Red Mountain

Aficionados claim this funky, old-fashioned cult resort at the old mining town of Rossland provides some of the most exciting and challenging tree and meadow skiing in Canada. Hard-up, would-be heli-skiers adore it – a day in this part of the Kootenays is like a day's heli-skiing without the helicopter. There are two mountains and, confusingly, it's Granite Mountain – the bigger of the two – which provides most of the thrills. Red itself is by and large a lower-intermediate hill. A good 50% of Granite Mountain's terrain is advanced, but that doesn't mean there's nothing for average skiers. The Long Squaw trail, for example, is a superb roller coaster boulevard. Red Mountain is not the easiest place to get to and has little on-mountain accommodation. Explore it before it becomes commercialised