Mountain Spirit Resort & Spa

I found this article and thought it was spot on in terms of describing the benefits of fractional ownership at Mountain Spirit Resort in Kimberley. This chap is called Bob Wood and is a regular contributor to Regular Forever Young. Bob found it easy to write on the pros and cons of fractional ownership of a recreation property - he’s an owner himself. Here’s his article:

I’m sitting on the side deck of our comfortable, modern two-bedroom, Muskoka-style cottage ready to attack a mystery novel, sipping a glass of chardonnay. My only worry on this day is whether I’ve applied a suitable amount of sun block. While April 13 may seem a little early to be soaking up cottage-country rays, the warmth of the afternoon sun is trapped on the porch, making a liar of the thermometer and tricking me into thinking that we’ve skipped spring and jumped straight into summer.

And as I look around, it’s all mine - sort of. We get to enjoy spring, the other three seasons and a bonus summer week with the five-week fractional-ownership package we purchased a few years back at the Bayview Wildwood Resort’s Cottages at Port Stanton development.

Started in 2003, the Cottages at Port Stanton bills itself as the closest fractional ownership project to Toronto - a 90-minute drive. With “unbeatable views” of Sparrow Lake and the surrounding rugged Canadian Shield countryside, we have been able to appreciate “the joys of lakeside living” pretty much as advertised since April 2004.

Is fractional ownership for you? Before we bought into Port Stanton, my wife and I, now both in our 50s, hadn’t really given the idea much thought. I suppose fractional ownership seemed like something intended for other people - with lots of money.

Up until about six years ago our vacation experience was split between “car camping” at various provincial parks and booking inexpensive hotel accommodation. Then, the need to escape the day-to-day grind of work and, additionally, take a break from caring for aging parents began to get to us and so we decided to spoil ourselves with a three-day/two-night package at a family resort north of Orillia known as the Wild Echo Bay Lodge.

Looking across Sparrow Lake on a snowy Friday night, we detected some building activity and decided to check into it. We were thinking at the time it was a timeshare and we expected the stereotypical hard sell associated with those places - but instead got the soft sell. And we were sold. The Cottages at Port Stanton rose on the site where Wild Echo Bay Lodge used to be.

We soon learned the difference between timeshares and fractional ownership. These units were the latter.

It turns out, the idea of sharing resources to purchase a vacation property has been around for years. As far as formalizing such arrangements in a commercial form, timesharing preceded fractional ownership. The first timeshares were apparently offered at a ski resort based in the French Alps in the sixties.

The fractional-property industry in North American didn’t really get going until the early 1990s, beginning at ski resorts in Colorado and other Rocky Mountains states.

So what’s the difference?

A timeshare is a right to the use of a property. Timeshares can be resold to another party as time, not as traditional real estate. On the other hand, fractional ownership (generally defined as a percentage share of an asset) can be resold, as fractional ownership conveys title of land.

As far as usage of the property, there are different schemes - fixed periods, floating dates and blends of both. A fractional share gives the owners certain privileges, such as a number of days or weeks when they can use the property.

For me, fractional ownership works just great. Here’s how:

• Disciplined me to take holidays

According to a Decima Harris research poll done last year, nearly one-quarter of employed Canadians report not taking all of their vacation days. This translates into 34-million unused days in Canada overall, representing about $6.03-billion in labour donated to employers. I am not inclined to work for free.

• Gets me away from the phone

We jump when the phone rings, which is probably a good thing.

• A break with no maintenance

Unlike traditional cottage owners, we’ve got no chores to do when we get there.

• A place for everything

Everything in our luxury, furnished cottage is always where it is supposed to be - not something that can be said about my permanent residence.

• The price is right

It seems cheaper than other types of vacationing. I leave it to financial gurus to prove me wrong but our maintenance fees for a week run in the $500 range for a two-bedroom. We originally paid about $44,000 for 50 years’ use of the property.

• Love that natural living. We can get closer to nature than our regular suburban existence.

I haven’t found any negatives yet and as I sip my wine and contemplate the good life, I don’t think I will find any.

Fractionals: a growth industry

Not so long ago, if you wanted a weekend or summer getaway, you bought a cottage and with it the costs of upkeep, or rented at a resort - hoping you could get a decent slot in the season you wanted. The idea of buying “part” of a cottage - one where someone else shouldered the responsibility of maintenance - was unheard of.

Today, however, fractional ownership is a rapidly growing industry, says Sue Nickason, a marketing consultant working with three such communities, including the new Cottages at Windermere House.

