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COLUMNS SPORTS DECEMBER 2005

North Carolina is skiing's best-kept secret.
December 2005

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WORDS BY DeMARCO WILLIAMS

DID YOU SNOW
When the ski slopes prove costly elsewhere, North Carolina’s got you covered.

Bad luck,” “Dodge Ram” and “Civil War” are phrases few people realize are oxymoronic. The words “North Carolina skiing” are said so infrequently that they may not even warrant the “oxy” part. The state’s known for slam dunks, soccer and shopping, but slopes and slaloms? Quit pulling our Columbia-covered pants leg.

But really, amid the lush hills of the Western Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains, lie scenes few outside the Old North State knew existed— actual ski resorts. Vacation magazines toss superlatives like snowballs Telluride and Vail’s way. The travel shows trumpet Deer Valley and Jackson Hole in much the same fashion. But contrary to powdery belief, scaled-back winter wonderlands have nestled east of the Mississippi and south of the Allegheny for decades.

“The vast majority of people don’t even know that there’s skiing in the states of North Carolina,” notes Mike Doble, owner of the independent online resources www.SkiNC.com and www.SkiSoutheast.com. “The resorts themselves do very little advertising off the mountain and really depend on the mountains to draw the crowds. Word of mouth and some individual resort advertising make up the bulk of the traffic needed and gained.”

Most of the eight North Carolina resorts simply don’t have the budget to compete with Vermont and Colorado’s marketing dollars. So they counter aggressive ad campaigns with convenience. “The main draw of the mountains is the close proximity to most of the Southeast,” adds Doble, a man trying to shovel the region out of skiing obscurity. “A two- or three-day trip won’t cost you thousands that you’d spend traveling and staying out west. While the skiing isn’t up to Colorado standards, the resorts of North Carolina can offer an excellent bit of skiable terrain for all skier levels.”

Sugar Mountain in Banner Elk, North Carolina, is just 115 miles west of Charlotte. Catch the glistening hills on the right January morning and your eyes won’t know if they’re in Whistler, British Columbia or Winston-Salem. Unfortunately, the white stuff doesn’t usually accumulate until after the New Year. Until then, the Upper and Lower Flying Mile slopes (running about one mile with a 1,200-foot vertical drop) are covered in the finest artificial stuff resort money can buy. Another draw for Sugar —in addition to the resort’s reasonable $20 weekday and $30 weekend lift tickets—is its wonderful schedule of events: The always-rocking Sugar Fest (December 17-18), the senior citizen-focused Septuagenarian Party (January 10) and the Sugar Bear Birthday Celebration (February 26) assure there’s plenty for the budget-minded family to enjoy.

Neighboring Beech Mountain’s Ski Beech is another great destination when Aspen is out of the financial equation. The highest ski area in eastern North America, the resort has attracted slope novices and experts since 1967. While a tad more expensive (weekend tickets are $50), Ski Beech makes up for it in fine accommodations. Be it a country inn with jumbo shrimp on the menu or a slopeside chalet with majestic views, there are potential postcard scenes aplenty in the bustling resort town.

Blame spotty advertising for such knowledge going largely unknown outside of Blue Ridge. However, if Ski Beech, Sugar Mountain and other area locales keep doing the admirable jobs they do with the natural resources they have, it’s only a matter of time before there’s a flurry of bookings across western North Carolina reservation desks.

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