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Lifts & Terrain

Ski Resorts Near Innsbruck, AustriaInnsbruck skiing provides access to over 500 kilometres of trails across nine main ski areas. Unfortunately the individual ski areas are fairly tiny and they don’t cater well to advanced skiers or snowboarders. Accordingly, Innsbruck is not considered a premier advanced destination for skiing and snowboarding. Unless you’re a beginner, the highlight of a skiing trip to Innsbruck is likely to be the fabulous cultural experience of the city and surrounds.

The resorts of Igls and Mutters appeal to families, novices and intermediates. There is more on offer for advanced skiers at Innsbruck, Patscherkofel and the Stubai Glacier, but this is not substantial and won’t entertain hard-core skiers for very long.

	% Beginner runs	% Inter-mediate runs	% Expert runs
Axamer Lizum	25	60	15
Stubai Glacier	60	30	10
Igls	55	45	0
Mutters	42	42	16

Igls, Mutters, and Schlick are very small resorts. Axamer Lizum is slightly bigger, and Stubai Glacier is the largest of the Innsbruck ski areas. Nonetheless, Stubai Glacier is still small compared to other Austria ski resorts such as St Anton ski resort or Lech/Zurs that are more than twice the size.

* information not available or unreliable

The snowfall is not substantial in the Innsbruck area. It is not formally reported, possibly because they don’t want to emphasize the lack of fresh powder, but it’s thought to be about 3-5 metres annually. Due to high elevation, Stubai Glacier has the best snow conditions of the Innsbruck resorts. All the resorts have a heavy reliance on snowmaking facilities to top up the base.

The lift infrastructure is varied across and within the ski areas. Most resorts have at least one gondola or cable car, and Axamer Lizum has an impressive tram (Olympiabahn) that services that women’s downhill run. Unfortunately some of the other chair lifts are ancient and slow. They were possibly built pre-Olympics (the first Olympics!!).

Lifts & Ski Terrain for Axamer LizumAxamer Lizum is a small ski area that provides runs for all levels of skiers. The highlight of this area is the amazingly spectacular scenery. The landscape is dotted with many avalanche fences, so there are clearly times when this area receives significant snowfalls. We unfortunately visited at a time when there had not been considerable snowfall. Sadly Powderhounds can’t always have what their hearts desire.

For the Beginner and Intermediate The best beginner runs are serviced by the Kaserwald T-bars at the base area. More confident beginners can venture down the no. 1. Lots of the intermediate runs are located on the Hoadl and off the Olympiabahn, with the highlight being the slick women’s downhill.

For the Shredder The halfpipe is conveniently located next to the Kaserwald t-bars (so long as you don’t mind riding t-bars). It’s maintained relatively well and is used for various snowboard championships. As it’s located at the bottom of the hill where the snow conditions are not always ideal, it sometimes becomes a bit slow. The best time to hit the halfpipe is often at night.

There’s a small terrain park next to the half-pipe. It’s OK for novices, but it’s not worth writing home about.

For the Advanced Skier There is only a little bit of black on-piste skiing alongside the Burgitzkopel chair, but unfortunately we can’t comment personally on the quality of these runs . We can however comment on the incredibly slow double chair – luckily the scenery was gorgeous. When we explored this chairlift, our German language skills were quite under developed. We could understand a sign that said “Achtung” at the bottom of the lift, but the words after that were just jibberish to us. The lift was running, so we assumed the runs were open, and jumped on. The fresh powder was enticing on the journey up, but when we commenced our descent on skis we quickly discovered the complete lack of base underneath. No wonder the powder was untracked! The chair was clearly only open for sightseeing or to access the charming pub at the top.

For the Powderhound/Expert Unfortunately due to the poor snow conditions, we can’t comment personally on the off-piste skiing at Axamer Lizum. There appears to be a few areas to duck off the piste, but this of course would be reliant upon the snow gods doing their thing. Apparently there are some backcountry runs easily accessed from the Pleisen double chair. The “Axamer Run” is on the skiers’ left, and is a long tree run through the valley that goes down to the Axams village. From here there is a free bus back up to the Axamer Lizum resort.

Considering the annual snowfall is not significant, it’s probably a case of good luck for powderhounds to score a fabulous powder day.

Snow Conditions When we visited Axamer Lizum there had been a fresh dump of 20cms of powder overnight, the skis were bright blue, and it was very crisp – probably about -25 degrees Celsius. The conditions were absolutely perfect and the powder was exquisitely dry. The only problem was that there was a non-existent base. There were fresh tracks galore to tease us, but we didn’t have “rock-hoppers” to make the most of rocks underneath the powder.

Even though there was beautiful powder on the sides of the piste, the groomed runs were horribly icy.

The mountain is quite exposed, so visibility is quite impaired in bad weather. In these circumstances, there are protected tree runs off the Hoadl I chair.

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