Dry Winter? Meanwhile, This Canadian Resort Is Flirting With Snow Records

By now, you know the story.



Across the West, ski resorts in states from Colorado to California got blanked. The snow failed to show up, and then, towards the end of the ski season, a nasty heat wave arrived. As the mountain snowpack baked, resorts dropped like flies.



All the while, though, a few Canadian resorts in British Columbia and Alberta bucked the trend, and now, one is sharing just how far winter can go in the other direction.



Sunshine Village, one of three ski resorts near Banff, Alberta, posted on social media, sharing data showing the snow water equivalent (SWE) at its 7,316-foot site. SWE is a measure of how much water the snow contains. It's also a commonly used metric for assessing snowpacks historically.



And boy, is the graph of Sunshine Village's SWE station a sight for sore eyes. See below.



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The green line shows the 30-year average. The black line shows this season. So far this season, Sunshine Village has received about 33 feet of snow on its upper mountain.



According to Sunshine Village's snow report, the resort's upper mountain has recorded 990cm (389 inches) of snow to date.



For comparison, consider that only a vanishingly small number of sites in the Western US have above-median snowpacks. Most are in the red, or below 50% of the median.



That makes the Banff a dramatic outlier. At Sunshine Village, the upper mountain base is still eight feet deep. At Lake Louise, another Banff mountain, the snow is about 7.5 feet deep.



The powder trove isn't just for show. Both Sunshine Village and Lake Louise remain open, planning to close on May 18 and May 3, 2026, respectively. And rather than limping along with a few thin trails, these resorts are still wide open, with more than 100 trails to choose from. All 12 of Sunshine Village's lifts are spinning.

For Sunshine Village, the season started strong. This December, around 100 inches of snow fell, marking the fifth snowiest December on record for the resort. Another 80 or so inches arrived in March, making Sunshine Village's season the snowiest in more than a decade.



Now, we aren't in the business of forcing anyone to take a ski vacation, but if you're wondering where on this side of the Mississippi River you can get the full spring skiing experience, Banff would be a good place to start.

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This story was originally published April 28, 2026 at 10:38 AM.