Most of my time has been spent at Whistler Blackcomb, but I make a point to try and ski a new resort every year. I haven’t made it to every ski resort on this list, but I’m sure I’ll get to them all one day!

Local Mountains

Cypress Mountain

Cypress is the biggest of the local mountains and the first resort I skied in BC. The resort is split between Black Mountain and Mount Strachan and has 4 major chair lifts. It’s a very busy mountain on weekends, so my preference is hitting up the mountain after work for night skiing! The highlight of this mountain is the view of Howe Sound from the Sky Chair.

Mount Seymour

A group of snowshoers head downhill in winter on a snowy mountain with snow covered trees and a view of Vancouver city in the background from Brockton Point in Seymour Mountain Provincial Park in British Columbia, Canada.

Seymour is a great family mountain. It has two lifts and is a great little mountain if you have kids or are learning to ski. It will be busy here as it’s a popular location for snowshoeing and touring as well. My favourite way to visit is to skin up to Brockton Point on my touring skis and then ski down through the resort. It’s a great place for night skiing and sunset views!

Grouse Mountain

Grouse is probably the most well known resort in the city as the ski slopes can be seen from all over the lower mainland, especially when they’re lit up for night skiing. Believe it or not, I have never actually skied Grouse, mostly because it’s the smallest resort and you have to take a gondola from the base to access anything, but I’ve heard the views are unparalleled!

Resorts within a 2-hour drive

Whistler Blackcomb

A photo of Peak Chair as seen from Roundhouse at Whistler. There is a Canadian flag in the foreground and snow covered mountain peaks on a blue sky day in the background, at Whistler, BC.

Whistler Blackcomb is by far the most well known ski resort on this list, and for good reason. It’s a premier ski resort and it has access to an incredible amount of terrain. I ski Whistler Blackcomb for 5-6 days every year and I never get tired of it. It will always be busy, so embrace the early morning rise to get in a few good runs before the crowds really pick up! My favourite areas to ski are 7th Heaven on Blackcomb and Symphony on Whistler.

Sasquatch Mountain

Sasquatch is a small resort north of Harrison. It’s surprisingly close to the city, but difficult to access because it has a gravel road that requires snow tire chains. But it’s a really nice resort with 3 chairs and low crowds (even on weekends). It didn’t have much powder when I visited it, but I’ve heard it can get a nice amount of powder and the runs seem designed around this, with lots of gladed tracks down the mountain.

Manning Park

A view of lightning lakes covered in snow during the winter, with the trees and mountains in the background on a cloudy day in E.C. Manning Provincial Park in BC.

Manning Park is another small resort. It’s further than Sasquatch, but generally easier to access. The challenge with Manning is that there are very limited accommodations near the resort. So plan to either drive up and back in a day, or stay in Sunshine Valley or Hope. I adore Manning Park for its unlimited recreation activities and while its cross country trails are much more well known, it has a nice downhill resort as well.

Mount Baker

I have explored a lot around Mount Baker, but I haven’t had the opportunity to ski there yet (not for lack of trying, I had to cancel 2 trips). Odds are, most of the people skiing Mount Baker will be from BC to take advantage of the high amount of powder they get. The North Cascades are a beautiful place to visit and I love spending time in this area. There’s no where to stay on the mountain, but you can stay in Glacier, Bellingham, or drive there and back in a day.

Resorts within a 3-5 hour drive

Sun Peaks

Sun Peaks is the next biggest resort after Whistler. It’s located just north of Kamloops and is a great ski destination! There are tons of accommodations and there is lots of terrain to explore. The runs span both sides of the highway and have a huge variety of alpine and glade runs. Some of the smaller resorts on this list can be visited in a day, but definitely give yourself at least 2 days at Sun Peaks!

Big White

Of all the resorts I’ve visited in the interior, Big White is probably my favourite. It gets great snow and it has some fabulous runs. It’s located east of Kelowna and has tons of chair lifts to keep you busy. I really liked the ski village in Big White – Sun Peaks felt really large, while other resort villages felt a bit small. I may have a soft spot for this resort because it was the location of my first group ski trip, but I definitely want to go back in the future.

