By Dan and Unuruu

This weekend, a new major ski resort will start operating, it is located on the slopes of the sacred Mountain Bogd Khan Uul, overlooking the capitol city of Mongolia, Ulaanbaatar.
The new "Sky-Resort" has several runs served by two chairlifts, the lower west one for beginners and the eastern one for ski racing and training,  it ascends to the height of 1570m.

The ski center includes a coffee shop, a restaurant and renting facilities, including  skiwear, skis, boards and boots. A 30% discount is offered until 25 December 2009. The site is open from 8:30 and serves full light night skiing until 22:00.

Ski school trainers will be present to teach the basics of skiing to visitors, on a individual or group basis.

The snow

The temperatures in Ulan Bator are well below freezing throughout the winter. It does snow from time to time, but not enough to ensure snowy slopes. An Italian company Techno-Alpine has installed snow-making equipment. The snow is made and covers the slopes with the aid of  15 lances (snow guns) that spray snow along the ski slopes. They are operated by two fully automated pumping stations.

In order to minimize delivery times, the lances, pump and compressor station units were transported overland from South Tyrol in Italy to Ulaanbaatar via Russia. The remainder of the equipment was transported via China by sea and then transported overland to Mongolia. The final testing of the equipment was completed a few weeks ago.

The slopes

Compared to international ski slopes, the Sky-Resort slopes are easy to intermediate. The slope colors on the map below do not indicate the difficulty, they should all be green and blue according to common ski slope color codes. None of the slopes can be considered black diamond coded (difficult), although the most challenging slope is the Khurkhereet 1020m, which is named after the name of the near by valley.

To try out your ski skills use the Khurakh 110 meter slope. Continue on the Artsat 210m, and Nukht 400m slopes. When you feel comfortable with your ski skills take the lower western chair lift and ski down the Tenger 800m, and Chuluut 850m.

Experienced skiers will enjoy going up the eastern higher chair lift and go down the Zalaat 1050m, and Zaisan 1070m slopes. The most challenging slope is the fast Khurkhereet 1020m slope. Have fun.

Cost

Sky Resort ski slopes map.

click on map for full size.

Click here for this map in PDF format for downloading and printing.

Source: ToMongolia/ski This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it