Finding Fernie
The best mountain you’ve never heard of.
Like most skiers, I have a mental list of mountains that I like. The top of my list includes a handful of mountains that I love to ski – my go-to reserve I can always count on. But I also like to keep a list of mountains that I hope to ski in the future – my aspirational list of legendary mountains where people come back with incredible stories, great photos, and memories that last a lifetime. Those “man, you should have been there” places that skiers dream of experiencing at some point in their life. When we started planning our Gravity QuestTM Challenge, Fernie had never been on any of our lists, but that’s because nobody talks about Fernie! But Fernie just might be the best mountain we’d never heard of.
If you like mountains like Snowbird, Jackson Hole, and Telluride, or if you’re one of the diehards who dream about legendary mountains like Revelstoke and Kicking Horse, then you need to know about Fernie. It’s the hidden gem of the bunch. It’s the kind of place that once you’ve skied it, you can’t understand how it’s still a secret. It feels like it should be famous, offering huge bowls, deep snow, a cool town, and real culture — yet it remains strangely under the radar. Raw, unrefined, and unconstrained, Fernie is a true skier’s mountain. You don’t go there for the scene or the selfies. You go there to ski, let loose, and be challenged. That’s it. That’s the whole pitch.
Did I mention what a cool town it has? A charming little village dropped in the middle of nowhere surrounded by mature pines, wooden buildings, old-world charm, and everything buried in white. Less than an hour from the Montana border, Fernie has a European feel that makes you think you’ve flown across the Atlantic Ocean to get there.
On our first day, I took the opportunity to walk the village at around 6:00am before anyone was up. The air was cold and crisp, and the solitude created a quiet I could almost feel — but it didn’t last. In under three hours the lifts started to spin, boots clomped against wooden planks, skis clanked on the metal racks, and the whole place started to hum with the excitement of the day. There’s something about having the mountain to yourself and watching a ski town wake up that sets the day right. I just kept thinking the same dumb, happy thought, “I can’t believe I’ve never heard of this place before!”
And the mountain delivers. Fernie belongs with the greats — the likes of Revelstoke and Kicking Horse — that exist in a league of their own: steep, deep, challenging runs that make you think before you drop in, then dare you to lose focus once you’re under their influence. On our first few runs we just locked in and ripped. Unfamiliar with the mountain, we followed each line wherever it took us, the joy and the adrenaline of the moment pulling us forward, and the second we reached the bottom, we wanted nothing more than to catch the lift to do it again.
The best stuff we found was off the backside — we dropped in to find waist-deep powder, slipping in and out of the trees trying not to drown in our own slough. The runout was every bit as fun as the steeps up top. We just kept pumping, kept our speed, and fought through the exhaustion until our legs were screaming and our faces hurt from grinning. That’s Fernie. It doesn’t hand you anything. You earn it, and that’s kind of the point.
The day we were there it was very cold. I’m talking the type of cold where your fingers are bundled into fists inside your gloves cold. Nothing some grinding turns, a pair of heated gloves, and a warm adult beverage couldn’t cure — but the cold probably did us a favor as it left the slopes pretty much all to us, the diehards who’d driven too far to “sit this one out” over a little freezing weather. Admittedly, we were frozen on the outside, but we warmed up quickly once we got moving. Without a doubt, Fernie is legit, and if you’re willing to make the journey it delivers.
One day I’ll never forget had nothing to do with skiing. After skiing all day, we walked a quarter mile through the snow to find dinner — pitch black, no idea where we were going, we kept hoping the restaurant was just around the next bend. Sure enough, we found a charming little chalet that felt like it sat in the middle of nowhere, full of warm, friendly people and good cheer that carried the feeling of the mountain right into the evening. After some great food and an ample number of drinks, the place revealed its secret: the Ice Bar. A private vault carved entirely out of ice, serving more than forty different vodkas in ice shot glasses with a bar, wait for it, made of ice. A rack of Helly Hansen expedition jackets lined the entrance so we threw them on over the coats we were already wearing so we could stay as long as we liked without turning into one of the ice fixtures ourselves. Great music, dancing, the whole crew, and plenty of ice-cold vodka to keep the mood climbing. Unforgettable.
Here’s the thing that made all of it land a little deeper. Gravity Quest is what got us off the couch and up to Fernie in the first place — motivated us to do more, go further, and actually try to make a difference for kids. So, all that fun, all that powder, that ridiculous ice vault full of vodka — it was adding up to meals for kids who needed them. Great skiing, great people, a great cause, all wrapped into one trip. It was incredible on so many levels.
Find Fernie. Nobody’s going to hand it to you. Point the car north, drive a little too far, show up when it’s a little too cold, and go discover the best mountain you’ve never heard of.