Well, hardly. There's a mountain of fun in the white stuff out there, particularly if you have kids too young or unprepared for skis, and all of it can be done without falling down and hurting yourself. What follows is a sampling, with the help of winter-fun experts, of non-skiing thrills in the snow and where to find them.

Mushing in Minnesota: If you ever imagined winning the exhaustive Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race in Alaska -- or simply got a kick out of watching Bob and Bing mush through the Klondike in Road to Utopia -- the Gunflint Lodge in northeast Minnesota is the place for you.

Cross-country skiing, snowshoeing and even listening to wolves howl are big pastimes here. But Gunflint is famous for its dog-sledding, offering anything from one-hour, two-hour or full-day rides to getting up-close and personal with your own dog team, learning to mush (with voice commands, not whips) and spending four days out in the wild.

You cover woodland and frozen lake trails, pulled by teams of 10 to 25 Siberian Huskies barking all the way. "The dogs get very excited. This is what they live for: to mush," says Gunflint general manager Jennifer Walsh.

Information, 800-328-3325 or www.gunflint.com .

Sleigh rides in New Hampshire: If the Currier and Ives print comes alive, you're probably under a wool blanket with a dozen others in a sledded wagon with Queenie and Frank in the harness at The Inn at East Hill Farm near Troy, N.H.

Might as well surrender your inhibitions on these sleigh rides in the shadow of Mount Monadnock. Otherwise, they will be singing and laughing without you.

"It's kind of classic New England," says Ann Hallock, editor of FamilyFun magazine. "This is a real nice place to go, especially with very young children."

During your stay, you live on a working farm, with rooms dating back to 1834, so there's oodles more for young ones: milking cows or goats, collecting eggs in the morning, sledding, ice fishing for perch and feeding the baby Dorset lambs.

There's also snowshoeing, skating and more.

Information, 800-242-6495.

Snow coaches in Wyoming: When winter arrives in Yellowstone, about the only way to enjoy its snow-covered splendor -- apart from the noisy, shattering vibration of a snowmobile -- is by snow coach.

"They're sort of fortified tractors," says Kyle McCarthy, editor of the familytravelforum.com on-line newsletter. Few roads are plowed and Yellowstone's bounty of wildlife -- elk, deer, coyote and more -- are in full array. "You've got a big, beautiful bison with a full winter coat," says Rick Hoeninghausen, spokesman for the Amfac-operated park lodges. "He may have been pushing around in the snow, so you've got this great powdered head."

A good place to hook up with Amfac snow coaches is through Flagg Ranch Resort, just outside Yellowstone's south entrance. The resort also has its own snow coaches.

Flagg Ranch information, 800-443-2311 or www.flaggranch.com . Amfac, 307-344-7311 or www.amfac.com .

Bobsledding in Upstate New York: Now this is the way to go fast in the snow: with a driver, a brakeman and a helmet. Bobsledding can reach speeds of 65 mph down a half-mile track at the Olympic Sports Complex in Lake Placid.

"That is definitely for the thrill-seeking family," says FamilyFun's Hallock.

Bobsled rides are only part of the winter fun at Lake Placid, where two Winter Olympics were held. There's also luge rides (this version is more of an enclosed sled, they call it the Luge Rocket), ice climbing, ice fishing, indoor and outdoor ice skating, tobogganing, showshoeing and more.

In fact, Lake Placid has been consistently rated by Ski Magazine as North America's No. 1 resort for winter activities that don't include downhill skiing.

Information, 800-447-5224 or www.lakeplacid.com .

Horseback riding in Colorado: Hoofed excursions through Colorado white powder, horse nostrils billowing frost, are the stuff of fanciful TV commercials pitching one masculine product or another. But at the C Lazy U Ranch outside Granby, Colo., you do it for real: trail rides through wooded acreage above Willow Creek Reservoir or maybe up over the Continental Divide, all in the Rocky Mountain foothills of northern Colorado.

"You see elk, mule deer, moose, hawks and eagles," says ranch spokeswoman Kim Kroehling.

This place has 155 head of appaloosas, quarter horses, thoroughbreds and mixed breeds. There's also a 10,000-square-foot indoor riding area and an extensive training program of activities for kids.

A bonus: It's the only guest ranch in the nation to receive both the AAA five-diamond and the Mobil five-star awards.

Information, 970-887-3344