Danielle clarke
Rossland News
What to look forward to in the summer:
There are lots of things to look forward to in Rossland in both winter and summer.
Last weekend started the summer off with the Pink Bike Project from June 20-23. Local biker, Mike Hopkins was in the area with photographer Bruno Long.
“It’s an amazing group with some amazing elite athletes,” said Deanne Steven, executive director at Tourism Rossland.
There will also be a contest put on by Mountain Bike BC that includes a bike trip around BC. Rossland just so happens to be one of the stops and the tour will bring the media with them.
“I’m hopeful that we’re going to have a really good bike summer,” said Steven who has seen exponential growth in maps this year. To date, Steven is sending out four to five bike maps per day.
As for annual events, Enduro will be held on the August long weekend. The event is part of a bigger circuit this year and should bring together about 200-300 riders.
The Huck’en Berries Bike Jam event is also on a bigger circuit this year and will take place during the Golden City Days.
“The Golden City Days is a really great community event,” added Steven.
The Summer Student, Eric Gonzalez is also preparing to release the first of his webisodes any day.His webisodes are short video clips that showcase Rossland’s lifestyle with all its recreational activities.
“I try to look at all the things in the area that people would want to do,” said Steven who put together the video topic list for Gonzalez.
The list includes Gold Fever Follies, Rossland Museum, Heritage Walking Tour, Frisbee Golf, Columbia Gardens Winery, boutique shopping, dining and nightlife, Rossland artists and road biking.
What to look forward to in the winter:
The planning for future months begins way in advance in order to get more things done. Rossland shines through as a fantastic ski town destination.
“This year we’re doing more ski shows than ever before,” said Steven who has partnered with different ski groups to share costs.
“By pooling all our funds together we’re able to do more ski shows,” concluded Steven.
This year Denver, Sacramento and Boston have been added.
When choosing destinations for ski shows, Steven explained what they look at where people would be most interested in while visiting Rossland, as well as figuring out how easy it would be to transport people to Rossland.
Over the past couple of years, Rossland has arranged for a shuttle bus service to run to and from the Spokane airport. This service started out four days a week in the first year, last year it was five days a week, and this year it will run every day of the week.
“Which is going to be really key to us being able to get people here,” said Steven who explained that “not only Americans use this airport; people coming in from Toronto have an easier time flying in to Spokane as well”.
The next step, as Steven explained, is creating internal transportation once the tourists arrive.
The internal shuttle bus is a free shuttle bus that will run everyday from 7:30-10:30. Last year, the service “…was so much more successful than anticipated,” said Steven. As far as improvements go, the bus will be running to Black Jack six times a day as well as heading into lower Rossland.
The shuttle bus will also tie into the school timetable and the bus itself is “…going to be more continuous through town,” said Steven.
Last year the accommodation revenue for the months of January, February and March exceeded more than all of 2006, explained Steven who believes this is partly due to the addition of the free shuttle bus service.
Rossland has become more well known in other areas.
“Last year was the first year that I would go to a ski show and I didn’t have to start with, ‘Have you heard of Red Mountain in Rossland, BC before?’” said Steven.
The bars and restaurants also saw improvement as did downtown businesses.
This year people can get excited about Red Mountain Resort and the village of Rossland tying everything together.
Last but not least, there will be a new Nordic skiing brochure coming out that will include not only Black Jack, but also the Strawberry Pass and Paulsontrails. These trails will be labeled as non-tracked trails.