Waterville Valley Ski Resort
Waterville Valley Ski Resort is a ski area located in the state of New Hampshire in USA. The resort is in the town of Waterville Valley, NH.
We recently ranked all of New Hampshire's ski resorts, so you can see where Waterville Valley stacks up against all its nearby ski hills!
Season Passes
Waterville Valley is a part of the INDY Ski Pass system. This allows you to buy one lift pass, and ski at all of the slopes that are also a part of the group.
Lodging Options
There are numerous options to stay at Waterville Valley around the resort. Check out the available options with the form below.
Waterville Valley Mountain Resort Terrain Overview
Waterville Valley has a total of 52 ski trails, which are serviced by 10 ski lifts, gondolas and/or trams. Waterville Valley is considered a smaller than average ski area, with only a maximum of 220 acres available to ski. This area is equivalent to 89 hectares, 0.3 square miles, or 0.9 square kilometers.
Waterville Valley's slopes see on average 148 inches (4.5 meters) of snowfall a year. That is almost 12 feet every year!
Total Runs
52
Lifts
10
Skiable Acres
220(1 km2)
Annual Snowfall
148"(4,511 cm)
Waterville Valley Ski Resort Elevation
Waterville Valley Ski Resort has a summit elevation of 4,004 feet, or 1,220 meters. However, not all of that elevation is able to be skied. The base of the ski slope sits at 1,984 feet above sea level, creating a ski hill that is 2,020 feet (616 meters) high. This is referred to as the slope's vertical drop - or a measure of how high the skiable hill is.
Waterville Valley's summit elevation is higher than average. There are a lot of ski slopes that are much higher than this one (some stretch to 12,000 feet!), but it is not small by any stretch of the imagination.
Summit Elevation
4,004'(1,220 m)
Vertical Drop
2,020'(616 m)
Base Elevation
1,984'(605 m)
Waterville Valley Ski Resort Difficulty Level
Difficulty Score™
48.7out of 100
DID YOU KNOW?
At Parks & Trips, we've created a proprietary Difficulty Score that attempts to show how difficult a particular ski slope is. We get to this number by combining a number of metrics for each resort and comparing them to its peers. Most of the score is based off the amount of easy-intermediate-expert slopes by acreage and the maximum vertical drop of the overall resort, but also includes a few lesser-used metrics as well.
Our algorithm compares each resort’s metrics with all others in North America, then assigns each a Difficulty Score, which we use to rank them accordingly. Resorts with a lower score are easier to ski than those with a higher one. However, a high score does not mean that the resort does not have any easy slopes, or vice versa. This is just an overall score given to the resort based on all its metrics grouped together.
Skiable Terrain by Difficulty Level
Waterville Valley has 220 total skiable acres, which can be broken down into the three main groups of difficulty: Beginner, Intermediate, and Expert.
Waterville Valley is mostly a beginner-friendly ski area, with about 20% of its trails as easy. However, it also has its fair share of more difficult runs - which account for the remaining 80%.
Beginner
20%(44 acres)
Beginner trails (identified by a green circle) are the easiest trails on the hill with a gradual 25% or less gradient, and are usually wide to accommodate beginner skiers.
Intermediate
60%(132 acres)
Intermediate trails (identified by a blue square) are usually the most popular and crowded runs, which have a slope of anywhere between 25-40%.
Expert
20%(44 acres)
Expert trails (identified by a black diamond... or two) are the hardest slopes on the mountain, and have very steep gradients over 40%.
Is Waterville Valley Ski Resort good for beginners?
Waterville Valley can be beginner-friendly, depending on the runs you take. While it ranks in the lower half of all North American ski areas in terms of overall difficulty, it still has 80% of its trails rated at or above intermediate.
Waterville Valley Ski Resort Location
Waterville Valley Ski Resort is located in the state of New Hampshire, USA. This ski area is nearest the town of Waterville Valley, NH.
Address:
Waterville Valley, NH 03215 USA
View on Google Maps
Website:
waterville.com
GPS Coordinates:
43.96000, -71.50000
Getting to Waterville Valley Mountain Resort
By Car: If you are driving, you would set your GPS to either the ski resort's name (Waterville Valley Ski Resort), its coordinates of 43.96000, -71.50000 (latitude, longitude), or simply drive towards the town of Waterville Valley, NH to get close.
By Air: If you are coming in from across the country, then you may need to board an airplane to get here.
A large airport has scheduled major airline service with millions of passengers per year. This type of airport always accepts international flights. Here are the closest large airport(s) to Waterville Valley Ski Resort.
| Name | Code | City | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Portland International Jetport | PWM | Portland, ME | 63 mi |
| Logan International Airport | BOS | Boston, MA | 113 mi |
| Montreal / Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport | YUL | Montréal, QC | 152 mi |
A medium-sized airport has scheduled regional airline service. This type of airport may or may not accept international flights. Here are the closest medium-sized airport(s) to Waterville Valley.
| Name | Code | City | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lebanon Municipal Airport | LEB | Lebanon, NH | 46 mi |
| Portsmouth International at Pease Airport | PSM | Portsmouth, NH | 70 mi |
| Manchester-Boston Regional Airport | MHT | Manchester, NH | 71 mi |
There may also be much smaller regional airports next to Waterville Valley Ski Resort, but we didn't list them here due to the fact that no major airlines go through them.
