Horseshoe Resort

Went cross-​country skiing for the first time here. Being a beginner and my first go at it found the experience enjoyable. Friendly staff & instructors, fun begginer’s course, clean washrooms :) and decent rustic space to r&r after a run or two. Will be back.

Sad tiny hill with very limited runs. Great for beginners. Very family friendly. There are plenty of nightly accommodation here, it is nice for anyone looking for a chill vacation with more family friendly winner activities. St. Louis is definitely a better choice since there are more trails and lifts, but horseshoe has tubing tho (and cross country skiing)~
Horseshoe was also hard to navigate around.

Whereas the rest of the resort was showing its age, Silks the ‘nice’ restaurant at Horseshoe, was a pleasant surprise. Dark, elegant and great for couples (kids too, at this family-​friendly resort). The service was attentive. The food was both tasty, substantial and very prettily presented.
We started with the charcuterie plate — it was a bountiful and artfully presented platter of a delicious selection of meats, brie, olives and pickles. I very much appreciated having the creamy brie to cool down some of the spicier meat selections.
For the main, the Muscovy duck breast with broccalini and polenta was so juicy. The yummy land/​sea plate of beef and shrimp was paired very well with a mix of veg and beautifully plated.
We shared the crème brulé. Yum! For drinks, I had dinner sort of strawberry pinot grigio sangria concoction. Fruity and refreshing. The warm bread at the beginning came with a strawberry buyer that looked good, but tasted a bit strange.
If you’re staying overnight at Horseshoe and are in the mood for a nicer dinner after a day on the slopes, Silks is a good choice.

Was staying in the area and we came just to skate for a bit. The rink is in their adventure park and it was open until 10pm! It’s free to use and they have skate rentals for around $ 10. The rink itself was pretty mediocre (not super well groomed since it was really late), but it was completely empty when we went there! There are adorable warming huts and a fire pit right beside it so you can take a break whenever. They also had a healthy amount of tswift playing in the background.
I did also come here for snowboarding several years ago. Their hills are good for novice skiers but aren’t really comparable to Blue Mountain’s.

So this was my first time trying out my new fancy spancy gear and actually I should say my first time trying any sort of winter board sports.
My friends decided to go for the afternoon but I took a look at the website and saw they offered a beginner introduction course so I decided to come earlier and get some practise in.
The intro lesson was $ 40 but I think it sucked that on top of that you have to buy a lift ticket… please come on. Anyone who is a total newbie won’t get off the bunny hill so why is there a charge for the lift ticket at all?
Ended up having to spend an extra $ 50 for the day/​night ticket, I should have at least been offered a beginner lift ticket or something.
The instructors were great. Dave and Steve if i remember. The group was small, just 3 of us newbies so we were getting great advice. I have been 2 times now to other resorts and have already got to carving and I think without the 1.5 lesson provided I would not be at this point.
So the downside, they only have one bunny hill, the lifts for that closed at 5pm so had to use the annoying magic carpet. The bunny hill got very icy and could have done with some grooming at some point.
The cafeteria on site offers crap food for a high price and is just not a comfy place to relax and rest.
I did eventually try the green hills but as a first time i found those difficult so i cant really comment on their other runs.
For convenience i can understand why people come here.
Also no wifi, anywhere! That sucks.

Went here for snowboarding. This place is actually pretty good. Disclaimer: I’m still «beginner» level, and also this is the first resort in Canada (I’d previously only visited resorts in sunny California).
Pros:
–close to Toronto. The drive was a little over an hour. Easy drive too (no windy roads up a mountain; single lanes, etc)
–not too crowded (compared to what I’m used to). Minimal wait for lifts, and also it was pretty easy going down the mountains without having to maneuver around people.
–lift ticket price isn’t too unreasonable
–my son took the kids skiing class, and we were impressed with the teaching quality. He did quite well for his first ever lesson
–there is a tubing park also which looked fun. It’s $ 20 for 2hrs (it would be better if they had a 1 hour option as well though)
–plenty of parking
–one of the other reviews mentioned a lack of bathrooms. Maybe things have improved, but the main building has quite a few, and they are pretty clean
Cons:
–not much variety. I was trying to stick to the green slopes. There’s basically only 3 runs (I think). I ended up going down the same run most of the time
–as others have mentioned, I don’t think that this place is very challenging (for people who are more advanced). I accidentally went on a «black diamond» slope once, and managed to make it down without too much drama
I will return

