Snow tubing: the activity that converts reluctant skiers

What a tubing park actually is

Not a hill with tubes on it. A commercial tubing park is a purpose-built piece of terrain: parallel lanes carved into the snow with banked walls, a consistent gradient, a long flat runout at the bottom, and a lift, conveyor or tow to get you and the tube back up.

Every one of those features is a safety feature, and together they are what makes tubing at a resort a different proposition from tubing on a local slope. The banks keep you in the lane. The runout is long enough to stop in. Staff release riders one at a time. And nobody is walking up the middle of the track, which is the most common collision on an uncontrolled hill.

Who it suits

The one caution is the fourth row down. Tubing looks gentle and the deceleration at the bottom is more abrupt than it appears from the side, particularly on a fast day. Anyone with a back or neck problem should watch a few runs before committing.

Park rules, and why they exist

• Minimum height, not age. Most parks publish a height requirement, because the tube and the harness are sized rather than the person.
• One person per tube unless the park says otherwise. Some parks allow an adult and a small child together; many do not, and it changes the speed and the stopping distance substantially.
• Feet first, or facing forward sitting up. Never head first, which is the same rule as on a sledding hill.
• Hold the handles, not the rope. The tow rope on a conveyor is not a handle.
• Wait for the attendant to release you. The spacing between riders is the whole safety system.
• Clear the runout immediately. Somebody is coming behind you.

What to wear

Exactly what you would wear to ski, and for once that is not an exaggeration. Tubing is wetter than skiing, because you are sitting in contact with the snow the whole way down, and it is colder than skiing because you are not generating heat.

• Waterproof jacket and pants, ideally bibs. The seat gets soaked; this is exactly the case bibs solve. The bibs comparison.
• Waterproof boots. Not trainers. You walk on packed snow between runs. What to look for.
• Gloves, and mittens for children. Hands are on a cold wet rubber handle the whole way down.
• A hat, and a neck gaiter rather than a scarf. Never a scarf near a tow.
• Goggles or sunglasses on a bright day. The glare is the same glare as on a piste.
• A helmet if you own one. Not usually required and worth wearing; the speeds on a good lane are comparable to a beginner ski run.

For the full list, the kids layering page applies unchanged, and the single most useful thing to carry is a dry spare pair of mittens.

The helmet question

Most parks do not require one and most people do not wear one. The argument for wearing one anyway is straightforward: a tubing lane produces speeds comparable to a beginner ski run on a surface just as hard, with no ability to steer or stop, and riders sometimes spin so the head is leading.

If your family owns ski helmets, there is no reason they should sit in the car. If not, a bike helmet is far better than nothing for this specific activity, with the caveats on the ski-versus-bike helmet page: no ear coverage, and a different impact profile.

Buying your own tube for a local hill

A consumer snow tube is a different object from a park one, and it is worth being honest about the difference. Park tubes are heavy commercial units with a hard base that runs fast in a groomed lane. A consumer inflatable is lighter, slower, and punctures.

On a local hill, an inflatable tube is fast on packed snow, bounces over bumps, and cannot be steered at all - which makes it the worst of the sled types for a small child on uncontrolled terrain, and a lot of fun for an older one on a wide open slope with a long runout. The sled roundup compares the published options, and for most families a toboggan or a saucer is the better buy.

If you do buy a tube: check the published weight capacity, get one with handles rather than a rope, and carry a pump, because they arrive flat and lose pressure in the cold.

Cost, and why it belongs in the trip budget

Tubing is usually sold in one or two-hour sessions at a fraction of a lift ticket, and an hour is genuinely enough - it is more tiring than it looks, because you walk or ride up and pull a tube around between runs.

For a family, that makes it one of the few genuinely cheap lines on a ski trip, and a good use of the afternoon after a morning lesson. The cost page puts the whole trip in proportion, and the page for the non-skiers in the family lists the alternatives for the rest of the day.