Silver Star

Silver Star Resort is located north of Vernon and is smaller than Big White and Sun Peaks. It also attracts less crowds, but can feel busy due to the smaller number of chair lifts. I’ll admit, Silver Star wasn’t my favourite resort, but I think it’s mostly because it didn’t have great conditions when I visited. It has a really nice village and I’d definitely be willing to give it another try!

Apex

Apex is one of the lesser known resorts in the interior (or at least, it feels that way). It’s located further south, east of Princeton, but west of Penticton. It gets less crowds than the other resorts I visited, but it had some truly awesome powder! I’m not sure if this is a common theme, but I have heard it tends to get dumped on in the winter. It’s a small village, but my favourite part was the forest skate loop!

Mount Washington

If you want to visit Vancouver Island, Mount Washington is pretty much your only option. Take the ferry to Nanaimo and then drive north to Courtenay. Mount Washington is on the boundary of Strathcona Provincial Park and while the road up the mountain isn’t it great shape, it is a really nice resort for skiing and snowshoeing!

Stevens Pass

I discovered this resort because it’s included in my edge card/epic pass for Whistler. It’s located east of Seattle and is incredibly popular among the locals. There’s no ski village, so we stayed in Skykomish and drove into the resort in the morning. Be prepared for terrible traffic coming out of Seattle and aim for an early start. The lift passes will sell out and the parking lot will fill up, both of which will result in you being denied entrance. But it’s a great ski resort with some nice terrain if you plan accordingly!

Russet Lake Backpacking Trip

September 22, 2023July 11, 2024 / Maria / 4 Comments

After a month of resting my foot from my plantar fasciitis injury on the HBC Trail, I was really determined to get back in the backcountry. To be honest, my foot was definitely not feeling 100%, but I had a two week hiking trip planned for the end of August and I really needed to test out hiking again before committing to that trip. We had permits to camp at Russet Lake in mid-August, so it was a good opportunity to test the waters. Me and Brandon bought our Whistler edge cards early this year, and the pass comes with a free summer sightseeing ride on the gondola, so our plan was to take the gondola up to the top of Whistler and hike to Russet Lake from there.

This was my first time hiking at Whistler-Blackcomb and I was totally blown away by it! I’ve never bothered to pay for the gondola up because it is expensive and I spend a lot of time there in the winter, but it is absolutely worth visiting in the summer. There are a ton of cool trails up there, as well as another entrance to Garibaldi Provincial Park. I’ve done all the other major hikes in Garibaldi Park (Garibaldi lake, Elfin lakes, Wedgemount lake, etc), so this was the last big hike in the park for me. That said, even with the gondola, Russet Lake is still a challenging hike. It’s not at all technical, but more psychologically challenging with the topography of the terrain.

There’s a few options for hiking to Russet Lake. I think the most common option is to take the gondola up the mountain and hike from either Roundhouse or Peak Chair via the High Note trail (like we did). This route is approximately 12km long, with 600m of elevation gain. However the gondola pass is just shy of $100, so the free option is to hike up from Whistler base via the Singing Pass trail. It’s only 3km longer than hiking from peak chair, but it has more than 1400m of elevation gain. That said, it’s a gentle uphill most of the way.

I didn’t do the Singing Pass trail, but the reason I say the route via High Note is psychologically challenging is because there’s a lot of up and down. Every time you finish a peak, you can see several kilometres forward to the next peak that you’re going to have to hike down and up again. We had to do this 4 times, so it some ways it felt harder. However, it’s worth noting that it’s a net downhill hike on the way to Russet Lake, so there’s more uphill on the way back. If you want to try both trails, you could hike down the Singing Pass trail on the way back instead.

Me and Brandon were joined by Carolyn and her friend Scott on this trip and they opted to hike up the Singing Pass trail. So between us we did both, but Carolyn and Scott joined us on the return trip to complete the rest of the High Note trail, which loops back to Roundhouse. I would say that Russet Lake is an ambitious hike for a single day (24km roundtrip), but the High Note trail is a great option for a day hike from the gondola. It starts at the top of the Peak chair and there’s a few cool new attractions, such as the Skybridge. From there it hikes down around the back of all the chair lifts, looping back to Roundhouse around Piccolo Summit. It’s a 10km loop option to do this trail, but I’d recommend adding on an extra 1km each way to go to the top of Flute Summit – in my opinion this was one of the best views along the entire trail.

