Las Leñas
Las Leñas is a ski resort for all levels of skiers yet it’s possibly best known for its gnarly hard-core skiing terrain located within the resort area and also within the easily accessible backcountry. It has an area serviced by a lift known as the Marte chairlift which provides direct access to extreme skiing terrain right off the lift.
If you are not up to throwing yourself off cliffs and straight-lining narrow chutes, don’t despair; 40% of the terrain within the resort is suited to intermediates.
The resort offers an impressive vertical drop of 1,100m (3,904ft) with a base elevation of 2,240m (7,349ft) and a top lifted elevation of 3,340 (11,253ft). If you are a seaside dweller most of the year you may need a day or two to acclimatize to this altitude.
Topped off with a more than respectable annual snowfall of over 6 metres (250 inches) it is a powder hounds delight.
The village of Las Leñas is located at the base of the lifts providing ski in / out accommodation. Most accommodation is hotel style and pretty much all packages are bases on Saturday to Saturday stays. There are however a number of self contained apartments in the village that generally provide more flexibility in the number of nights stay and the days you arrive and leave.
Las Lenas Accommodations Listings
If partying is your thing, Las Leñas has a vibrant nightlife with bars and night clubs located right in the village.
Las Leñas is quite remote geographically making it a little bit tricky to get to. It is located about 1,200km from Buenos Aires (the capital of Argentina). By car, the journey takes about 11 – 12 hours but if you are hiring a car this can be expensive as the car won’t be needed once you arrive at Las Leñas. The cheapest way from Buenos Aires is an overnight bus. The direct Andersmar bus takes about 16 hours leaving Buenos Aires at 7:05am on Fridays and arrives at 10:45am the next day. The return bus leaves Las Leñas on Saturdays at 6:30pm arriving at Buenos Aires on Sunday at 10:30am.
There are also several flight options from Buenos Aires. The first thing to be aware of is all domestic flights go from the domestic airport (Jorge Newberry Aeroparque – AEP) which is located about 1 hour from the international airport.
There are 3 destinations with airports near Las Leñas:
- Mendoza (MDZ) – 500km (6 hours) by road from Las Leñas
- San Rafael (AFA) – 200km (2 hours) by road from Las Leñas
- Malargue (LGS) – 70km (45mins) by road from Las Leñas
The next challenge is that apart from regular flights to Mendoza, flights to San Rafael and Malargue are few and far between and often only by private charter.
There are 4 flights every day of the week from Buenos Aires to Mendoza.
From each of these destinations there is various ground transport options from private transfers to shuttle bus services.
Las Lenas has not been reviewed by Powderhounds.com.