According to Ellen Guidera Purcell, Henry’s wife and a key figure in Portillo’s day-to-day operations, the early days mostly involved the Purcells inviting their famous friends here for ski parties. “The parties were an omen of the future,” Guidera said. “Because Portillo has continued not only as a place for beautiful skiing but also as a place for good times with family and friends, a place of happy dinners, parties, bar dancing and making memories.”
Carolina Mendoza, a retired business owner, first visited Portillo in the mid-1970s as a teenager growing up in Venezuela. She’s returned nearly every year since, only missing a Portillo season during the pandemic or while living in Europe. For Mendoza, whose mother is Chilean, there’s a magic to this little mountain hamlet. “There’s such a sense of community here,” she said. ‘It almost makes you feel like you’re with family.”
But Portillo has also become synonymous with serious skiing. Known for its challenging alpine terrain, it hosted the FIS Alpine World Ski Championships in 1966, which established its reputation as a hardcore winter sports destination. Today, both the convivial atmosphere and the hair-raising slopes remain critical to Portillo’s cult-favoured status. Every year from June to September, when the northern hemisphere is in the throes of summer, snow-chasers from the US, Canada, Europe and Latin America head here to enjoy an endless winter. Many, like Mendoza, are repeat visitors. Others are world-class athletes in training for big-ticket events like the Olympics.