Christie Mountain Review

Worldwide there is approximately 125 million skiers/snowboarders (nsaa.org). Unfortunately, I must stay broad because honestly who knows how many UW students ski/snowboard? nobody cares to find out, but if you are one of the 125 million that ski’s or snowboards enjoy my review on Christie Mountain. The mountain is located in Bruce county, home to the blue hills of Wisconsin. Christie Mountain is named after a turn used in alpine skiing called the Stem Christie, which isn’t surprising to me because the hill is predominantly used by skiers.

Christie Mountain first opened for the public in 1977. Since then it has had three different owners and has been sold twice. Each new owner of Christie Mountain added more runs and overall bettered the hill. Today Christie Mountain has 30 different runs, one double seated chair lift, a T-bar, and three rope tows (ChristieMountain.com). Inside the chalet you can buy any gear you need or get a fresh wax and sharpening at the pro-shop. If you’re new to the sport, lessons are offered by the AASI snowboard school and the PSIA ski school. Lodging is available and food is served in the chalet pictured below.

When I first pulled into the parking lot my expectations were very low, the hill is in the middle of nowhere and it is the cheapest skiing/snowboarding hill around UW-Stout with a lift ticket costing $34. I was really hoping it would be worth the hour and a half drive from UW-Stout. The parking lot was full when I got there on Saturday, so I knew it had to be a decently good hill. One of the first things I noticed was all the skiers. My roommate and I both snowboard and people looked at us like we were insane. There were some others who were snowboarding but nothing like the hills I have snowboarded at before.

The double seated chair lift at the bottom of the hill runs fast so you have to be ready for it when getting on. Surprisingly for a double seated chair lift it gets a lot of people to the top of the hill, which is nice because you don’t have to wait in line very long. After my first run on Christie Mountain I quickly realized my expectations were wrong. The hill offers a huge variety of runs with the longest being 4000’. The blues and greens were some of the steepest I have ever snowboarded, with that said if you aren’t at least intermediate at the sport I would be careful at Christie Mountain. The best thing about Christie Mountain is the variety of runs I could do in one trip. I had one main trip that I would take, it consisted of 4 different runs all in one. First the Timber Pup which is a run that offers tree skiing; tree skiing is when you go off the designated run and weave through trees. I put a pretty good scratch in my board from this. Next, I went on the Bear Paw and Chipmunk which again are super steep for being a green, finally I finished my trip by entering the Fox Hop terrain park.

 I asked people at the hill how they compare Christie Mountain to other hills they have been to around the area. Most of them said it’s one of the best, a few like Trollhaugen more because they have a half pipe. Christie Mountain exceeded my expectations and I will definitely be snowboarding there again. I recommend this hill to anyone who is intermediate at the sport. The only cons I noted was the fast chair lift, the other skiers/snowboarders seem to be regulars who are very unfriendly, and it’s kind of in the middle of nowhere.