Tried to go snowboarding in the New Years holidays.. and ended up sat in the car most of the afternoon.. Made pretty good time on the drive over from Edinburgh.. but ended up sat in a queue after two cars got stuck as the roads hadn't been gritted and cleared completely... With the road being quite narrow and not cleared a lot on either side, it wasn't really an option to give up the wait and turn around... Once we eventually made it to the top, the weather was starting to close in, an executive decision was made to throw in the towel and just head home again... but ended up sitting in the car in yet another massive queue to get back down the mountain as they closed the road on both sides to try and clear and grit the road.. In NZ, most ski hills have 'chain up' areas where you can opt to pull over and hire chains for any 2 wheel drives which might struggle to get up the hill, if the road conditions are bad, they can make it mandatory for any non-4x4s to chain up, if you decide not to, there are car parks nearer the bottom to park, then the mountain runs a shuttle service to get you up and down. Glenshee could do with something along these lines, as there was a LOT of frustrated people sat in their cars that day. read more

Glenshee - Sports Clubs Near Me - Ballater, ABD

Today I had a great time at Glenshee's ski resort. While my friend enjoyed a great lesson by Fresh Tracks at the ski school this morning, I enjoyed exploring the slopes on the side of the road with the main lodge, cafe and ticket booth. We had some blustery weather combined with driving sleet, making it wet and also making visibility a bit tough on that side in the morning. That side also felt very constrained within a small area of lifts, and the queues were cold and could be frustrating. I had a fantastic afternoon, though, exploring the many additional runs on the other side of the main road. There were even more trails and you could ride to the top of one munroe and then ski down the other side, taking another lift up the next munroe and down to yet another one! It was really fun and I enjoyed it. I've given Glenshee four stars because I had a really fun day there and really enjoyed their trails. However, I am used to East Coast American skiing and, as this was my first forray into Scottish skiing, I was a bit shocked by the outdated, tiny lodge and the really old lifts. I'm used to large, efficient chair lifts that seat two or three, but at Glenshee only two chair lifts were open and I spent much of my day on what felt like ancient 'pomas'. The equipment/infrastructure of the ski resort is more of a two-star from that repect, but then again I've given more stars because a) I think most Scottish slopes are like that and b) I liked their trails and had a really good time. Plus, the scenery of the Cairngorms was beautiful! read more