Blue Ridge ski season

These three resorts carry a High Country ski trip. All of them make their own snow. Natural snow is a bonus you get to brag about later. None of them print a price that this guide will copy. Check current rates, hours, and whether your slope is actually open.

Sugar Mountain Resort

The slopes are in the Village of Sugar Mountain, beside Banner Elk, not inside Banner Elk's town limits. The resort publishes 20 slopes on 125 skiable acres, a 4,100-foot base, a 5,300-foot summit, and 1,200 feet of vertical. Six chairlifts and two Magic Carpets serve the hill. Fourteen slopes are lit for night skiing. Snowmaking covers the slopes. The longest run is 1.5 miles, and the resort's mix is 40 percent beginner, 40 percent intermediate, and 20 percent expert. Tubing uses 700-foot lanes on the golf course across from the base lodge. The outdoor ice rink is 10,000 square feet and generally runs from early November through March. The resort tries to open by early or mid-November and stay open through the end of March. Weather still gets a vote.

Beech Mountain Resort

This one is inside the Town of Beech Mountain, higher than the other two and a steeper drive from the Banner Elk valley. The resort publishes 17 trails, 95 skiable acres, a 4,675-foot base, a 5,506-foot peak, and 830 feet of vertical. It counts nine lifts and snowmaking on its slopes, and it runs tubing. It opened in 1967 and calls itself the highest ski area in Eastern America. The town uses that same 5,506-foot figure for itself. The air up there is not a rumor.

Appalachian Ski Mountain

The closest skiing to Boone and to Blowing Rock village, with a Blowing Rock address. It is the small hill: 13 slopes, a 3,635-foot base, a 4,000-foot peak, and 365 feet of vertical. Every slope is lit for night skiing, and snowmaking covers all of them. The longest run, Orchard Run, is half a mile. There is an ice arena of 6,000 square feet. The resort has posted a projected 2026 to 2027 season of November 20, 2026 through March 14, 2027. That is a plan. Check the mountain before you treat it as a promise.

How to choose

Stay in Sugar Mountain or Banner Elk for Sugar's vertical and the tubing and skating at the base. Stay on Beech if you want the highest of the three and you don't mind the climb. Stay in Boone or Blowing Rock if Appalachian is enough skiing and you want the town services afterward. Don't build the weekend on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Sections close for ice and snow. The village of Sugar Mountain recommends four-wheel drive higher on its own mountain in a snow, and says that is sometimes required.

Town pages: Sugar Mountain, Beech Mountain, Blowing Rock, and Boone.