But let’s talk about Russet Lake. The biggest thing of note when we visited was the wildfire smoke. It was perfectly clear in Vancouver the night before we did the hike, but then a lot of smoke from Kelowna started to roll in in the early morning. The closer we got to Whistler, the smokier it got. Honestly, we probably shouldn’t have gone, the smoke is really not good for your lung health, but it seems to be a fact of life in the Pacific Northwest these days, so we opted to go anyways.

Carolyn and Scott headed off on the Singing Pass trail and beat us to Russet Lake by more than 2 hours. It took me and Brandon a while to get to the top because we had to take the Blackcomb gondola, followed by the Peak to Peak gondola, followed by Peak chair. But we had the best time on the trail and the views were fantastic! You leave the resort and enter Garibaldi Provincial Park just after Flute Summit. The biggest uphill section on the way there is right before Russet Lake and when you crest the top of the pass you can see the very fancy Claire and Kees Hut looking down to the lake.

The Hut is pretty incredible. It’s managed by the ACC and requires advance booking of course. The campsite is managed by BC Parks and also requires advance booking 4 months prior to when you want to go. Permits disappear quickly, so mark your calendar in advance! The hut is gorgeous, but the campsites are right on the lake, so personally I preferred the campground. From the campsite you can look out to Fissile Peak and Overlord Glacier, so it’s pretty cool.

We went for a quick swim in the cold water immediately after arriving and then Carolyn and Scott left to head up to Whirlwind Peak for more views. Me and Brandon considered joining them, but my foot needed a break, so we ended up just climbing a short way up for a view of the lake to have our dinner instead. Carolyn and Scott opted not to go the whole way to Whirlwind Peak, but got a few more views of the area.

My foot was definitely tired when we got to Russet Lake, but overall doing well. I made a point to stop once an hour on the way there to roll it on a ball and stretch it. Regular breaks makes a huge difference and since then it’s become a part of my hiking regimen to make sure I stop every 5km to rest it.

The rest of our evening was spent lying out enjoying the views and being a bit giddy about being out in the backcountry again. We were eventually driven back to our beds as it got colder. It was pretty cool overnight, but warmed up quickly again with the sun in the morning.

Unfortunately, the smoke was worse in the morning and there was a real smell of bonfire in the air. When you’re out in it for too long, it definitely gets in your sinuses and I had a bit of a persistent cough for the next week, which is why I don’t recommend it. It helps to wear a wet mask, but it’s hard to hike uphill with a mask on. At one point even my eyes were watering from the smoke.

Carolyn and Scott joined us on the hike back to Roundhouse because we all wanted to go to the Umbrella Bar. It’s more uphill on the way back, but I actually preferred it because I find going uphill easier on my foot than going down. There’s a few cute lakes on the way back and you hike through the actual ski resort, so it was cool to compare the terrain in the summer to terrain that I’m very familiar with in the winter because it looks like a different world depending on the season.

The Umbrella Bar turned out to be a bit of a bust. You can get drinks, but there’s very limited food, so we opted to download the gondola and eat in the village instead. We treated ourselves to burgers to celebrate a successful trip. For me, I was celebrating that my injury hadn’t prevented me from doing the trip and looking forward to heading to the Rockies just 1 week later. Overall it was an eye-opening trip for me – I feel like there’s a whole world of hiking at Whistler that I didn’t know about. So if you get the chance, definitely check it out!

Hiking Skywalk North

September 14, 2022August 20, 2024 / Maria / 1 Comment

Last week I said Tricouni Meadows might be my favourite hike of the season… then I did Skywalk North and now I can’t decide! After such a successful hike at Tricouni, I was enthusiastic to try another day hike. This time we decided on the Skywalk North Trail in Whistler – it doesn’t require any off-roading, but is a much longer trail with much more elevation gain.

I’ve heard of the Iceberg Lake hike, which is quite popular, but I hadn’t heard much about the Skywalk trails, which I found in the 105 Hikes book by Stephen Hui. There’s a ton of hiking trails in the area and many mountain bike paths – the Skywalk trails consist of 2 loops with a shared middle section. The South Trail leaves from Alpine Way and the North Trail leaves from Mountain View Drive (both in Whistler). The South Trail is a bit shorter, but if you want to visit Iceberg Lake, they’re both probably about the same length because it’s a branch to visit the lake on the South Trail, whereas the North Trail goes right past it.