Fractional-ownership developments are springing up throughout Muskoka as well as other “cottage country” regions, like Haliburton, the Kawarthas, the lake region north of Kingston, and Georgian Bay. Nickason says the priorities for most are lakes, golf and ski opportunities. Most also like to be within three hours of their home base, although she sees buyers coming from as far away as Alberta and even England.

Read the article here: http://www.foreveryoungnews.com/leisureandlifestyle/article/16069

Chad Jenson of New Dawn Developments was recently recognised as the top business person in Cranbrook this year by the Kootenay Business Magazine. Chad and his team have received numerous awards and accolades for their professional work, which includes the construction of Mountain Spirit Resort. Click here to read the full article.

One of New Dawn Development’s current projects is the construction of the City of Kimberley’s Conference Centre and Athlete Training Centre which is just 200m from Mountain Spirit Resort. Construction will be completing for opening in October this year and many bookings have been confirmed ranging from company conferences to weddings.

Here’s another great place to hike and to cross country ski (for free) if you’re in Kimberley. It’s just a short drive to Bootleg Gap Golf. You can explore this area from Bootleg Gap itself or from a little further outside Marysville. If you keep going past Bootleg Gap’s entrance you’ll see a pull-in on your right. These trails are accessible from this pull in. You’ll cross the rails to trails paved path. Keep going and walk through the meadow to reach the top of the hoodoos, with views of the St Mary’s River, Bootleg Gap, and of course, the hoodoos themselves.

If you have vertigo don’t get too close!

The Smoothest of Highways… The summer long $11m project to resurface the highway 93/95A through Kimberley and replace and beautify sidewalks is completing, much to the pleasure of visitors and locals alike. The project also included replacement of underground drainage pipe networks and should complete this month.

Other local initiatives are progressing nicely including the Peak to Platzl trail project, providing a paved biking and walking trail from just outside Mountain Spirit Resort right down to the city centre.

The Rails to Trails project is also approaching completion, which will mean walkers, bikers and even roller bladers will soon be able to enjoy a paved trail along the previous railway line, all the way from Kimberley to Cranbrook.

This article which appeared in the Vancouver Sun on Friday, highlights the imminent development of a 500 person conference centre and paralympic training centre at the base of Kimberley Alpine Resort, just a few hundred metres from Mountain Spirit Resort & Spa…

Kimberley builds a global reputation

By Bruce Constantineau, Vancouver Sun, August 28, 2009

The small East Kootenay town that morphed into the Bavarian City of the Rockies in the 1970s wants to become the Paralympic training centre of Canada in the new millennium.

Kimberley expects to have Paralympic ski teams from Canada, the U.K., Australia, New Zealand and other countries training on a dedicated run at Kimberley Alpine Resort just before the Paralympic Games next year.

The Dreadnaught run was developed to accommodate downhill, slalom, giant slalom and super-G events, with safety netting from top to bottom and new communications and timing equipment.

The facility is fully equipped with ski equipment required by disabled athletes and International Paralympic Committee World Cup events were held there in 2005 and 2007.

Now, city officials hope to capitalize on the run’s international reputation by building a $6-million Paralympic Training and Conference Centre at the base of the mountain by late 2010.

“International teams are talking to us now about the possibility of coming here and training in the future,” Kimberley Mayor Jim Ogilvie said. “So throughout the Olympics, we’ll make it known we’re going to have this centre available.”

The provincial government committed $3.9 million to Kimberley’s Paralympic vision four years ago and the city has used some of those funds to help develop the ski run and to make its civic arena and curling rink more accessible for disabled athletes.

The arena’s players’ benches and penalty boxes now are at ice level, allowing for smooth transitions on and off the ice for sledge hockey players, while dressing rooms have been renovated with automatic doors, accessible washrooms and showers, wide benches and equipment boxes.

Curling venue upgrades include covered ramp access and automatic doors leading into the building. The city’s two-year-old aquatic centre is also wheelchair-accessible.

“What we’re saying is come here and train here because we really do have the complete package,” Ogilvie said.

The package won’t be totally complete until the new ski-in, ski-out training and conference centre is built next year, but he said most of the project funding is already in place — including $2.5 million left from the provincial grant, another $2 million in federal-provincial infrastructure funding and $1 million from the city.

The facility will have training facilities, change rooms, meeting rooms, audio-visual equipment and conference space for up to 500 people.

Kimberley didn’t send delegations to previous Games, but Ogilvie noted several international sport federations found out about the city’s Paralympic aspirations at the B.C. Pavilion in Turin in 2006.

He credits renowned Canadian ski instructor Jerry Johnston for giving Kimberley so much credibility as a centre for training disabled athletes. The 73-year-old member of the Order of Canada moved to Kimberley from Alberta in 1980 and brought his groundbreaking training skills with him.

