As soon as the summer equinox is over, skiing re-enters my mind and with it, as the weather warms up and quickly heats-up, my sole escape back to skiing seems to look down under. I shop the various webcams of Argentina, Australia, Chile, New Zealand and even South Africa, to see what’s frozen, cool and in-between under the Southern Cross skies…
This year, Chile got more than its fair share very early in the season. Portillo, that stands pretty close to the Argentina border in Chile, got lots of powder and using the webcams available, I pieced together a quiet morning in that resort that doesn’t appear to be very busy.
In 1946, Emile Allais, came to Chile to take part in the initial development of Portillo and La Parva ski areas, becoming the first director of the Portillo ski school through 1954, until Stein Ericksen took over in 1955. Located 100 miles from Santiago, Portillo’s low latitude (32.83°S), barely gets high enough with an altitude of 9,450 ft at the resort, offering a 2,500 ft vertical stretching from 10,860 ft at the top, down to 8,360 ft below the lodge.
The skiable area is small, just 1,240 acres and pretty much all visitors are housed inside the same hotel, ski on 35 trails served by 5 fixed grip chairs and 9 surface lifts, including the unique Roca Jack, aka “Va et vient”. As you can imagine, it’s a super cool place, so if you feel oppressed by the summer heat, just go there and enjoy some good turns while there’s snow!
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