Beauty and the piste: ski co-ops in Canada

"Whatever happened to that simple joy?" asks the narrator of Valhalla, the latest ski film from Sweetgrass Productions. The film features a fictional skiing community who eschew fast chairlifts and expensive mountain restaurants for a purer, gentler life, in harmony with their surroundings. It is rich in nostalgia - for a time when being in the mountains in winter was about freedom and adventure.

In one sense, though, Valhalla is located firmly in the 21st century: it will resonate with anyone who has ever winced at the cost of a week's lift pass in a big resort, or stood in a 30-minute chairlift queue before descending a piste packed with skiers, dodging cannons making artificial snow.

Has it ever occurred to you that it doesn't have to be this way?

It occurred to the residents of Terrace, British Columbia - 1,500 kilometres north of Vancouver - who in January became the proud owners of their local hill, Shames Mountain, making it Canada's first not-for-profit, operational ski co-operative. My Mountain Co-op was formed in 2010 out of Friends of Shames, a group established to create a business model that could take ownership of the mountain (which had been for sale for a decade) and save it from otherwise certain closure. Local businesses, individuals and families bought member-ships to the co-op and managed to raise the C$360,000 (HK$2.64 million) needed to meet the purchase price.

Shames is no resort: it has no hotels, no glitzy bars, no restaurants or shops selling the latest gear. It has two chairlifts, a tow bar and a base lodge where you can buy food and drink and hire equipment.

It also gets 480 inches of snow each year - comparing favourably to Canadian mega-resort Whistler's yearly average of 469 inches.