Across Canada, skiers are shedding their outer layers and the snow has begun to return to its liquid form. For the snow bunny, its time to lapse into temporary hibernation. However, as you stuff your winter gear beside that dusty exercise equipment, just remember: summer is here! Snow may be seasonal, but many Canadian ski resorts are open year-round.

It's not too late to visit one of Canada's fabulous ski resorts for a plethora of summer activities!

Why Summers are Spectacular at Ski Resorts

Many ski resorts offer year-round activities and events to suit all summer adventurers, sightseers and sports enthusiasts.

Here's a taste of why vacationing at a ski resort in the summer is unbeatable:

Discounted Accommodation Rates: Find your own mountainside get-a-way in a number of luxurious properties for much lower rates than during ski season.

Develop a New Summertime Hobby: Most ski resorts offer summer activities for all fitness levels and interests. Try horseback riding, mountain biking, bungee jumping, white water rafting, canoeing, hiking, sightseeing, wilderness tours, and much, much more!

Avoid the Ski Season Crowds: Visit and explore Canada's ski resorts in the summer without the large winter crowds.

Admire the Views in the Sunshine: Canada's magnificent mountain ranges never go out of season. Journey to new heights to breathe in fresh mountain air and soak in the natural beauty of your surroundings.

Partake in a Special Summer Event: Most ski resorts never close their doors to visitors. This means year-round events to match every season. Special events for 2008 include the Pemberton Festival (Whistler), Kokanee Crankworx (Whistler), Tremblant International Blues Festival (Mont Tremblant), Canada Day Celebrations and wine festivals (Silver Star, Sun Peaks).

Discover Summer Activities at These Resorts:

• Whistler
• Sun Peaks
• Kicking Horse
• Panorama
• Silver Star
• Fernie
• Mont Tremblant

Find Summer Ski Resort Accommodation Deals

Search or browse through hundreds of summer accommodation options in Sun Peaks, Silverstar, Mont Tremblant, Whistler, Fernie, Panorama, or Kicking Horse. Book on-line with property owners, save time, and get back outside to enjoy the sunshine!

Now that flowers are blooming again and the skis are buried in the back of the closet for a few months, perhaps it's time for a bit of nostalgia about the 2007-2008 Canadian ski season. Do your memories capture a winter of epic proportions? Or did the powder fail to live up to your expectations?

The statistics tell a varied story. Some mountains received a little more than usual, some mountains saw a little less, and others were just right. Here's a graph with a few mountain's snow stats this year, but only from those mountains that reported a final cumulative snow total this year.

While this season seems to have been rather humdrum in terms of snow, mountains south of the border in Colorado received record dumps, with eight mountains breaking all-time snowfall records.

But for at least one local, the pleasure of the season isn't measured in centimeters. The writer of a (very detailed) blog chronicling Whistler weather said that in his five years in the area, "This is the best season since I have been living in Whistler."

It's still too early for accurate predictions of next season's weather, but we'll certainly welcome your wild guesses.

What's colourful, big, and descends on Fernie for the first time ever this upcoming Canada Day weekend?

It's the First Annual Fernie Fest! Held in the new Riverside Park, the festival aims to celebrate music, the arts, culture and Fernie, over three full days of summer partying.

Like all good ideas, the festival was born when someone brought up the question "Why doesn't Fernie have a summer music festival?"

Soon thereafter, a group of interested individuals got together to cultivate the idea; resulting in the Fernie Fest starting this Friday.

Visitors can book Fernie accommodation in town or the ski resort, or buy a camping pass for any number of nights. Tickets are available online for $35 and up, and kids under 12 are free.

Thinking of attending? Here are a 6 reasons why you won't want to miss the party:

1. The best Kids Zone ever

FernieFest will be featuring plenty for the children, including scavenger hunts, drum building, puppet shows, mask making, face painting, and the comedic stylings of PT the Clown.

2. You can support the local community

Events like these are all about celebrating the local community: the culture, the flavours, and the artistry. In this age of globalized society and homogenization, it's nice to be able to experience the unique qualities everyone has to offer.

3. Group yoga sessions along the river

Relax after a morning of hiking the Fernie forests with some group yoga along the stunning Elk River. Afterwards, don't miss the Dunk Tank, Sumo Wrestling, and a variety of other bizarre and entertaining activities.

4. Hear artists perform Celtic, Funk, Folk, and Electronica

FernieFest will be featuring 16 great artists from throughout BC, Canada and the Kootenays.

A few artists include Third Eye Tribe, who "fuels his audience with his lyrical drive-bys of socially conscious rhymes" and Emaline Delapaix, who sings about "everything from dodgy jobs to hard hitting world issues, secret love affairs between musicians, and lust on the dance floor under a spinning mirrorball."

Check out the full lineup here.

5. Friday Night Pub Crawl

After the Block Party in downtown Fernie during the day (with lantern making, a street fashion show and more) participating Fernie pubs & bars come alive, showcasing a variety of live entertainment and specials until the wee hours of the morning.

6. Pancake Breakfast

The only thing better than fresh pancakes...are fresh pancakes that raise money for a good cause. (All proceeds towards the Canada Day Breakfast finance 12 Fernie Secondary Students to the Student Leadership Conference in Ottawa).

So there you have it. Plenty of reasons to attend the first annual FernieFest. For more info, visit the official website.

When you're interested in visiting a ski resort for the first time, how to learn about it?

Talk to friends who have been there? Head to your travel agent? Read some ski magazines in the library?

Those methods are so last century.

By now, just like 99% of the planet, your first stop is the Internet (or more specifically, MSN, Yahoo, or Google). Let's say you want to know more about Fernie ski resort, so you type in "fernie ski resort."

If the search engine has done it's job, you'll be rewarded with a wealth of information on the ski resort. Unfortunately, that's not always the case. You may find yourself quickly wading through pages and pages of information, some of it useful, some of it useless.

Well now there's a slightly better way of finding out information on ski resorts, and every other topic you can think of. It's a website called Squidoo.

Basically, anyone can sign up and create a "lens" on any topic they wish. The idea is that a person with an interest in their field would be able to condense all the best information down to a single, easy to use reference.

And to kick off our own legion of lenses, we've put together some handy beginner's guides to Fernie Ski Resort and Fernie BC.

Check them out and let us know what you think!