Ski Marmot Basin near Jasper, Alberta, Canada

Jezz and I on the new chair lift at Marmot Basin in Jasper National Park, Alberta (Canada). Photo by Anastasia Martin-Stilwell.

I’m so relieved to never have to say the phrase, “I’m from Vancouver but I’ve never been skiing” again. This weekend, Travel Alberta brought me to Jasper so I could get my first ever skiing lesson on Marmot Basin in Jasper National Park (in the Canadian Rocky Mountains).

It started off well when staff arranged for Jezz, a British import from Southampton, England to be my instructor. I was told on my way to the lesson area that it helps your skiing skills to have a cute instructor

Perhaps they were right. After a few demos of snow plows, the occasional crossing of my skis and reminders to keep my eyes up so I could see where I was going, we jumped on the new speedy quad chair and headed to the top of the mountain.

Two small falls later and I was able to pick up some speed and go from snow plowing to actually skiing with some smoothness. Just as I began getting confident, hooting and hollering at each turn and humming “da da da da, da da, da da,” my skis got caught up in each other slightly as I was picking up speed. I stumbled, taking a face plant, my body sliding to a halt.

All I could think of was brushing the snow from my face as I checked my eyes, one month removed from laser eye surgery. All was well, thank god.

Lori Henry doing snowplows on Marmot Basin in Jasper National Park, Alberta (Canada). Photo by Anastasia Martin-Stilwell.

I was a bit more cautious after that and got a “job well done” assessment from Jezz at the bottom of the hill.

What I Liked:

• Jasper Tourism was holding a media lunch to promote their Jasper in January event this January 15-31, 2010. We had a wonderful buffet meal upstairs at the Paradise Chalet and refuelled for the last leg of the mountain to ski down post-feast.
• There were no more wipeouts, although my body reminded me of the big fall all the next day in the form of soreness…
• Marmot Basin is a fantastic ski mountain. Once a small local ski destination, it’s now well-reputed outside of Jasper and has the new high speed quad chair that takes skiers and snowboarders 1.5 miles and up 1,955 vertical feet in 7.5 minutes.

Tags: Alberta, canada, Canadian Rocky Mountains, Jasper, Jasper in January, Jasper National Park, Jasper Tourism, new quad chair, Paradise Chalet, Ski Marmot Basin