I went here to try out Snowboarding for the first time so I really had nothing to compare it too. However, I can definitely tell you that Snowboarding is super fun and full of falls and biffs that make you stronger!
It is about a 1.5hr drive to the mountain and the price for an all day lift ticket was $ 52 plus $ 42 fo rental and $ 6 for a Helmet. Make sure you bring your own goggles. The customer service at this place is truly exceptional. Before going to the mountain I emailed them and called them for details and everybody wqs quick to respond and extremely helpful. It was hard to find at first because I accidentaly went to the chalets insteas of the mountain. A simple ask for diections led me to the correct destination.
There are about 20 runs all varying from Pony Hills to Infamous Black Diamond runs. It was busy but everything still moved quickly. Snowboarding was great at Horseshoe! I will definitely be going back!

Checked and the resort on a Monday afternoon (Sept ¹⁵⁄₁₄) — I made the reservation about a month prior for a two bedroom unit with a complete kitchen.
About two weeks before my reservation I called the resort to confirm what type of room we had only to find that it was just a double room. Disappointed as we needed a room that was going to be able to have two bedrooms with a living room and a full kitchen area so I upgraded to their condo room. I was told these rooms were newly renovated at $ 218 a night. When we checked in we were totally disappointed to learn that we were in a totally separate building from the resort itself. I saw the building as I was driving into the resort and it looks like a prison from the outside really not very attractive. Note to horseshoe resort — you might want to paint the railings or the other wood throughout the building on the exterior a different color other than the color of cement.
In the separate building there is not one single amenity other than a luggage cart and a broken luggage cart at that, not a soda pop machine, not a snack vending machine or even an ice machine nothing ! As I opened the door to the room I raised a note of relief that it actually was very nice upon first impression.
That being said with had a few bumps in the road this week. On the first night, one of my guests who was sleeping in the front guest room could not get to sleep from 9 o’clock to 12 o’clock because another guest on this floor decided to have a party complete with bongo drums, guitar playing, singing and loud voices — it took security over an hour to come up and stop the party. Actually when I checked in I had to sign a release not to smoke in the room and not to make noise after 9 pm… so how come they get away with it?
The suite is newly renovated that’s for certain. New living room furniture even though the sofa was filled with stains, new dining room furniture and I’m assuming new beds. The quality of the renovation; it still could’ve use a few more coats of paint in many areas, trim nailed but not painted and small details throughout not completed. And the carpet could’ve been a better quality as it was starting to frame the seams.
When you renovate a timeshare/​condo you would hope they would also upgrade some kitchen components; the dishes were new, the Frying pan look like it’d been through World War II I don’t think there was any nonstick surface left on that frying pan it was so old and cut up… Talking about cut up a plastic cutting board so thin and so badly damaged with thousands of cuts in the plastic — I wouldn’t cut anything on it… what you can’t upgrade nine dollar cutting board? There were some items in the room such as a kettle, a drip coffee pot (only took 40 minutes for the coffee finally finish being made), and a toaster but no blender — found that kind of odd. And no full length mirror anywhere — seriously isn’t that and an iron basis 101 hotel room basics ??
Overall the condo is very nice — a beautiful circular dining table seating six, a very nice sectional sofa with the LCD screen and a fireplace, a solarium with large window that can open to bring in fresh air, (but the window looked like it hadn’t been cleaned inside or out in many months) and a view of the ski hill and pool and hot tubs below, the master bedroom is beautiful very large king bed and spacious with the on-​suite with double sinks and a spacious shower very nice. The guestroom does not have a LCD/​TV in it which I found kind of odd, just a dresser night table and double bed.
The unit also has a washer /​dryer which would definitely come in handy if there was a large group or you were staying for a long period of time, but you had to ask for washing powder.
No swimming towels in the room — mind you the hot tub was colder than bath water so we only used it once.
No hangers in the guest closet — someone took the hangers and left the holders
Wi-​fi in the room has terrible streaming and in the resort itself it’s public wifi and even with nobody visually around I can’t stay connected. BAD !!! Horrible wi-​fi even at 3 in the morning.
Overall we stayed there for four nights it was «okay» but for the money I would’ve stayed somewhere else — I should’ve done better research before I booked this hotel.
The spa in the hotel was great ! Wrote a separate review for that one look it up (Shizen Spa). The restaurant «Silk»…went to it twice for coffee because it never seem to be opened other then a corporate events. The gift shop — meh…

