En route to Calabogie

As promised here is my review of Calabogie Peaks just over an hour outside of Ottawa.  Now before I begin I should preface that this was my first time out of the season which is sometimes tough no matter where I am.

Calabogie has so much potential! The drive there was stunning, it was a winter wonderland and the hill is actually quite high making it obviously good to ski on.  Even the hotel looked nice as we pulled up. After the free parking all the goodness ended…

• We waited over 30 minutes in line in -13 weather to buy our lift tickets
• The hills were not groomed so everything was covered with moguls which made every hill a black diamond
• In the pub there was just one bartender, one server and one cook (did I mention we were there December 28th during the holidays) so you had to wait in line for a drink then try and flag down a server and clear your own table to make a clean spot to eat at

We skied only a couple runs and packed it in and hoped that Tremblant would be better (which it was, Tremblant did not disappoint)!  We overheard someone saying that they were caught off-guard but I am in awe of how that could happen since:

A – they are a ski resort that was hit with a windfall of snow AND

B – it was the holiday season

The Calabogie experience continued with an okay room at the manor but with nothing else around we were stuck with the expensive hotel restaurant that looked much like the breakfast area at the Holiday Inn (and we actually like the Holiday Inn and the free breakfast but imagine if it was $32).