George Koch

Reading Time: 7 minutes Austria’s massive Gastein Valley has four distinct ski areas, thermal baths for whatever ails you – and a 2000-year-old tourist office by George Koch   Holy smokes, there’s two of […]

Reading Time: 5 minutes Sunshine Village’s firing last winter of seven ski patrollers, including two of its senior-most personnel, hit the skiing world like a string of explosives shattering a cornice. The appearance of heavy-handed ski resort owners […]

Reading Time: 7 minutes The Cat, the Guide and the School Bus A return to Mustang Powder brings a Narnia like alternative reality of endless steep runs and breathtaking vistas. by George Koch   […]

Reading Time: 9 minutes by George Koch from Winter 2011 issue For hardcore skiers, this B.C. town offers a tasty triple scoop of cat, heli and resort skiing My best skiing memories are of […]

Reading Time: 5 minutes Freeride skis have come a long way in the past decade. It was buttery smooth, exhilaratingly fast and dumbfoundingly easy. It liberated me to ski harmonically with the contours of the […]

Reading Time: 9 minutes From the Travel Guide 2011 issue Serfaus, Austria, isn’t a popular destination for North Americans, but after days of powdery surprises George Koch and friends think that should change Hour […]

Reading Time: 6 minutes Several readers responded to my article of two years earlier (Is it all doom and gloom? – Fall 2007) that had circumspectly raised questions about (okay, joyously heaped scorn upon) […]

Reading Time: 7 minutes From the Buyer’s Guide 2011 issue One corollary of big-mountain skiing is the way the terrain swallows up the people doing it. We had just crested a gentle saddle a […]

Reading Time: 7 minutes It’s the end of an era for the only privately run ski school at a major resort in Canada. He’d ride up the mountain first thing to work on his […]

Reading Time: 15 minutes A roundup of 10 top resorts on the road from Calgary (from Buyer’s Guide 2011 issue) Last fall it seemed as if Divine Intervention itself was about to lift the […]

Reading Time: 6 minutes Charlie Locke’s return to the grande dame of Alberta ski areas was both unexpected and predestined Alberta encapsulated: beef cattle grazing on undulating emerald grass slopes, rusty oil wells, a […]

Reading Time: 12 minutes 10 great ski areas tempt locals and vistors alike with all that’s new and improved From Fall 2009 issue Ski resort marketing people are somehow psychologically wired to look ahead. […]

Reading Time: 4 minutes This winter the usual early-season snows largely bypassed Whistler- Blackcomb even as Victoria and Vancouver suffered havoc. Extended cold, a rain crust, a dangerous layer of faceted crystals and lastly […]

Reading Time: 3 minutes Alert readers will recall my chronicling of the Kicking Horse story since it began as a glimmer in the eye of Vancouver skier-visionary Oberto Oberti. I was an instant convert […]

Reading Time: 10 minutes Pounding music, hoarse yells, diminishing inhibitions and a crush of costumed but not heavily clad flesh beggar the senses. Per Jonsson, pro rider, is sporting a short dress, shaved legs, […]

Reading Time: 4 minutes Helicopters stood in silence, flags fluttered and people milled about on the broad plateau beneath Saddle Mountain, chatting or munching smoked salmon and other treats from a vast buffet spread […]

Reading Time: 6 minutes A ski helmet first went onto my head way back in 2000, when helmets were just this side of exotica. So why does the hectoring of helmet zealots for mandatory […]

Reading Time: 9 minutes It was a magical January day with Mica Heli Guides high in the Rocky Mountains northeast of Revelstoke. We were pausing between huge pitches to gaze at the mountains ringing […]

Reading Time: 5 minutes There’s a weird dichotomy in the way skiing markets itself. Our sport’s image is self-consciously elitist. Glitz, glam and bling. Celebrity athletes performing superhuman record-setting feats on the racecourse or […]

Reading Time: 13 minutes It was the greatest run of a fabulous season. What appeared as a dusting of snow on the access road became eight cm in the parking lot and, as we […]

Reading Time: 6 minutes It’s dark outside and I’m driving uphill. Transitions are one of the most exciting things about going to the ski hill. There’s always a giddy excitement whether it’s leaving the […]

Reading Time: 3 minutes In mid-August, the 20-year-long era of the company that operates Whistler-Blackcomb, Mont Tremblant, Panorama, Blue Mountain and numerous other resorts came to an end, or turned a page in its […]

Reading Time: 7 minutes From the Spring 2006 issue Three men are generally credited with inventing helicopter skiing: Hans Gmoser, Herb Bleuer and Mike Wiegele. Gmoser, founder and long-time head of Canadian Mountain Holidays […]

Reading Time: 4 minutes B.C.’s business-friendly Liberal government that replaced the NDP just after I wrote the previous column has cut taxes and taken steps to restart the province’s economy. The Vancouver Island freeway, […]