Can a Complete Beginner
Learn to Ski in Gulmarg?
Yes. The fearsome reputation belongs to Apharwat — steep, off-piste, expert-only terrain reached from the top of the gondola. You would be learning roughly 900 vertical metres below it, on wide slopes that barely tilt.
Skill level
Absolute beginner
Where you learn
Base slopes, not Apharwat
Group size
3 students per instructor
If you have spent an evening researching where to learn to ski in India, you have probably read that Gulmarg is not the place. Several widely-shared comparison articles say so directly.
Gulmarg is the wrong mountain for first-timers.
It is the better mountain, and the worse idea for most people.
Those writers are describing a real thing. They are just describing the top of the mountain, and you would be learning at the bottom.
Why Gulmarg has a reputation for being expert-only
Gulmarg's fame was built on off-piste skiing at the top of the mountain. Ski films, international magazines and two decades of powder-hunting visitors have focused on the same terrain, and almost none of that coverage mentions the base area at all.
The reputation is earned. The resort drops 1,330 vertical metres from the top of Apharwat to the base, and the upper part of that is steep, ungroomed snow needing experience, avalanche awareness and usually a guide. Skiers travel from Europe and North America specifically for it.
Vertical drop from the top of Apharwat to the base. This is the terrain Gulmarg is famous for, and the upper mountain genuinely is expert-only.
The year two British officers founded the Ski Club of India here. India's national skiing institute has been based at Gulmarg since 1969, on the slopes at the base.
What gets lost is that this describes one zone of a resort where skiing has been organised since 1927, and where the country's own ski instruction has been based for over fifty years. The writers calling Gulmarg expert-only are right about Apharwat, and have not looked at what sits below it.
Gulmarg is really two mountains
The resort splits into two areas with almost nothing in common, and the Gulmarg Gondola is the dividing line. Everything a beginner does happens below its first station. Everything the ski films show happens above its second.
The mountain, by altitude
Base to top stationApharwat shoulder · Gondola Phase 2
Steep, ungroomed, largely uncontrolled bowls dropping into the Pir Panjal. The full descent from here to the base is 1,330 vertical metres. This is the Gulmarg the ski films are about, and it is not where anyone learns.
Kongdoori · Gondola Phase 1
The top station of the first gondola stage. On the final day of the course you ride up here and ski the run back down under your own control.
Gulmarg base · the learning slopes
Wide, open, treeless and barely tilted, directly behind the hotel strip. Short drag lifts tow you back up. This is where you actually learn to ski.
Station altitudes, not peak heights. The beginner area and the expert terrain are separated by an entire gondola stage.
The base area — where you actually learn
Gulmarg village sits at 2,650 metres, and the learning slopes are directly behind the hotel strip. They are wide, open, treeless and gently angled, served by short drag lifts that tow you back up without you needing to know how to ride a chairlift. The resort runs six lifts in total, and the two at the base are the only ones a beginner touches in the first five days.
There is nothing steep here and nothing to fall off. The slope runs out flat at the bottom, so the mountain stops you even when you have not yet learned to. This is where our six-day beginner ski course spends its first five days.
Apharwat and Phase 2 — where you absolutely do not
The gondola's first stage climbs to Kongdoori at around 3,090 metres. Its second stage continues to 3,980 metres — not the summit of Apharwat, which stands higher at about 4,200 metres, but a shoulder below it. Above that station the mountain changes completely. The bowls off the Apharwat ridgeline are steep, ungroomed and largely uncontrolled, dropping away into the Pir Panjal.
This is dangerous ground for an inexperienced skier. It is not somewhere you go on day three because you are feeling confident, and no responsible operator will take you there in your first week. The articles warning you off Gulmarg are warning you off this, and they are right to.
Riding the gondola is a different matter. It is the second longest and second highest cable car in the world, and plenty of visitors go up to Phase 2 purely for the view and come straight back down in the cabin. Going up as a passenger and skiing down are not the same decision.
Roughly 900 vertical metres and an entire gondola stage separate the two. You will not wander onto Apharwat by accident.
What your first day actually looks like
Your first morning does not involve a slope. You spend it on flat snow learning to stand, walk and side-step in ski boots, which are rigid, heavy and unlike anything most people have worn before.
Day one, hour by hour
Nothing points downhill until you are readyA theory class, indoors
The course opens with a classroom session on the do's, don'ts and the underlying idea of what skis actually do. You arrive at the snow the next morning already knowing what you are being asked to try.
Briefing, boots on, flat ground
Every session opens with a safety briefing, and helmets are issued before anyone steps onto snow. Then standing, walking and side-stepping on level ground. No slope, no speed. The boots are the hard part, and this is where you get used to them.
Your first glide
A few metres of straight running on the gentlest part of the slope, with the flat run-out doing the stopping for you. No turning yet.
The snow plough
Tails pushed apart, tips held close. The wedge that lets you control your speed and stop when you decide to, rather than when the slope decides for you.
Steering, and your first turns
Pressing the inside edge of one ski to steer. By the end of the day you can expect to be making controlled stops on command and linking your first plough turns.
We start on flat ground because the first thing that beats a beginner is not the mountain. It is the boots.