I can’t say what this place is like in the winter, but that summer Groupon sucks. The attractions are just backyard toys for kids and toddlers, set in a small area. Even if you do have small kids, it’s not worth the drive. I wish that they had specified «FOR KIDS» on the groupon description.
My fiancé and I got the «summer play» groupon option that included archery, paddle boats, rock climbing, euro bungie, mini-​golf among other things. After driving for over an hour, we arrived to see that the activities were literally some random toys that were put there temporarily for the summer.
The «archery range» was actually just 2 targets, and there were these 2 plastic toy bows sitting on a picnic table, with toy arrows with round foam tips. It was crowded by a group of teenagers, and there was nobody supervising it. The family that arrived with a kid couldn’t play with it because the teenagers were hogging the 2 targets for quite a while. I was disappointed because I was expecting more than 2 targets, and real bows and arrows instead of toy ones.
The euro bungie, inflatable thing, red horse maze, etc, are all for small kids, even the climbing wall as miniature. The tree-​top trekking was all fully booked for a month.
The mini golf course was crowded by several large groups, even one of around 8 people, when the rules clearly say «limit 5 persons per party.» One of the groups weren’t even wearing wristbands, so they didn’t even pay to get in. There was nobody supervising this area. Needless to say, we didn’t get to play much and left.
Oh! And they don’t have water fountains and charge a lot for bottled water. We had a water bottle and we were looking everywhere for a water fountain. I had to go to the bar, which was closed due to some private function, and so I had to ask the hotel receptionist to let me use his water jug.
We finally got fed up and asked for refund, and after a while of being on hold with Groupon they gave us the refund.

Great hills, nicely groomed and clean — my only complaint is that their signage is terrible — what is a green, blue or black run can be difficult to determine as the signs don’t agree with the maps, and trails tend to split off from one another without warning. I’m a decent enough skier that it wasn’t a problem if i ended up on a more difficult hill than i was anticipating, but Horseshoe could end up with a lawsuit on their hands if a less experienced skier had had the same trouble. I think it was the worst on the C5 lift, but issues could be found all over.

