Active Pursuits

Coeur d'Alene is an outdoor playground. Twenty-five miles long, glacier-dug Lake Coeur d'Alene is the center of activities. Boating, sailing, jet-skiing, water-skiing, fishing, and anything else you can do on water are available. The world's first water skis were used on Lake Coeur d'Alene in the 1920s. Today you can jet-ski, take a seaplane tour with Brooks Seaplane Service (tel. 208/664-2842), or parasail with Coeur d'Alene Parasail (tel. 208/765-5367). Lake Coeur d'Alene Cruises offers a variety of cruises, including a sunset dinner cruise (tel. 800/365-8338).

A summer visit means you can tee up on the Coeur d'Alene Golf Course (tel. 800/688-5253; www.cdaresort.com/golf), one of only 16 golf resorts in America to receive the "five-star" designation by Golf Digest (which also named it "America's most beautiful resort course"), and one of 20 with a Golf Magazine Gold Medal. The course is known for its famous Floating Green, anchored to the lake bottom and reachable only by boat.

Winter in northern Idaho means skiing. A 30-mile drive east of Coeur d'Alene brings you to Silver Mountain Ski Resort, near Kellogg (tel. 800/204-6428 or 208/783-1111; www.silvermt.com), with the world's longest gondola operating year-round. Summer concerts are held at Silver Mountain; an indoor waterpark operates year-round. Schweitzer Mountain Resort (tel. 800/831-8810; www.schweitzer.com), 44 miles north in Sandpoint, offers stunning views of Lake Pend Oreille. Summer brings horseback riding, biking, and adventure camps.