Olixora · why day one starts on the flatWhy the first hour is on flat ground
That first hour is not caution for its own sake. Ski boots are rigid, awkward to walk in and unlike any footwear most people have worn, and trying to learn a new sport while fighting them is what makes a first day miserable. Get comfortable standing up in them and everything after that is easier.
Once you are steady, the snow plough comes next. It is the foundation of everything else on the course, and it is the reason a beginner can be on a real slope safely within hours rather than days.
Falling over is part of the morning. The snow is soft, the gradient is shallow enough that you stop almost immediately, and everyone on a beginner course is doing exactly the same thing. Nobody is watching you.
What the six days build toward
The course adds one new technique at a time rather than piling everything on at once. Snow plough, kick turn, traverse, stem turn, uphill christie, and finally the side slip. Each one builds directly on the day before it.
Snow plough & plough turns
Speed control and stopping on command, then steering with the inside edge. The foundation everything else sits on.
Kick turn
Changing direction a full 180° while standing still. Balance without momentum.
Traverse
Skiing across the slope rather than down it. The first day nothing points downhill.
Stem turn
The bridge from plough to parallel. Turns start to link together.
Uphill christie
Letting the skis skid on purpose. Your first proper stop, skis parallel.
Gondola Phase 1 & side slip
You ride the first phase of the gondola and ski the run back down under your own control. The course ends with a beginner certification, but the part that matters is getting off a lift on a real mountain and coming down it yourself. This is a morning — the afternoon is your transfer back to Srinagar for an evening flight.
Six days on snow. The programme opens the day you arrive with an indoor theory session on the do's, don'ts and the idea behind each technique.
Why group size decides the week
Three students per instructor, every session. You get corrected while you are making the mistake.
Published caps at ski schools vary widely, from four students per instructor at the small end to ten at the large. Where you land is not usually something you get to choose.
Group size decides how fast the week moves. We cap the course at three students per instructor, which is what makes it possible to correct a mistake while it is still happening rather than three runs later.
There is a fuller answer on timing in our piece on how many days it takes to learn to ski.
Who should not learn to ski in Gulmarg
Everything above argues that Gulmarg works for beginners, and it does. But some people genuinely should go elsewhere, and it is worth saying so before you book a flight rather than after.
If you only have two or three days
Skiing takes four to six days to stick. A long weekend gets you sore legs and a taste of it, but not the thing itself, and much of that time goes on flat ground.
Instead: wait until you can take the full week. A half-learned skill fades before you next get on snow.
If you want a groomed resort holiday
Gulmarg is not the Alps. There is marked terrain and there are lifts, but grooming is thinner, a great deal of the mountain is left ungroomed on purpose, and there are no mountain restaurants to ski between. Evenings are organised rather than found — bonfires, a gondola trip, a run out to the frozen waterfalls — not a village of bars you wander into.
Instead: this is the wrong country rather than the wrong resort. Japan or Europe is what you are picturing.
If reaching Srinagar is hard or expensive from where you live
Gulmarg sits about 50 km from Srinagar airport. That is an hour and a half to two hours in good conditions, and two and a half to three and a half in deep winter, when chain taxis or a 4×4 are required for the climb beyond Tangmarg. Getting to Srinagar in the first place is the bigger variable, and from some cities it is a long or costly connection.
Instead: Auli is closer to Delhi and simpler to reach. For a first trip, that convenience is a real argument.
If your dates cannot move at all
Snow across the Indian Himalaya arrives on western disturbances, and when those do not form, the season does not either. Gulmarg ran on bare ground through January 2024, and a snow deficit of roughly 80 per cent across January and February 2025 saw the Khelo India Winter Games postponed for a second year running. Early December carries the separate risk of cover not having built yet.
Instead: January to March is the strongest part of the season in most years, but no month is a guarantee. Travel on dates you can shift, or on fares you can change.
None of that changes the answer to the original question. It just means the honest version has conditions attached.
Frequently asked
Is Gulmarg harder for beginners than Auli?
No. The beginner areas are comparable in difficulty, and both work. Gulmarg has more lift infrastructure and a longer season on the calendar, running December to March against Auli's narrower window. The full comparison covers travel time, cost and how reliable each one has actually been.
Do I need to bring my own ski gear?
No. Skis, boots, poles, a helmet and safety kit are included in the course and fitted to you on arrival. You bring clothing — thermal base layers, a waterproof outer shell, warm gloves, sunscreen and UV-rated goggles or sunglasses. Beginners spend a fair amount of the first day sitting in the snow, so waterproof trousers matter more than people expect.
How long before I can ski a real run?
Four to six days of structured coaching for the basics to hold. The course is built around six, adding a new technique at a time and finishing with a run down from Phase 1 of the gondola on the final day. There is a fuller answer in our piece on how many days it takes to learn to ski.
Will I be on the same slopes as expert skiers?
No. The beginner area sits at the base of the mountain and the expert terrain is above the second gondola station, roughly 900 vertical metres higher. They are separate parts of the mountain, and you will not encounter one while learning on the other.
Learn on the right part of the mountain
Six days on the beginner slopes at the base, finishing with your own run down from the gondola. Built for people who have never stood on skis, and taught on the assumption that you have not.