On the night of the crazy ice storm that hit Toronto and froze half the city, our family decided to drive all the way to Barrie and stay at Horseshoe Resort for a short family vacation. Luckily, we survived and escaped that «end of the world» apocalypse Toronto was in.
When we arrived at Horseshoe and got settled in our hotel room, I took in the dingy brown hued room that I was going to sleep in. The bed and facilities were clean, but I couldn’t say the same for the couches and tables in the living room. Horseshoe Resort needed a serious reno ASAP. From cracked concrete floors outside our hotel room and the old furniture in the room, Horseshoe Resort does not emanate luxury or elegance.
For breakfast, all the Horseshoe patrons made their way down to the main lobby building where a satisfactory breakfast buffet was spread out. From tater tots, pancakes, scrambled eggs, bacon, sausages to jams, cream cheeses, cereals, patisseries, and oatmeal, Horseshoe had an adequate spread of breakfast goodies. I really enjoyed their refreshing orange juice and their buttery scrambled eggs.
As for the snow activities, I truly enjoyed my skiing experience at Horseshoe. Being a beginner skier, I had a wonderful instructor who was extremely patient with our group. After I perfected the right and left turns, I was successfully able to get down the beginner hill without falling. (yay me!) More experienced skiers had the option of going on the lift and trying out one of the 26 runs offered. To be honest, I was jealous of their skill and fearlessness to go down the hill gracefully with confidence and speed.
My most memorable part of the trip however was snow tubing with the fam. Make sure to get into the first lane and ask for the «super spin» and HOLD ON FOR YOUR DEAR LIFE. Snow tubing also gives you the option of pairing up in a train or in a triangle configuration with others, which lets you share the fun among family members and friends. I found a lot of the snow activities to be expensive, especially when you’re paying for your whole family to participate, but I don’t really have a strong reference to base my opinion off of.
I see a lot of potential for Horseshoe and a lot of room for improvement hence the two stars, but I hear that they’ll be undergoing a complete renovation in April, which will probably change my star rating after I revisit… til then!

This is a great place to learn to ski or snowboard but it’s not a massive resort that offers a lot of challenging hills. We were learning to snowboard so it suited us fine. Out friends are good skiers and snowboarders and they had a good time but commented that the resort is not too challenging. They have night skiing/​snowboarding so you can get a lot of runs in. Definitely recommend this place for beginners.

So I looked into resorts near Toronto and came up with Horseshoe Valley Resort. But my stay here started out weak and then turned into a nightmare. Scroll down to «The Ugly» if you’re the type to skip to the horror scene. Halloween came early I tell ya.
THE GOOD–
–Summer midweek sale 25% off your stay. Tempting right?
–Decent suites with nice plantation shutters and all-​glass showers
–Inspiring menu from the Silks restaurant in the main inn. Enjoyed the maple goat cheese and prosciutto stuffed chicken and the 10 OZ mesquite rubbed new york striploin as well as the signature Horseshoe toffee pudding.
–Breakfast is all you can eat and drink
–Dogs allowed (awww)
THE BAD–
–No Breakfast in bed. Buffet only and NOT COMPLIMENTARY. Tsk tsk.($ 15.82 for inedible eggs and undercooked sausages)
–Dogs allowed (STFU! IT’S TWO AM!!)
–No bathtub (for parents of small children this can be annoying)
–Not many options for the spa goers. See their website.
–I would think the resort would offer a shuttle from the Go station to the hotel. Not the case. This would attract a demographic (single travellers, young professionals, non-​locals)
–The website says the resort is in Barrie but the resort is in Oro-​Medonte, north of Barrie. Cab driver gave me grief and GPS wouldn’t pull up the address in Barrie.
–The indoor pool is tiny, not big enough for laps, just for floaters. Also a major disappointment.
–All restaurants close at 10 or 11pm and the gift shop closes at 5, so keep that in mind if you’re a midnight muncher.
–My wifi connection dropped a lot especially with streaming
–The TV quality was terrible… A maintenance guy came and sorted it out but didn’t do anything about the quality (grainy). Speaking of which, don’t expect skylite satellite channels as advertised, they are not programmed yet.
–Rooms are supposed to have complimentary coffee. I saw no such thing.
–Room service only available from the Silk restaurant which is really overpriced. To grab a bite elsewhere, you have to leave the main guest room building.
THE UGLY–
–It was CONSISTENTLY hard to reach the front desk and room service. Had to walk over several times to place my orders, huge nuisance. The same goes for the Silks restaurant.
–On my last night, I asked for a WAKEUP CALL and didn’t get one. I missed my morning train.
I was told no manager was available ON A FRIDAY until 2pm but I would get a call. I did NOT.
At 3:30 I called the front desk to follow up on this issue (my missed train meant an extra night’s stay and they needed to adjust my bill to their best ability). Was told NO MANAGER ON DUTY UNTIL SUNDAY. ON LABOR DAY WEEKEND!!!
So no resolution to my problem (and no surprise) until after my departure? How does that work Debbie?
SO MUCH FOR A quick, easy, relaxing (and affordable) GETAWAY.
I RECOMMEND– Not bothering to check out HSV. But if you do, DO NOT splurge for the «valley view». What it is is a view of the golf terrain, with some parking lot on the side in some rooms. No high floors so you won’t get a view of much but turf. Very misleading given the higher rate than courtyard views. Ain’t nobody got time for that!
EXTRA TIP– Drive in. It’s $ 12.40 one way on the Go train to get you from Toronto as far as Allandale. A 25 min cab from there to the resort will run you approximately $ 50 one way! Had I known, I wouldn’t have opted for this mode of transport or this location.