Other Nearby Ski Resorts
Skiers will - especially if coming from far away - try and visit a couple different slopes all in the same trip. Here are the closest other ski slopes within 100 miles of Waterville Valley Ski Resort.
| Name | Location | Summit | Difficulty Score™ | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cannon Mountain | Franconia, NH | 4,080 ft | 57% | 16 mi |
| Attitash | Bartlett, NH | 2,350 ft | 51% | 17 mi |
| Cranmore Mountain | North Conway, NH | 2,000 ft | 39% | 21 mi |
| Bretton Woods | Bretton Woods, NH | 3,100 ft | 52% | 21 mi |
| King Pine Ski Area | Madison, NH | 850 ft | 17% | 21 mi |
| Black Mountain | Jackson, NH | 2,350 ft | 43% | 25 mi |
| Wildcat Mountain | Gorham, NH | 4,062 ft | 55% | 26 mi |
| Loon Mountain | Lincoln, NH | 3,050 ft | 50% | 26 mi |
| Shawnee Peak | Bridgton, ME | 1,700 ft | 42% | 35 mi |
| Ragged Mountain | Andover, NH | 2,250 ft | 42% | 38 mi |
| Burke Mountain | East Burke, VT | 3,267 ft | 60% | 47 mi |
| Mt. Abram | Greenwood, ME | 2,001 ft | 38% | 48 mi |
| Sunday River | Bethel, ME | 3,140 ft | 55% | 49 mi |
| Mount Sunapee | Newbury, NH | 2,743 ft | 44% | 51 mi |
| Dartmouth Skiway | Concord, NH | 1,943 ft | 39% | 53 mi |
| Pats Peak | Henniker, NH | 1,400 ft | 32% | 53 mi |
| Lost Valley | Auburn, ME | 495 ft | 39% | 62 mi |
| Whaleback Mountain | Enfield, NH | 1,800 ft | 38% | 63 mi |
| McIntyre Ski Area | Manchester, NH | 510 ft | 17% | 66 mi |
| Killington | Killington, VT | 4,241 ft | 68% | 67 mi |
| Sugarbush | Warren, VT | 4,083 ft | 60% | 67 mi |
| Mad River Glen | Morrisville, VT | 3,637 ft | 59% | 68 mi |
| Suicide Six | South Pomfret, VT | 1,200 ft | 36% | 68 mi |
| Pico Mountain | Mendon, VT | 3,967 ft | 53% | 69 mi |
| Crotched Mountain | Bennington, NH | 2,066 ft | 41% | 70 mi |
| Okemo Mountain | Ludlow, VT | 3,344 ft | 52% | 72 mi |
| Middlebury Snow Bowl | Hancock, VT | 2,720 ft | 39% | 72 mi |
| Bolton Valley | Richmond, VT | 3,150 ft | 40% | 74 mi |
| Gunstock | Kingston, NH | 2,300 ft | 47% | 75 mi |
| Smuggler's Notch | Jeffersonville, VT | 3,640 ft | 59% | 76 mi |
| Cochran Ski Area | Richmond, VT | 950 ft | 32% | 79 mi |
| Titcomb Mountain | Farmington, ME | 750 ft | 32% | 81 mi |
| Magic Mountain | Londonderry, VT | 2,850 ft | 52% | 82 mi |
| Jay Peak | Jay, VT | 3,968 ft | 50% | 85 mi |
| Ski Bradford | Haverhill, MA | 1,548 ft | 29% | 86 mi |
| Owl's Head | Mansonville, QC | 2,480 ft | 46% | 86 mi |
| Bromley Mountain | Peru, VT | 3,284 ft | 42% | 88 mi |
| Stratton Mountain | Winhall, VT | 3,875 ft | 45% | 91 mi |
| Black Mountain | Rumford, ME | 2,150 ft | 44% | 94 mi |
| Mont Sutton | Sutton, QC | 3,175 ft | 41% | 95 mi |
| Mont Hatley (Montjoye) | , QC | 0 ft | 0% | 95 mi |
| Mount Snow | Somerset, VT | 3,600 ft | 44% | 99 mi |
Waterville Valley Ski Resort Mountain Stats
| Name | Statistic |
|---|---|
| Summit Elevation | 4,004 ft |
| Base Elevation | 1,984 ft |
| Vertical Drop | 2,020 ft |
| Trails | 52 (20% Beginner, 60% Intermediate, 20% Expert) |
| Lifts | 10 |
| Skiable Acres | 220 |
| Avg. Annual Snowfall | 148 inches |