Skiing the online slopes
Since I’ve been skiing a little bit recently (for the first time in years), I decided to check out what was happening online in the skiing world. Specifically I wondered if there were any ski blogs out there and if the many ski magazines offer online archives of their content.
Just like every other topic under the sun, skiing is well covered in blog land; no chance for fresh tracks here. A couple of quick searches uncovered blogs about backcountry skiing, New England skiing, ski adventures from around the country, skiing products and fashion, Colorado skiing, an attempt to ski 120 days of powder, Euro-centric skiing, and even a skiing videoblog.
Most of the skiing blogs I found focus on their respective author’s adventures on the slopes. If someone wanted to start a skiing meta-blog (blogging not just skiing adventures but other skiing-related topics and pointing to other people’s adventures), would there be enough good information out there to point to? The magazine racks of ski country convenience stores are filled with all kinds of periodicals about skiing…how much of that content is online? From what I can tell, the skiing magazines do offer content on their sites, but not necessarily from the pages of their print magazines. Both SKI Magazine and Skiing Magazine have archived print articles on their sites, but only from June 2005 and earlier. Both have other resources like forums, skiing news, resort details, videos, and online-only features. Neither site is organized particularly well for quick information perusal and retrieval. Skipressworld offers PDF versions of their entire print magazine online, including the current issue. Powder magazine has some online archives as well as online-only features like videos and message boards.
And so on…Google News is currently featuring over 10,000 articles about skiing (although much of that is due to the impending Winter Olympics), Flickr has thousands of skiing photos, and nearly all the ski areas an resorts have web sites on which you can check the current conditions, the lines at the chairlift via webcams, and trail maps. Killington is even doing podcasts.
So there’s lots of skiing info out there. I know there must be a few skiers among the kottke.org readership…what are your favorite skiing sites and resources online?
Reader comments
kingbennyFeb 07, 2006 at 5:45PM
I love the Flickr skiing group.
McSixthFeb 07, 2006 at 5:54PM
Freeskier magazine has a web site.
tienFeb 07, 2006 at 6:13PM
at least it's finally cold out so we can go skiing.
MichaelFeb 07, 2006 at 6:32PM
I like RubberSnow.com, it's a text messaging service that lets you know the conditions at the slopes over your cell phone.
RandyFeb 07, 2006 at 6:37PM
Steepandcheap.com - one awesome deal a day on ski or winter gear.
AndrewFeb 07, 2006 at 6:39PM
Alpine Zone and Snow Journal are news/forum sites focusing on northeastern skiing.
Ted HarperFeb 07, 2006 at 6:48PM
ski.com.au is mainly focussed on skiing in Australia (yes we have snow, and it is during the northern hemisphere summer too). Very active discussion forums on that site also, with a lot of members who travel overseas to ski every (northern) season as well as skiing locally.
CoryFeb 07, 2006 at 6:49PM
I haven't found many telemark sites that I visit regularly, so I end up at Utah Avalanche Center advisory and Alta.
RobFeb 07, 2006 at 6:50PM
Wow, someone else uses RubberSNOW! They also started a mountain guide wiki called www.Wikimtn.com.
NicoleFeb 07, 2006 at 6:56PM
Thanks for the links. I hadn't even thought about scouting out Colorado ski blogs, but after a short wandering of sites I see there are quite a few out there. I'm new to Colorado and skiing (though I'm addicted after three days on the mountains) so these will be great additions to Bloglines.
My main resource is the Ski Loveland site to check the snow report before I head out.
SarahFeb 07, 2006 at 7:26PM
I like snowforecast.com for great microclimate forecasts of the Western US.
NyankoFeb 07, 2006 at 7:42PM
I ended up having to go to the library to look at articles from Ski Magazine from this past fall, so I feel your pain. I can't believe these magazines haven't made more stuff available online. I would've even paid for access.
I like The Barking Bear Forums when I need more personalized advice. Lots of friendly, knowledgeable people there. Other than that, I think you've covered all the sites I've found. In my opinion there's actually a paucity of info sites on the web... it's hard to find good tips and info beyond a random article or two.
KjellFeb 07, 2006 at 7:53PM
Warren Miller has an impressive catalog of quick videos which I must've spend two hours browsing the other day. People skiing off mountains and doing triple backflips and the like. Highyl entertaining.
I've had a bit of luck finding interesting stuff with the del.icio.us ski tag also.
RidertechFeb 07, 2006 at 8:17PM
Thanks for linking our video blog up. We also have a resorts mapped using Google Maps and Google Earth.
FrankFeb 07, 2006 at 8:25PM
Aspect Journal is probably the best online creative ski writing in a web magazine format. I have a couple funny stories about my time at Alta and Sugarloaf, as well as photos buried on my site.
JFeb 07, 2006 at 8:40PM
Dave Riley is the General Manager for Mt. Hood Meadows just outside of Portland, OR. This year he started a blog to communicate with the public about goings on at Meadows. From what I've seen it's been increadibly sucessfull for them.
His topics covered have been reopening lifts after massive storms, asking for input on taking trees for more glade skiing, reasons behind opening times, and what it takes to open backcountry terrain.
As a patron of Meadows, he has given me more insight as to what goes on behind the scenes of Meadows and has answered a lot of questions I've had for years but never been able to ask.