It’s like an adult fun park! =)
They have ogoing, zipling, mazes, mini-​golf, tree top trekking (which I wish I had the time for). I recommend going to Horseshoe Valley Ski Resort on the weekend because I made the drive in early June to be sadly disappointed that they weren’t open. I personally wanted to enjoy shorter lines, I didn’t think there wouldn’t be lines at all! My guess is that they aren’t open weekdays until school’s out (late June).
Going on the water OGO (otherwise known as zorbing) was the highlight of my trip! Be sure to make it yours as well.

This is NOT a great place if you’re a legitimate skier… but it great for some other things… apparently for rolling around in giant, plastic balls and ziplining, which is something you can do in the summer. There are also rock-​climbing walls.
I have only been in the winter, so I’m going to comment on that! I think that if you’re learning to ski, this is a great place for you. The hills are small… don’t let anyone tell you otherwise… it’s Barrie, not ummm… anywhere you go for an actual ski vacation.
Not that this is necessarily a bad thing. If you’re in the Toronto area and want an easy day trip and are not an avid skier, as I said, or if you have younger children, this is a great place for skiing. (Note: This is a popular place for student ski trips on weekdays, so if you are going, don’t think it’s necessarily going to be quiet and calm on a weekday, because a group of 100 high school students may arrive).
This place ALSO has snow-​tubing. I have been to another snow-​tubing place in Barrie and there are pros and cons about both. At the other location we were pulled up the hill by a pulley that we hooked our tubes into. At this location there is a «magic carpet» which is basically a flat escalator that you stand/​walk up with your tube. Certainly it’s more relaxing to ride up, but it’s faster walking up and honestly, not sitting around for an extended period means you get less cold.
At the other location there were only two runs, but one was your sort of average run and the second run was a larger, steeper run. This place had five runs, but they are all the exact same size… and more on the «average» scale. So while it is less intense, your wait time is never long at the top.
Now some comments about this snow-​tubing place specifically. One thing we noticed was that there is not a lot of space at the end of the run. They have put down some hay and there is a plastic mesh to stop you from going over the end of the run, into a ravine. The other place we went had a much longer end, so you could keep sliding till you were done. At this place you were expected to «break», as in let go of anyone you were sliding with and if needed, put your feet down to start slowing down.
We were not told about this rule in the beginning and nearly went crashing through the barrier the first time. The girl manning the bottom got very pissed at us and gave us a big lecture… she kept telling us we needed to put our feet down «like she had been yelling at us to do»…umm…just FYI… when you are racing, full force down a hill, yelling with your friends, there is a good bet you will not hear some someone at the bottom telling you to slow down.
BUT lesson learned and we got very skilled at «breaking» and slowing down at the proper times.
Our favorite way to go down was in a train. You pick up a lot of speed. But suddenly we were not longer allowed to go down as a train, because the girl at the bottom was calling the shots and decided that was no longer allowed. Apparently people were not «breaking» when she was telling them to. No one went crashing through barriers, but their behaviour was not acceptable (to her).
The employees at the top of the hill were great and hilarious and (awkwardly enough), enjoyed being annoyed at the girl at the bottom of the hill with the rest of us. Apparently she was «in a bad mood» this evening.
The staff at the top are skilled in pushing people down the hills so that they are at optimal speed and spinning (if you wish).
Ultimately, you (and the people you are with) make the time you have and we DID have a great time. Snow-​tubing is a blast! I also feel like you can get your money’s worth here. Because of the five runs, we were able to get up and down quite quickly. You basically get one run for $ 4, or an unlimited run pass for two hours for $ 20. Obviously, if it gets too busy, you’re not going to be able to get as many runs in. Although it got progressively busier as the evening went on, we still managed to get in a lot of runs and left satisfied.
At the end of the day, snow-​tubing could be better here. I think the easiest thing to do would be to add groves, or more hay as the hills start levelling off, so that the tubes start to slow down on their own. They can’t extend the trails because of that ravine situation. Making it so that the tubes slowed down on their own would allow for people to go down as they like and not have to worry about crashing through barriers. Would probably take some pressure of people manning the bottom of the hills as well!

