It's been transformed beyond recognition the past 10 years, but it’s easy to forget The Remarkables skifield was also born, 40 years ago, out of a bold vision.
Mount Cook Group, which had opened Coronet Peak in 1947, realised there was demand for a second Queenstown skifield and one which, in those pre-snowmaking days, offered more reliable snow due to its higher elevation.
It also became mired in controversy, like many local projects, with concerns the access road would create a permanent scar.
Then, as luck would have it, "the first year [1985] was the worst snow year Remarkables has probably ever had," its first manager, John Cooper, recalls.
"We only opened, I think, for six weeks and did about 16,000, 18,000 skier visits, which is just a nothing.
"That was when The Remarkables turned into The Regrettables."
Subsequently, it became ‘The Redeemables’ and built its own clientele, Cooper says.
"Because Remarkables had this reputation of being a bit flat and boring, we worked hard on creating events which promoted the fact it wasn’t."
Snowboarding came along in the ’90s, which Cooper suggests was a better fit for Remarks than Coronet.
Gradually, he notes Department of Conservation also relaxed constraints on what you could do on the field.
But the biggest constraint was ultimate owner Air New Zealand’s lack of interest in investing in its Queenstown skifields.
That changed when local businessman/ex-mayor Sir John Davies and his family bought into them, and Canterbury’s Mt Hutt, in 2002.
He’d been approached by NZSki boss Duncan Smith and initially pushed back: "Haven’t you heard of global warming?"
However, Smith convinced him snowmaking would be the fields’ salvation.
Sir John put his early focus on Coronet, but then in the past 10-plus years has injected about $100million into The Remarkables.
First came a new $25m base building, 50m down from its much smaller predecessor.
Sir John had personally watched families being dropped off then struggle — often via an unreliable magic carpet conveyor belt — to get to the base building.
The skifield was advertised as family-friendly but, he says in his book, it was "the most un-family friendly" in the country.
In addition to a new base building, opened 10 years ago, NZSki sealed the access road’s first 9km, then, successively, installed three detachable six-seater lifts that opened up new terrain — Curvey Basin and the repositioned Sugar Basin and Shadow Basin.
Those lifts are "just incredible", says current ski area manager, ex-Wakatipu High principal Steve Hall, who was also an early Remarks ski instructor.
"I’ve been to the States and Japan and it is very uncommon to see that, this is world-class infrastructure."
NZSki chief Paul Anderson says in addition to $15m to $20m spends on each lift, another $2m to $3m has gone on snowmaking to ensure there’s snow on the terrain they open up.
Snowmaking, he says, is "expensive to run, expensive to install, but it’s far less expensive than not having snow".
In his 2021 book, Sir John states: "Today The Remarkables has probably been our best investment, as we took it from nothing to where it is now."
Anderson says in the years after those initial investments, "our average visitation grew about 50%".
"Remarkables used to do below 150,000 skier visits a year, now we do in excess of 260,000, some years 290,000."
He says the field has "two really interesting markets, your family market, but then you’ve got your ‘frothers"’.
He’s referring to freeriders and freeskiers taking advantage of the skifield’s terrain parks and big mountain terrain.
Like Coronet Peak, the field’s attracted devoted clients like Hong Kong-based Steve Rowlinson, who’s come almost every year, apart from Covid, since ’92.
He calls it "a great location for a family trip with fabulous scenery", and notes his children learned to ski there, "and both are top all-terrain skiers nowadays".
"I have also invited numerous friends over the years to join me in this winter paradise."
Anderson notes the growth of Queenstown’s southern corridor, starting with Jack’s Point and Hanley’s Farm, has also been "a massive boost".
Hall adds: "Because traffic and congestion is now an issue in the Whakatipu Basin, for those who live down the road it’s perfect — it’s like a skifield on their back door."
Looking forward, NZSki has massive plans — for which it is seeking fast-track consent — to extend into the Doolans via a gondola, which would extend The Remarks’ daily capacity from about 4000 skiers/boarders to 10,000.
"It has the greatest future of any skifield in NZ because of its height," Sir John says.
"We’ve spent a lot there now, but we’re going to spend a lot more in the future."
So far, local Remarkables Park developer Alastair Porter’s plan for a gondola to the skifield hasn’t materialised. However, Anderson says "you can only put so many people up a dual-lane road, so at some stage it’ll make sense to build a ropeway".
For now, Sir John says he’s thrilled how the skifield’s come on.
"We can do everything as a family, but you’ve got to have your staff, and from the top to the bottom we’ve got great, great staff."
