Destination: The West : Offbeat Off the Slopes : Out-of-the-ordinary winter sports that offer thrills along with the chills

Deciding on a ski destination once depended on such quaint notions as vertical drop and size ofskiable terrain. Today, even the most die-hard skiers can experience the high point of their ski week--figuratively and literally--off the slopes.

And the more off-the-wall, the better. Not to slight sleigh rides or run down snowmobiles, but they just don’t cut it when your cutting edge is as sharp as your skis’. Even heli-skiing, if you can afford it, isn’t exactly news.

So this season, try something different. Pilot a luge. Attend ice driving school. Go up in a glider plane, or snap on crampons for a tour of icefalls at the bottom of a frozen canyon. No experience necessary.

If you can’t pry yourself from your skis, check out the country’s only recreational ski-jump school. You can learn daffies and other aerial maneuvers, or simply make like Eddie the Eagle, the popular, semi-blind English ski jumper who soared his way to fame in the Calgary 1988 Winter Olympics.

Moose and more in Jackson Hole: If you’ve always assumed that winter is a lousy time to view wildlife--with most species in hibernation or departed for warmer climes--high-tail it to Jackson Hole, Wyo., and book passage with the Great Plains Wildlife Institute.

“There’s more viewing time per animal in winter,” says staff naturalist Lorrie Lee. “The animals are down in the valley, so you don’t have to drive so much, and because it’s cold, they don’t move a lot. Everything is still, quiet, defined.”

Even on four-hour sunrise expeditions (which depart from Jackson at 8 a.m.), winter clients see at least 10 species--from elk, moose, buffalo and bighorn sheep to bald eagles and trumpeter swans. The full-day expedition, meanwhile, includes lunch, a snowshoe walk and hands-on research. This year’s major project: tracking porcupines for a fire-ecology study. Now, that sounds like a sticky business.

Half-day sunrise expeditions cost $65, or $35 for children 3 to 12. Full-day expeditions are $135 for both adults and children. Vehicles are equipped with roof hatches, spotting scopes and binoculars. The Great Plains Wildlife Institute will pick you up at any hotel in Jackson. Telephone (307) 733-2623.

Build an igloo in Canada: Why would anybody--besides an Inuit, that is--want to learn to build an igloo?

“Because it’s odd and unusual, of course,” says Trent Schumann of Calgary, Alberta-based Mountain Quest Adventure Co. “Most people come for the novelty. For back-country skiers interested in overnight touring, we offer a formalized course--snow architecture.”

If you’re staying in Calgary or at any Banff, Alberta-area resort (such as Lake Louise or Sunshine Village) and want to learn to build an igloo--or snow cave or trench shelter--Schumann will pick you up for a one-day or overnight excursion into the Kananaskis backcountry, about a half-hour south of Banff and a 75-minute drive from Calgary and Lake Louise.

“We give them snowshoes, walk a few miles into the woods, pull out the snow shovels and snow saws and start building,” Schumann explains. “Igloos are nicer than tents. It normally doesn’t get much lower than freezing inside, which is pretty amazing, considering it can get down to 20 below zero outside. “

An igloo-building day trip is about $60, including tools, snowshoes, lunch and transportation. For about $143, an overnight trip adds supper, winter camping gear, breakfast and lunch. Tel. (800) ANY-TREK (269-8735).

Ups and downs of Squaw Valley: Forget 55-degree cliff runs--you can get dead vertical and live to tell about it at Squaw Valley U.S.A., on the north shore of Lake Tahoe.

Bungee Squaw Valley is at the edge of a 500-foot precipice, adjacent to the High Camp Lodge at 8,200 feet. The platform is 75 feet up, and your fall is a maximum of 65 feet--so there’s at least 10 feet between you and the ground. The operation claims more than 15,000 jumps, by jumpers 10 to 87, with nary a nick. Ready to take the plunge?

Five, four, three, two . . . one jump is $40, additional jumps $15. Your leap on video is $20, photos $13-$15. Open daily from 11:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Tel. (916) 583-4000 .

Soaring over Telluride: The Peaks at Telluride, a Colorado hotel-spa complex and the town’s only high-rise, boasts a small climbing wall. But another Telluride enterprise allows visitors to climb thousands of feet higher. “Glider Bob” Saunders takes you soaring above the town and ski area in his sail plane.

Don’t confuse this activity with para-gliding, which involves a parachute, or hang-gliding, where you launch yourself off a cliff. “Hang-gliding is notorious for injuries,” Saunders says. “Sail planes are safer than golf. The most dangerous part of an airplane is the motor, and we don’t have one. There’s nothing to go wrong.”

The sleek craft--there’s space only for the pilot and one passenger--is towed in the winter to an altitude of 12,000 to 13,000 feet and released. The high altitude might draw thrill-seekers, but Saunders says the quiet and scenery are the real attraction.

