Excitement grows over new ski resort

Being among the first British travel writers to ski the only new winter sports resort the world has seen in 20 years was indeed an exciting prospect.

To heighten my anticipation, there were the whispers echoing through the Canadian Rockies that this ski area could be the new Whistler.

I also knew the exciting variety of terrain could match Whistler's steeps, as it was formerly used by a heli-skiing company that charged powder-seeking enthusiasts hundreds of dollars to be dropped on its majestic peaks. Now you can ski it for the price of a lift pass.

The resort is named Kicking Horse after Englishman Sir James Hector, who in 1858 suffered a blow to the head and was knocked unconscious by his horse while searching for a safe railroad path through the mountains. His Indian companions presumed him dead and started to bury him in a picturesque spot near a river. When to their astonishment he awoke, they named the 'life-giving' river Kicking Horse and, nearly 150 years on, the developers of the new ski area wisely put the name to good use.

So can it rival Whistler, attract thousands every weekend and rapidly build a luxury, thriving resort at the base of its lifts? After a nine-hour flight to Calgary and a three-and-a-half hour drive west over the Alberta border, pushing deep into the Purcell Mountains of British Columbia to reach the industrial valley town of Golden, which lies at the bottom of a ten-mile access road to Kicking Horse Mountain Resort, I already knew the answer: No.

It is too remote. Part of Whistler's success comes from the fact that it's just a 70-minute drive from Vancouver.

Kicking Horse will never be so commercially developed as Whistler and be spoilt by over-popularity. Nevertheless it will be a 'must-ski mountain' on every self-respecting powder enthusiast's list, like Jackson Hole in Wyoming or Argentiere, near Chamonix, France.

Curerntly there is just one lift at Kicking Horse - a high-speed gondola taking only 12 minutes to whisk you from the new base lodge to a 7,700ft summit where the Eagle's Eye, Canada's highest restaurant, has just been built. While the giant A-frame timber lodge boasts 30ft tall windows in its elegant dining room affording unobstructed views, I was braced for disappointment, as such fabulous venues can too often be spoilt by poor food. But such worries were amply blown away by the chef, Brian Shaben. If I had a sack full of Michelin Stars I would have thrown them over him like confetti.

For starters I had mini lamb chops on a duck crackling risotto and followed this with a seafood tower, featuring British Columbia salmon, Chilean sea bass and jumbo prawns basted in a grape reduction and complemented with a mango and bell pepper chutney. It was accompanied by Burrowing Owl, the local Okanagan Valley Cabernet Sauvignon.

For nearly £700 per suite per night, the extremely extravagant can stay at the summit in one of two private luxury suites built into the eaves of the A-frame lodge. They come with private concierge, dinner of your choice, magical views, a hearty breakfast-and first tracks on the mountain before the lifts open.

By day the top of the gondola reveals what Kicking Horse is fundamentally all about - steep faces, ridges, glades, chutes, bowls and pistes, all fanning out from the sinister-looking CPR ridge named after the Canadian Pacific Railroad which thunders through Golden in the valley below.

From here, 3,800ft above the base lodge, the longest run home is just over six miles. But there is such variety on the way down through steep chutes, open meadows and tree-lined pistes that you feel as if you have skied six different runs by the time you reach the bottom.

A second lift, to be installed this summer, will access the 4,100ft Blue Heaven summit, opening up another huge bowl with exciting acreage. There are only ten privately-owned condominiums on the mountain at present, but a resort village is part of the eventual proposal.

For now the town of Golden, with its huge logging, saw mill and rail freight industry, sits incongruously close by to the new tourist hotels such as the Ramada Inn, where I stayed, but this is nonetheless an interesting venue. There is something strangely comforting about the huge trans-Canada freight trains rolling through at night giving a protracted, rhythmic clicketyclack - it reminded me of other real Canadian mountain towns such as Rossland, Revelstoke and Fernie, which have special ski areas nearby.

But until the resort village is completed, the best way to experience Kicking Horse is by twinning your holiday with a stay in Banff. It's only two hours' drive away and offers the excellent resorts of Lake Louise, Sunshine and Norquay.

Getting there

For more details or to make direct reservations visit www.kickinghorseresort.com or phone 001 250 439 5400. For British tour operator packages or more information call Tourism BC in London on 020 7930 6857 or visit www.HelloBC.com

Destination guide: Canada