So both trails are ~20km including the lake, though we tracked 22km on GPS, and over 1000m in elevation gain, so it is definitely a big hike and you should give yourself enough time to complete it. We started just before 10am and didn’t finish until just after 7pm. For the most part it’s not a very technical hike and it has a lot of flat sections, but this just means it does a lot of gain in a short distance, so it is steep.

On VancouverTrails, it says it’s 7.5km to the lake, but my GPS tracked 9km and 900m of elevation gain, but I didn’t find this part of the trail difficult at all. The trail starts with a steep climb, then flattens as you walk through the trees along the river and past some waterfalls. Then you climb again up to the meadows where you meet the junction for the Skywalk South Trail. There’s an outhouse and a gorgeous view up to the glacier. It’s another 1km to the lake, which is the most technical part of the hike. You have to hike up through the boulder field to the base of the glacier. This was one of my favourite parts of the hike though because there were lots of wildflowers growing around the streams coming down from the glacier and it was very scenic!

It took us about 3 hours to get up to Iceberg Lake. We barely saw anyone on the hike up to the meadows and once we left the lake, but it was fairly busy from the meadows to the lake. It was strangely cold on the day we visited though. Vancouver had been nursing a steady heatwave since mid July, but on the weekend we went, we got a brief cold spell and we had to layer up with fleeces and windbreakers at the lake. But not before I went for a swim!

I pride myself on almost always going for a swim, no matter how cold the water is and this was no exception. I knew I was going to get cold fast once I stopped moving and my sweat cooled, so I stripped down to my swimsuit immediately. It was definitely some of the coldest water I’ve been in and I didn’t stay in for more than a minute. By the time I crawled out my body was already starting to go numb, but it was cool to briefly swim with all the bergy bits – that was a first for me!

We hung out at the lake for a bit before continuing on. If you’re doing the South trail, you’ll have to hike back to the meadows, but the North trail climbs up over the pass on the right side of the mountain to continue into the sub-alpine. Unless you’re doing the shortest route (up and back on the Iceberg Lake Trail), I’d really recommend Skywalk North (though I haven’t done the South Trail yet). The hike up the pass was my favourite part of the whole hike because you get to look down on the lake and the glacier, which is a cooler vantage point than looking up on it.

Once you get to the top of the pass, the trail flattens out again and you spend a lot of time hiking through meadow after meadow. We stopped at the top for a bit of a photoshoot and then took our time hiking down. What I liked about the North trail is that you get to spend a lot more time in the sub-alpine than if you just did the Iceberg Lake trail. There’s a great view looking out towards Whistler-Blackcomb, Wedgemount, and Pemberton and the alpine meadows were all in bloom with yellow arnica, purple lupins, white sitka valeria, and pink mountain heather. Plus by doing a loop you get to experience all new terrain!

This part of the hike did take us a bit longer than anticipated. The down side to Berg Lake is that you eat your lunch when you haven’t done half of the trail, so it does make for a long afternoon. We hit Screaming Cat Lake around 4pm, which is a large lake before you start the downhill. I decided to go for a swim again and I was thrilled because Screaming Cat is not a glacial lake and is much warmer, so you can actually go for an enjoyable swim. It was still pretty cold, but once you got in, it was actually warmer in the water than out of it and we stayed in for a while, with both Lien and Brandon joining me.

The rest of the hike was pretty painful for me. It’s been a while since I’ve done so much elevation gain in one day and my knees were starting to bother me. After Cat Lake you have to do about 850m of downhill, which gets progressively steeper. It’s still a very nice hike – the trees aren’t tightly packed, so the forest had a very sunny feeling, but my knees were both killing me. I got slower and slower and pretty much crawled down the last 2km. We added a bit more distance to take the less steep routes where possible to save my knees. Even still, it was just after 7pm when we exited the trail, which I thought was pretty good all things considered!

We drove back to Squamish and had a delicious meal before heading back to Vancouver. I don’t think I got home until 11pm, so it was a very long day, but I really loved the hike! It’s a lot of work, but high reward and a lot of time spent in the alpine! Definitely recommend for those long summer days. Though I’d be wary of going on a really hot day – a lot of the hike is exposed and it’s a lot of climbing to do with no shade.