Ski-Snowboard Cardrona Resort, NZ
Skiing-snowboarding in Queenstown, New Zealand is worth the trip.
A ski-snowboard vacation to Queenstown on New Zealand's South Island that included four ski areas continues at Cardrona Alpine Resort.
The grand skiing and snowboarding vacation in Queenstown, New Zealand, last summer under the auspices of U.S.-based Holidaze Ski Tours and the guiding of Queenstown-based Ski Express, continued on Day Three at Cardrona Alpine Resort.
Queenstown, of course, is an internationally renowned destination for skiing, snowboarding, bungy jumping, and adventure of all kinds.
Cardrona
A perfect day. Not a cloud. Temps rising well above freezing. Only a mild bit of wind at the top.
This isn’t the largest of ski areas, but like its brethren, it’s wide open. And, when the snow is perfect like it was that day— literally perfect packed powder—it's hard to be too critical.
We followed a guide who calls himself Fly, who’s name fit his personality. Full of vim and vigor Fly talked nonstop, but he managed to lead us to some pretty special places.
We explored a few steep pitches that were littered among the cruising routes, and found some delightful turns between large rocks and off cat tracks. Come afternoon, we drifted out to skiers’ far left and paused to watch an WWII-era plane buzz the valley and do a few loops, augmenting wonderfully the endless views back towards Queenstown, down to Lake Wanaka and over towards Mt. Cook.
On the other side of the valley stands a small snowsport station that's terrain park and halfpipe only. It’s called Snow Park, and it was created and designed by the same guy who does the X-Games facilities for Aspen at Buttermilk. Up there, too, is a huge complex of Nordic ski trails. Unfortunately, this trip allows for exploring neither facilities.
Not that Cardrona is short on freestyle/freeride facilities. Consider:
- One of the largest pipe and terrain parks in the Southern Hemisphere featuring up to four halfpipes and three terrain parks.
- New Zealand’s longest terrain park with two trails running the length of the Whitestar Express chair, on a purpose built terraced course. The Heavy Metal park for advanced riders and bigger features, the Playzone park that runs along the upper part of Heavy Metal with smaller features and the beginners’ park for first-timers.
- The Gravity Cross course challenges skiers and snowboarders through the season—800 meters of curves, bumps and berms.
Nor are beginners forgotten here. Novices benefit from three Magic Learner lifts and a beginner quad chair all their own.
The base lodge buildings are painted a bright sunshine yellow, like something from the Caribbean. Among the food offerings is a unique eatery called Noodles, set in an ancillary building that requires climbing three flights of stairs. They serve Chinese in Noodles, rather unusual for a ski resort base lodge. And it’s uniquely served: you order at the counter, and it comes to your table served in classic Chinese food take-away boxes.
We finished our day by following something called the Secret Route, which skirted far to skiers’ left and led to some steep drops among huge rocks. A lot of fun, to be sure. Enough fun, in fact, that I don’t think it’s much of a secret.
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