Ski season slowly draws to a close

The start of spring often signals the end of the ski season. But with the extremely cold and long winter we’ve experienced this year, some ski resorts have seen a boost in business. We paid a visit to Glen Eden in Milton to see how they felt about their ski season.

Steady cold & snow – the ingredients were right from the very beginning for Glen Eden to have a strong ski season.

Dave Beynon is with the Glen Eden Ski and Snowboard Centre: “The natural snow that feel — we really didn’t lose any, so our conditions have been fantastic all season long.”

Glen Eden first opened its doors on November 20 and their only hiccup along the way was that vicious December ice storm.

Dave said: “We did have to close for the ice storm, primarily because we didn’t have the infrastructure to operate.”

But the storm that snapped power lines, damaged trees and cut off electricity for many, didn’t keep the skiing haven down for long.

Dave said: “Once we opened up again it didn’t affect us on the slopes again we were fine. And our numbers were good.”

Glen Eden closed the door on their 2013/2014 ski season on March 23rd, and thanks to old man winter, it was one of their best seasons yet.

Dave said: “Last year, we were open for 81 days and this year were open 96 days. So it’s been a longer season. All of our departments that we run here including our rental shop mainteneance department have done well this year.”

Glen Eden will now focus on repairing ice storm damage to its property and preparing for its summer programs.

Dave said: “Our mountain biking trails — our beach, our picnic and camp sites.”

And it seems as though the ski centre could have stayed open even longer – if it wanted to.

Dave said: “We did have a busy, steady flow of people through here till the day we closed.”

A few other ski resorts offered their experiences this season.

Blue Mountain is still open. They opened up in November and that’s only the second time in a decade that has happened. They project a 7% increase in single day skiers for this season and their learn to ski programs are up 10% over last season.

Mount St. Louis-Moonstone is also open — but they said that the extreme cold really made their January disappointing. They have the largest school ski education program in Ontario. But can’t operate during temperatures colder than minus 10 — and that happened often during the first month of the year.