He began training disabled skiers in the early 1960s and he and his wife, Annie, established Canada’s first disabled skiing program; they created the Canadian Association for Disabled Skiing in 1976.

Johnston helped establish the Japanese Handicapped Ski Association and headed the disabled skiing exhibition at the Olympic Winter Games in Calgary in 1988. He’s not an active trainer these days, but he remains an important consultant in Kimberley’s Paralympic plans.

“Paralympic skiing in Kimberley has been very successful,” Johnston said. “Things have really opened up for a lot of teams to train here and they don’t have to run around looking for equipment for speed racing.

“A lot of resorts won’t shut down a hill, but we have an agreement that we can do that for training.”

Kimberley will continue to attract high-level competitions for disabled athletes, he said, but it will be hard to become a permanent fixture on the IPC ski circuit because so many countries want to hold the events.

“It’s good to move the events around because that helps increase the popularity of the sport,” Johnston said. “Disabled athletes still aren’t respected at all in some countries and we have to change that. People thought we were crazy the first time we went to Japan but they really accepted the sport when they saw what the athletes could do.”

Kimberley Alpine Resort representative Matt Mosteller said the proposed new training centre will become a year-round facility for able-bodied and disabled athletes, with fitness and dryland training taking priority in non-winter months.

“The sport has been a very big positive for the community,” he said. “Athletes come to live and train in the area and there’s an economic win when you create and host events.”

Kimberley will host a Nor-Am competition for able-bodied snowboarders just before the Olympics in February next year, then hold a Nor-Am event for disabled skiers before the Paralympics begin in March.

The city expects to attract disabled curlers to its curling venue before the 2010 Paralympic Games and the Canadian men’s sledge hockey team is scheduled to play against an international opponent in the Kimberley Civic Centre on March 1.

Steve Bova, an instructor who runs a disabled ski academy at the resort, noted the Canadian snowboard team trained on the mountain last year and the Nor-Am snowboard event will attract snowboarders from all over the world.

“The main thing is to market what we have now and get the people here,” he said. “From a coach’s point of view, the venues are what’s important and we have them.”

bconstantineau@vancouversun.com

ECONOMICS OF THE OLYMPICS

The third in a four-part series looking at the economic impact of the 2010 Winter Olympics on communities throughout British Columbia:

Aug. 7: Comox Valley

Aug. 14: Prince George

Aug. 21: Kamloops

TODAY: Kimberley

Another great way to spend the delightful summer in Kimberley is rafting the St. Mary’s River. We chartered two rafts for the St. Mary’s Float with the Kimberley Raft Company. A few extra folks floated alongside in dinghies, which was a nice idea until the people on the rafts found the water cannons and started the biggest water fight I’ve ever seen! The fun didn’t stop from getting onto the rafts at St. Mary’s Lake, to stopping for smokies on the edge of the river, to the end of the float, about 4 fun packed hours later.

Setting off on St. Mary’s Lake:

Passing the hoodoos on St. Mary’s River:

The water fight:

St. Mary’s Lake is also popular for fishing, canoeing, kayaking, swimming and, of course, a starting point for rafting.

Kimberley is on the hot springs circle route and a favourite outing from Mountain Spirit Resort is Lussier Hot Springs, found on the way to Whiteswan Lake Provincial Park. These are a big favourite as not only are they totally natural and free, but there are lovely rock pools of different temperatures located right next to the creek. This means you can sit in the hottest pool and then gradually cool down in each neighbouring pool, finishing off with a refreshing dip in the creek… and then return back to the hottest pool to warm up and tingle!

Congratulations to Stan Salikin and his team; the City of Kimberley and the Kimberley & District Chamber of Commerce. The float representing Kimberley featured our favourite Kimberley icon, Happy Hans!

We look forward to the floats at the July Fest Parade on 18th - 19th July! Click here for more information on July Fest 2009.

What a great reason to think back to the awesome winter we had this year skiing and snowboarding in Kimberley Alpine Resort…

OnTheSnow.com has over 1 million unique annual visitors to their website and their visitors picked Kimberley as their overall favourite resort in the Pacific Northwest. Number one… That’s better than Fernie, Whistler, Sunshine, Lake Louise, Panorama, Big White… need I go on!

Click here to visit the site and read about the award!

OnTheSnow.com is the Web’s most visited snow skiing site with a Nielsen-audited 1.6 million unique monthly visitors. The site offers the ski reports, ski resort reviews, web cams and skiing deals for virtually every ski resort in the world. Please click for the complete list of the 2009 OnTheSnow Visitors Choice Awards. There are 13 International Editions of OnTheSnow in seven languages.