Ski: Cairngorm Mountain

📌 Ski centre near Aviemore, Highland
★★★

🛠️ Funicular currently closed for repairs with no estimated reopening date (checked November 2023)

Cairngorm Mountain (historically referred to as Aviemore) is Scotland’s best known winter sports destination, traditionally attracting more visitors than any of the country’s other ski areas. On paper, it’s easy to see why: its Top Bowls have the most reliable snow cover of any runs in the UK, accessed by a (notoriously unreliable) funicular railway which also directly serves the dozen or more runs on the Cas side of the mountain. Nearby Aviemore village is also the closest thing Britain has to an all winter (and summer) sports “resort”, making it a popular year-round holiday base. But Cairngorm’s drawbacks are non-trivial. Significant queues for lifts and ski hire are common at weekends and during school holidays, and the upper slopes are barren and inhospitable in bad weather: days when the hill is stormbound or uplift limited are fairly common.

Scroll down for our detailed guide.

🌍 Location

📌 Coire Cas (minor road end 4 mi south of Glenmore Visitor Centre)

🧭 O.S. Grid Reference: G.R.: NH 990060

🛰️ GPS coordinates: 57.133707,-3.670181

🚌 Bus from Aviemore

🚗 Car park (gets full) – access road prone to closure due to drifting after fresh snowfall

📝 Key info

🚡 13 lifts | ⛷️ 30 km | ↕️ Skiing range: 630-1,150 m

⌚ Roughly December to April, conditions permitting

🎫 Day lift pass: £30 adult / £19 child

🎿 Equipment hire: On site, or in Glenmore / Aviemore to west

🔗 cairngormmountain.co.uk

⛷️ Slopes guide

Don’t miss… The Ciste side of the mountain below the top green slopes – a steep-sided gully now only served by the West Wall Poma but offering the area’s best terrain for experts: often quieter than the rest of the hill.

If the queues aren’t too bad, the Funicular Railway is the obvious way up the mountain. It goes all the way to the top, but if doing mid-station stops you can get off for the Lower Slopes, also directly served by the Car Park T-bar. On skier’s right, Home Road is a direct cat track to base (recently reclassified from green to blue – why?), while on skier’s left of the railway there are a trio of green routes, with the modern Shieling Sunkid drag lift parallel to easy slopes on the top section. None are steep, but all have narrow sections especially if snow is poor. The Fiacaill Ridge Poma also starts from the base but goes higher, serving longish blue runs. Fiacaill Ridge next to the ski area boundary is often particularly quiet, with good views over Glenmore. Finally, two magic carpet lifts near the base station provide a fairly sheltered learners’ area, underpinned by artificial snowmaking.

Remain on the funicular instead of alighting halfway up and you enter a short tunnel ending at the Ptarmigan Top Station. To skier’s left of the mountain from here is the Upper Cas, with three reds returning to mid-station. The wide White Lady is one of Cairngorm’s signature pistes, with a sustained gradient allowing you to get serious speed up if groomed and quiet. On the other side of the funicular, the narrower M1 Race Piste and Side Track provide alternative direct ways down, but by far the busiest option is the road Traverse, which (after a flat section) connects to the Zig Zags and beyond to the Lower Slopes: nearly 500 m vertical all on green runs. A dense network of blues either side of the snowsure Coire Cas T-bar fill in the gaps – these offer more variety than the piste map suggests if you can find their respective starts, although the Gunbarrel can get intimidatingly busy – and narrow if the sides are scoured by wind.

The Top Bowls are situated adjacent to the Ptarmigan Station. This is all fabulous beginner territory in good weather, uplift provided by the Coire na Ciste T-bar, Ptarmigan T-bar and ironically-named Polar Express Poma. The West Wall Poma also finishes here, its uptrack stretching away enticingly into the extensive Upper Ciste area. Timid visitors beware: this is all red or black terrain, and the long drag back up can catch tired skiers and boarders out. Down the centre, the Ciste Gully is a natural half-pipe, often full of drifted snow late in the season. Various steeper runs descend both flanks providing excellent expert terrain, but if exploring No. 2 Gully take care not to descend too far and miss the traverse back to the West Wall Poma. Back near the Poma uptrack, Ryvoan is the direct way down avoiding a traverse. There’s one other run deserving a mention: the scenic M2 straddles the ridge between the Cas and Ciste sides, eventually reaching a fork. Right takes you Over Yonder (now sensibly regraded from blue to red) to the West Wall Poma, while left takes you to the Day Lodge Piste (also quite steep) which returns to the, err, Day Lodge. This run borders the Day Lodge Poma, which provides an alternative way to access the Ciste.

If exploring the Ciste you’ll notice the old pylons of the Ciste Chairlift and West Wall Chairlifts. These are no longer in use, although there are ongoing calls to reinstate them. Although this means no uplift now serves the lower Ciste, on days with good low level snow you can ski (according to the ski map, patrolled but unmarked) to the Ciste car park below. If running, shuttle buses take you back to the base of the funicular.

❄️ Snow & weather

Cairngorm usually has the longest season of any winter sports destination in Scotland. Decent snow cover in the Top Bowls is common well into May, and sometimes from as early as October; lower down, a new snow factory and impressive array of new snow guns help keep things open. Many runs are located in broad natural bowls which hold snow well, also catching drifting snow off the Cairngorms Plateau in southerly storms. North or northwest facing slopes are also good news, with only the Day Lodge Piste having a notably sunny aspect. The Funicular Railway allows access to the upper slopes when lower ones are bare. Wind is the biggest problem: gales often force lift closures (especially in the Top Bowls), scour off piste terrain and can block the access road and funicular tunnel mouth, occasionally for days on end.

👪 Queues & facilities

Queues are Cairngorm’s biggest problem, caused by large car parks, inadequate lift capacity and the region’s popularity during winter holidays. If snow and weather conditions are good, long queues are almost guaranteed at weekends and school holidays up to and including spring half term. Waits for ski hire can also be long, and if the top two car parks are full you may have to queue for a shuttle bus from the lower car park at the foot of the Ciste, over a mile from the base station. If all the lifts are open, the Day Lodge Poma and West Wall Poma may be a quicker way to access the top of the mountain than the Funicular Railway, which builds queues alarmingly. If possible, visit midweek in term time when the hill’s much quieter – also taking advantage of a lower lift pass price.

There are a number of locally-based ski and snowboard schools. Equipment hire is available but often sells out during school holidays; you can book in advance, or there are plenty of alternatives in Glenmore and Aviemore. Food at the base and at the funicular top station is generally a cut above general Scottish ski centre fare (in quality and price) if you manage to get a seat. There’s loads of accommodation in Aviemore and enough to do in the surrounding area to keep you occupied if the hill’s closed.

🥜 In a nutshell: Snowsports in Scotland

>> Want to know more about Scottish snowsports in general? Check out our overview page.