It was fine. Decent resorts, like a small one in Europe. Top height 2000m. Quality lifts. Only drawback is the bottleneck on the way back from Hebei to Beijing, loads of trucks being sorted out from the traffic by cretin cops.

I am surprised and disappointed at the low number of comments or even threads on this subject.

This is the 1 forum which gets the most attention from foreigners, and the 2 resorts mentionned above should already have garnered enough interest to satisfy most ski bums in this city. So what's wrong?

Is it that by some luck most ski bums follow enother forum or some weird thread I haven't found yet? Don't tell me they're not on the net.

PPL, the skiing in Wanlong last monday kicked major ass. Period. Loads of slopes (11 out of 22), loads of vertical, well groomed, almost no-one, plenty of snow cannons blasting the whole place white. What else do you want? You reach a 2200m lodge, grab a coffe and hammer it!!!

f***, even Dolomit does the trick if you don't mind trading diversity (7 out of 7 slopes open - 2000m top elevation, a little less vertical) for LOADS of additional skiing time (fastest detachable 6 seater wind protected chair in China.). Again, well groomed and plenty of snow Canons.

So what's wrong with you people? How the f*** can you be satisfied with Nanshan? You call those hills skiing? Yabuli (Heilongjiang) and Beidahu (Jilin) are not the only places where you can really ski anymore. Chongli really does the trick within a 3 hours drive from BJ (assuming good driving conditions).

Well, am probaly venting my frustration at a wall. These guys must be hiding somewhere...

BTW, a small teaser of things to come in China: Mt. Changbaishan in Jilin.

I went to Dolomiti on Nov 14 and Wanlong on Monday 7 Dec. So far last Monday was my best experience skiing in China. Back when Dolomiti opened in mid Nov that was my best experience. Real slopes, real vertical, real choice.

Dolomiti: 1 speed 6 seater detachable lift (only in one in China so far). Altitude 2000m. Probably about 1000m vertical at least. From that lift there's 4 totally different ways to ski down. On the facing mountain (2000m too) you need to take 2 Pomas to reach the top. 3 ways to ski that down. That makes 7 slopes. about 200rmb ski pass per day and 150 for the gear.

Wanlong: Too big to tell ya. I took at least 4 lifts that we working and I could see another 3 or 4 in preparation. 11 slopes were available. There's about 3 main sections of one large mountain that you can ski. Only one and a half was open. They were blasting snow all over the rest. That's 22 slopes all in all. 2200m altitude, about 1500m vertical. 400rmb ski pass per day, about 200 for the gear. Plus there's a hotel at the bottom of the slopes...

Both of the above are real cold, and due to the altitude the snow that fell in early novemeber hasn't gone at all from all of the north facing slopes. So the view from the top is still pretty cool. Both of these resorts invest heavily in snow cannons, and thanks to the temperature, the cover stays very well. Very well groomed slopes. What else? The black diamond slopes didn't feel like the gullies back at home in the pyrenees but was still pretty steep.

The only difference between these 2 places is the lifts: Dolomiti has less slopes but a high speed lift, so you can probably log in more ski time in a day and there's just enough diversity to keep you busy. The lifts are wanlong are not high speed, so you waste some time (like any other regular resorts), but the large choice of slopes totally makes up for it (though u pay an extra for it).

The locality, Chongli, remains a crappy chinese town but a brand new 4 star hotel is opening, in full modern chalet style (called rong chen alps town... ). There's a number of 3 star hotels in the area dedicated to skiers. Consider that there are another 2 or 3 Nanshan like shitty hills in that area too catering to the mass market. Chongli is aiming itself at being the yabuli of beijing... well, not there yet but certainly a valid effort. I didn't know about this until this year - had I knows last year my board would not have taken the dust. I almost feel guilty about this.

actually my mistake: wanlong is 2100m altitude. Not much, but just enough to satisfy within driving distance of BJ...

For this week end, try this:

http://www.bjski.com.cn/modules/article/view.article.php/a134

Pictures from yesterday:

Probably the steepest slope less than an hour's drive away from Beijing. That's just the one slope, and it normally stands out from the desert rock, but hey, it's powder week!