I came to this resort to ski their cross-​country trails. As a novice, you are looking for accesible trails that still provide a bit of challenge. HVR has the flat terrains to practice your glide; and a bit of an incline to practice the arrowhead and the wedge for the beginner skiier.
I enjoyed the trails because I learned & practiced. I did both yellow trails. It may seem as nothing to the advanced skiier but to the newbie, it provides the challenge of skiing consistently and some inclines to add to the mix!
The trails are great! The day I went though, it was packed. I should not be surprised given that there is a short supply of skiing terrain in Ontario.
The chalet though… It’s small, crowded and dumpy. On the first level, they have the ski sharpening, guest restrictions and rentals. There are a couple of cubby-​holes on the east and west side of the building, but not sufficient for the masses that visited the resort. I did not leave my backpack in a cubby-​hole because they were all taken!
The bathrooms are a joke. They only have 4 stalls (the 4^th one is hidden next to the baby change room in the far end) in a rather old-​fashioned bathroom locker set-​up. It’s only located in the 1^st level! There was a lineup that extended from the bathroom door to the guest services (almost east end entrance)!
Given the massive amounts of skiiers who visited the resort, they need to address this immediately. Install an additional set of bathrooms upstairs in the cafeteria & a unisex one.
The cafeteria is a chaotic mess! Cramped tables and lousy, old fabric chairs that I wonder how often or how properly they are cleaned. They need to re-​accommodate the layout and improve the set-​up, bringing in modern furniture (tables & seats) that can be hygienically cleaned.
The trails get 4 stars but the chalet gets 1 star (2.5 stars but b/​c Unilocal does not do half stars, I am leaving it at 2 stars). There is much room to modernize it.