In my opinion, it's the exact way and reason why corporations should be blogging, to keep the customers informed and up to date.
http://skihood.com/cs/blogs/daveriley/default.aspx
CamFeb 07, 2006 at 9:30PM
I'll have to second Ted Harper - ski.com.au is a pretty decent meta-skiing type of site.
SteveFeb 07, 2006 at 9:32PM
http://www.firsttracksonline.com/boards/index.php (check the east coast and west coasts reports) is a essential site for me - especially their "snow centric" weather reports (http://www.firsttracksonline.com/weather.shtm) ... too bad it's all running on some slow old web tech ... hopefully they'll update one day.
MattFeb 07, 2006 at 11:41PM
My blog is called Brooklyn Ski Club and has absolutely nothing to do with skiing.
GFeb 08, 2006 at 2:03AM
it's more about making skis than actually skiing, but http://www.skibuilders.com/ rocks. great tele photos and info on building your own ride.
RichardFeb 08, 2006 at 3:58AM
I check the snow reports at Lake Louise heading into every weekend.
Recently ventured west for some telemark lessons in Golden as well and it's got me psyched up for some serious touring next winter.
AdamFeb 08, 2006 at 8:46AM
I've never been anywhere except Ashland, Oregon. I can make it to Mt Hood, but I'm too damn lazy to drive there. It is great though, my friends and some family go.
mikeFeb 08, 2006 at 11:29AM
while not exactly skiing, jake burton, founder of burton snowboards, is blogging 100+ days of riding over at burton.com. Day 3 is the stuff of dreams.
DanFeb 08, 2006 at 12:40PM
Maybe subscribe to a few ski areas' newsletters to get snow reports. That's about it. Then, when the snow is good, get the hell up there!
Reading blogs won't enhance your skiing experience, it'll distract you and make you miss a good morning. Just go!
RobFeb 08, 2006 at 3:17PM
Descender.com
Duh!
BenFeb 08, 2006 at 3:20PM
www.newschoolers.com is the most popular online community for modern freestyle skiing.
Erik HFeb 08, 2006 at 8:47PM
Ask Aunt Google about "LOST SKI AREAS"
ericFeb 08, 2006 at 10:07PM
www.tetongravity.com and www.telemarktips.com both have devoted followings. Their message boards, while serving two pretty diverse segments of the skier population, are both filled with active communities centered around different regions.
Rogier van RijnFeb 09, 2006 at 2:56PM
Hi, on my website you can see a lot of high qualty ski photos taken in the french alps. Have a look and enjoy.
http://www.rogiervanrijn.com
OverwormFeb 09, 2006 at 4:26PM
I've water skiied a couple of times. Does that count as skiing?
SergiFeb 09, 2006 at 6:21PM
Soldeu - El Tarter (formerly Grand Valira), in Andorra (a little country in the Pirinees). I live near Barcelona, is Spain, and it's only 2 hours to this sky ressort. Plenty of tracks for my snowboard and few people :)
smaxFeb 09, 2006 at 6:43PM
I work For American Skiing Company. Killington isn't the only resort doing podcasts, in fact most are doing podcasts or video podcasts. Most of the resorts also have blogs, some sort of chat room or both. Most of our resort sites also have interactive trailmaps and/or live conditions maps that are updated literally constantly (Killington's is about as close to live as you can get).
I spend more time looking at and making ski sites than average, ok more time than almost any other activity other than sleeping and maybe skiing. Some other sites I frequent, a few special ones for the telemark skiier who also commented.
TelemarkTips.com
Snotel
RSN
Snocountry.com
Couloir Magazine
Unparalleled Productions (Tele movies)
Snow eye webcams
ManuelFeb 10, 2006 at 1:29AM
Hello, is pushed you coincidence over your Blog, comes from Austria and wishes you all good to the USA, wants times America a vacation to start must however surely still save most expensively comes the flight. well then still much success Manuel
Jason SwihartFeb 10, 2006 at 3:24AM
A couple people mentioned Colorado skiing, so I'll plug my sites: Colorado Ski Country USA and our blog, Club Colorado. The latter we launched about a year ago after I manned our booth at some ski shows and everyone asked the same kinds of questions: "Where do YOU like to ski?" "Where do YOU get deals on X" etc. It occurred to us that people in the rest of the U.S. are really interested in local skier knowledge, so that's what we're trying to do with Club Colorado--not clear how successful we've been--but getting authentic content from a traditional mar-comm focused organization is tough.
As an aside, next week we're having a group of bloggers out for three days to hang out, ski with us, and (hopefully) find worthwhile stuff to blog. We've affectionately dubbed it Bloggy Mountain High and, as part of it, there's a meetup in Keystone on Wednesday. You're all invited.
hilaryFeb 10, 2006 at 4:49PM
for telemarkers there is now a site like telemarktips for east coast skiers: www.telemarkeast.com started up by www.netelemark.com
you think of starting a skiing blog???
Aart AarniFeb 12, 2006 at 2:31PM
All can be!
DavidFeb 15, 2006 at 6:23AM
PisteHors.com is a good blog if you are going over to Europe, particuarly the French off-piste and backcountry scene.
Dan ShustFeb 16, 2006 at 6:03PM
Here is mine. (it is new!)
http://snowluva.com
This thread is closed to new comments. Thanks to everyone who responded.