Rides cost $75 for a half hour and $120 for an hour (times are approximate.) Telluride Soaring is located at the Telluride Regional Airport. Tel. (303) 728-5424.

Park City jumps and daffies: With a bit of instruction, even “very timid, very nervous people” can handle ski jumps, says coach Larry Stone of the National Sports Foundation at Utah Winter Sports Park, site of the only recreational ski-jumping program in the United States.

“Of course,” he adds, “Forget it if you’ve got a fear of heights--better go cross-country skiing.”

Lessons begin on itty-bitty snow bumps. First-timers can come away with an 18-meter jump (about 40 feet), but that’s length; they only get two or three feet off the ground. There’s also a 38-meter jump, but the 65- and 90-meter competition jumps are reserved for the kind of daredevils made famous in the opening shots of ABC’s “Wide World of Sports.”

Stone says that in the park’s freestyle-aerial program, skiers with “basic skills” can tackle such aerial moves as helicopters (a 360-degree spin), daffies (a walking motion) and splits.

The statistics would seem to bear him out: Since the park opened in 1992, officials have logged only a handful of injuries, none serious, in thousands of jumps.

Lessons in distance jumping (Fridays to Sundays) and freestyle (Saturdays beginning Dec. 31) are $20 for adults, $12 for ages 13 through 17, $8 for 12 and under. National Sports Foundation clinics take place from 1 to 3 p.m., with sign-ups at noon. Tel. (801) 645-7660 or (801) 649-5447.

Whooshing in Calgary: You don’t need to go faster than a speeding bullet to feel like one at Canada Olympic Park in Calgary, built for the 1988 Winter Games. When you’re blasting down the track only a few inches above the ice, 30 miles an hour will do just fine.

To ride the luge, a one-person open sled, you put on a helmet and elbow pads, lie on your back and guide the sled feet-first for a 35-second ride down the bottom third of the Olympic track--500 yards with five curves.

Or you can join three other people on a new self-steering, self-braking sled called the Bob Bullet, which rockets down the entire Olympic one-mile run at speeds of up to 60 miles per hour. Bullet riders are enclosed up to neck level in the padded sled and wear seat belts and helmets during the 1 1/2-minute ride.

A ride on the luge (minimum age is 12) costs about $9 for the first run, $6 for subsequent runs. Minimum age for the Bob Bullet is 16; cost is $29 per person, per run; subsequent runs are $26 . The luge operates Monday night s only, from 6-7 p.m. Bullet rides are offered Saturday and Sunday late afternoons, and Mondays at 7 p.m. through Feb. 26. Tel. (403) 247-5490. Reservations recommended.

Ice walking in Jasper: During the summer months, a prime attraction of Jasper National Park in Alberta, Canada, is a drive along the spectacular “Icefields Parkway,” a 142-mile-long highway that passes dozens of glaciers. But for an up-close-and-personal glimpse of ice and snow when you’re ready for a break from the slopes at nearby Marmot Basin Ski Area, it’s tough to beat the park’s Maligne Canyon Icewalk.

Three magnificent frozen waterfalls--the highest of which is 120 feet--are the highlights of the three-hour walking tour, which is 1 1/2 miles each way and takes you past limestone formations and snow and into huge caverns along a frozen river at the bottom of a 150-foot-deep canyon.

“Some years we can walk behind the falls, and it’s as if you’re in an ice cave, with an eerie bluish light,” says park interpreter Murray Morgan.

The canyon is a half-hour drive from Marmot Basin, about four hours from either Calgary or Edmonton.

Jasper Adventure Center ice-walk tours begin at 10 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. Cost is about $16, $8 for children 6 to 12 and includes boot s , crampons to help prevent slipping, and local transportation. Tel. (403) 852-5595.

Slick driving in Steamboat: Get in a car and slide, skid and spin your way through a class on ice driving. And while you learn how not to lose control on the highway, you can enjoy the thrill of doing just that--in a safe environment.

“You don’t need to go fast to get your adrenaline up,” says Mark Cox, manager of the Bridgestone Winter Driving School at Steamboat Springs, Colo. “Especially when you’re going sideways.”

Snow-banked guard rails “pardon” driver error on a mile-long road course with eight turns. Indoor classes explore concepts of car control in low-traction situations, such as on rain-soaked pavement.

“An L.A. off-ramp the first day it rained was one of the slipperiest situations I’ve ever encountered,” Cox says.

The half-day, level-one session, at $90, includes about an hour of theory and two hours on the track. The one-day level-two course, $190, adds videotape analysis and more hands-on practice. Level three, a day-and-a-half-long course, is $340 and focuses on performance-oriented techniques. Phone (303) 879-6104 or (800) WHY-SKID (949-7543).