Realistically this place is a means to an end. They’re the only place that offers night skiing for those of us who work the 9 – 5 grind that’s close enough to Toronto to not be a total inconvenience. The next closest option is Mount St. Louis-​Moonstone which IMO is 10 times the ski resort (by Ontario standards) but falls short for lacking night skiing/​snowboarding.
However lets speak about HVR for what it is. Convenient. Also this is the best place to learn (agreeing with Joe H’s review 100%). They’ve marked their hills up in difficulty to make them appear «scarier» but their «black diamonds» are about as challenging as they are long (not very).
While the runs and rickity chairlifts haven’t changed much (still as flat and icy in places) since I near killed myself here in highschool, there are notes of change around Horseshoe.
On the positive side, a restaurant/​bar (Crazy Horse) at the base of the hill, the addition of a BeaverTails stand (which makes one of the most delicious hot chocolates I’ve had EVER) and lastly they’ve started to build condo style chalet’s around the property for purchase!
**Note: If you’re going to buy hear, you REALLY need to love this hill**
Negative changes: $ 10 to get into the «Snow park». If you can really call it that… 5 – 6 low box rails, a couple of out of commission jumps and a ½ filled ½ pipe hardly warrants a charge. I was a little disappointed that they had 2 people guarding the entry to this lackluster area. Like the rest of Horseshoe this is a learning stunt park, should not charge for something so… meh.
I can’t come down too hard on HSV, I’m just old and bitter now and I think I’ve outgrown Ontario skiing, I crave a challenge now, I got my snow legs here and I know many many people do. They’re an affordable ($ 32 for a night lift ticket from 3pm-​10pm) option, close to the city, that is perfect for young families and those looking for a quick getaway to the hills of Ontarios north.
I’ll likely be back, unless the day comes that I move East, West or North.
Happy Shredding y’all!
2.5 star!

I went to Horseshoe Valley recently for snow tubing with a group of 10 people and I gotta say, HVR is clearly not your best spot for snow tubing in Ontario but it wasn’t bad either! Granted, they don’t have the steepest nor that longest (or even longish) rides but hey, we had fun!
Highlights:
— For a weekend with gorgeous sunny weather, this place was DEAD, which meant we went on the rides until we got sick of ‘em!
— Relaxed, fun staff. While most places frown upon group rides of more than 3 or 4 people, at HVR they allow as many as 12 people to go on the rides in tandem!
Tips:
— Get a 2 hour pass ($ 20) and that will translate to about 10+ rides on an average day. The alternative, $ 4/​ride, seems like a rip off unless it’s super busy and/​or you just want to go for a few rides.

Great on a summers day!
I’d always wanted to go ‘ZORBing’ and was very excited to hear that I didn’t have to trek to New Zealand before I could try it! While Horsehoe calls it OGOing… the extreme zorbing is basically like a huge waterslide, though, you are within a large plastic ball filled with water. Its way better than a water slide as you can easily rotate around inside the ball — and its quite safe!
Its one of the most extraordinary things I’ve ever done!
I also tried the version where they strap you into the ball in a harness, but I’ll probably never bother again. It was dizzying and just not all that fun, especially when compared to the water OBO.
My friends and I (we are mid to late 20’s) enjoyed the rest of the activities at Horseshoe also… the maze, mini golf, and they also have a zip trek, though it was booked up for the day… book it early I suppose. But we did the incredible on-​site 3-​hour tree-​top trekking and zip trekking anyway.
Then, we had an incredible 3-​course price-​fix dinner at the hotel’s restaurant following our big day. The food and service were fantastic!

Lets be honest, we live in ontario… and it’s flat. This is one of the few places we have to ski and it’s about 1 hour outside of toronto. I guess it’s really all we have so we can’t complain that much can we?
Out of the big 3 ski resorts in barrie/​collingwood area, this is one of them. The others are private/​semi private resorts which will cost you a pretty penny.
For something in ontario, this place is a big «Meh». The hills or short, the difficulty of everything in my opinion is sandbaged (ie. the black diamonds feel like blue or red [depending on where you live]). The good thing though is that this would be a very good place to learn how to ski/​snowboard/​mini-​ski etc.
One thing that really bugged me is how flat the «bunny hill» was. I was trying to give a couple of my friends lessons, and realized that it’s too slow on that hill to even do anything. I guess it’s really good for people that absolutely can’t even stand up, but common I believe you can do better.
The main chalet itself doesn’t seem like it’s changed since I used to come here at high school, but it did seem like their rental section keeps getting new equipment. I did have a chance to also visit the «Crazy Horse Restaurant» as well. I’ll write that review shortly.
Why would I come to horseshoe? Probably because I got a group deal for a ticket for half price. It’s also a great place to teach your friends how to ski/​snowboard before you dump them on a bigger hill.