Top Ten Unheralded Extreme Ski Slopes

In the shadow of the beast: Primavera's fearsome scar is on the far right (courtesy Moguls.com)

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Portillo is located 102 miles from Santiago high in the Andean mountain range. South America's oldest resort, it is also the only resort on the continent to have hosted a world championship ski event—in 1966—evidence of the challenging nature of its terrain.

Lying in the shadow of 23,834-foot Mount Aconcagua, the Western Hemisphere's tallest mountain, Portillo is not a monster resort in terms of size or its piste offerings, nor is it the continent's best-value destination. What it does have, however, is a lift elevation topping out at 10,204 feet, some of the world's driest powder, and those spine-tingling descents that can keep you awake at night.

The resort boasts some 22 percent of expert-rated terrain, presumably a significant factor in Portillo's preeminence as a summer training camp for several Olympic ski teams, including the U.S. and Austrian national teams. Actually, for pure fear-factor, Portillo's unremittingly steep Super C couloir out-scares Primavera. But for a steep, long powder run, Primavera is about as good as it gets in South America—unless, of course, you stumble into a Buenos Aires tango salon.

Resort Facts

Web: www.skiportillo.com

Email: info@skiportillo.com

Season: June to October