Calabogie Peaks ski hill to open Thursday as province eases restrictions

The slopes of Calabogie Peaks Resort will open to skiers Thursday as part of Ontario's plans to gradually ease pandemic restrictions amid declining COVID-19 case numbers.

The hill about an hour west of Ottawa will be one of two in Ontarioallowed to open this week, along withBatawa Ski Hill north of Trenton.

"What we were hoping to do isget a good end of seasonand have people come back out and and get some exercise and some fresh air," saidJim Hemlin, Calabogie Peaks'chief operating officer.

Ski resorts across the province were among the non-essential businessesforced to close when Ontario imposed a provincewide shutdown on Dec. 26. They've remained open in other provinces.

On Mondaythe provincesaid ski hills can reopen under new rules once their public health unit transitions back to the province'scolour-coded COVID-19 reopening framework.

That transition will begin withthree eastern Ontario public health units returning to the lowest level of green on Wednesday: Hastings Prince Edward,Kingston, Frontenac and Lennox & Addington andRenfrew County.

Batawa is only selling lift tickets to residents of those regions.

Twenty-eight other health units, including Ottawa, are expected to shed the stay-at-home order and return to that scaleFeb.16, whileToronto, Peel and York regions must wait until at least Feb. 22.

Hills can open across the scale

Aspokesperson for the province confirmedski hillswill be allowed to open across the scale,even in health units that are in the greyzone.

Anyone who rides a chairlift has to wear a mask that covers their entire mouth, nose and chin and hills that reopen in red or grey areas will havecapacity limits of 50 per cent and 25 per cent, respectively.

Lessons will be allowed at hills in regions that aren't ingrey, subject to in-person teaching regulations, physical distancing and capacity limits.

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The president of the Ontario SnowResorts Associationwelcomed the news.

"We've been hoping for some good news, forgetting our operators up and running again," said Kevin Nichol."We're hoping that we'll get a good spring season to make up for some of the losses."

Nichol said many of the hills that will reopen in the coming weeks were operating with heightened safety protocols before the shutdown.

"We're just going to pick up where we left off," said Nichol."We'll fine tune some of our protocols and we're pretty confident that we can operate safely."