I drove west from the DC area on MLK Weekend 2025. It was frigid all across the country, but not snowy so the drive was easy, if cold.
I skied four days in CO in the days following MLK day, one Winter Park and three Copper. Three days never went much above zero degrees. The last and mildest day had a high about 20 degrees.
21 Jan 2025: One of the few photos I have from my day at Winter Park. This is a hard carving friend. It was minus 8 when I pulled into the Mary Jane lot that morning.
I spent the next three days of January skiing at Copper Mtn. Here are a few pics.
View of I70 from upper mtn:
Moon rocks:
Summit of Three Bears chair in Copper Bowl:
View of Spaulding Bowl, one of my favorite runs that visit and occurred on the day it was a balmy 20 degrees.
Upon arriving in Utah on Jan 24 I promptly missed about five days of skiing due to a respiratory cold. My first ski day was 30 Jan. This photo from that day shows a snow cannon firing (center) in Snowbird's Mineral Basin. I usually don't see snow making in Jan/Feb in Utah. This was a harbinger of a somewhat lean winter in the West.
My first UT pow day (~6") of 2025 was at Solitude on 1 Feb.
On 7 Feb I had the most unusual experience of skiing while 10" of graupel fell at Snowbird. It was better than hardpack, but not as nice as blower pow. The best descriptor is Surfy. Here's a buddy surfing the graupel on STH:
More snow fell that night totaling 19" in 24 hours and the next day, 8 Feb, the sun came out. It was one of my best powder days of the season. This is another friend making a figure 8 with my line in the Peruvian Gulch area of Snowbird.
I took a break and went to Las Vegas for Super Bowl weekend to meet some friends. All I came home with was a case of the flu and lost another five ski days or so over President's Weekend. It included more respiratory congestion, but also fever and aches/pains. I had the flu and covid shots in the fall. I guess I'll also get the RSV vaccine next time?? Sick twice in three weeks was not fun!
A big storm hit Utah while I was sidelined and chomping at the bit. I got out on the morning of 21 Feb 2025. It was an extremely beautiful combo of sunshine and lots of recent snow over the last week (5+feet) at Snowbird.
23 Feb 2025, entrance to Ski Patrol Gully
This is the view from inside Ski Patrol Gully in Snowbird's Mineral Basin.
Mineral Basin proper the next day, Summit Lodge is at upper right:
I went back to Colorado during the first week of March 2025. I was part of a lucky little group that caught a rope drop into The Beavers at A-Basin on the morning of 4 Mar 2025. We got fresh tracks in what felt like about 16" of nice light snow in places.
A friend coming:
Same friend going:
Next day at Copper Mtn, beautiful Union Meadows area. Copper is large enough to have something for everyone:
Same area with a septuagenarian buddy enjoying fine snow conditions:
12 March 2025 back at Snowbird, UT. This is a friend in the Rasta Chutes area of Little Cloud Bowl.
Lower down, same area:
Heading to the Northern Rockies in a couple days to ski with an old DCSki buddy. To be continued...
This is great!
Question for you - or anyone else who knows - for a trip on the week of April 14-18 from the DC area, would you recommend Snowbird/Alta?
I'm leaning towards Snowbird/Alta because we have Ikon, and it's pretty easy to get there (direct flight from DC) and to get from the SLC airport to the mountain.
Would you buy the airline tickets now, or wait until we get closer and pull the trigger based on the snow conditions? How much more expensive will tickets likely be inside the four-week window?
My other thought was Mammoth, because I know they usually have good snow in the spring. However, that involves a long drive from Reno or LAX after the cross-country flight, which is not so fun.
Open to other suggestions...
Both Utah and Mammoth are having slightly below avg snow years. Both should still be quite good for April skiing. Not that savvy about air fares, but I'd wait until closer dates for current conditions, then choose.
Mongo wrote:
This is great!
Question for you - or anyone else who knows - for a trip on the week of April 14-18 from the DC area, would you recommend Snowbird/Alta?
I'm leaning towards Snowbird/Alta because we have Ikon, and it's pretty easy to get there (direct flight from DC) and to get from the SLC airport to the mountain.
Would you buy the airline tickets now, or wait until we get closer and pull the trigger based on the snow conditions? How much more expensive will tickets likely be inside the four-week window?
My other thought was Mammoth, because I know they usually have good snow in the spring. However, that involves a long drive from Reno or LAX after the cross-country flight, which is not so fun.
Open to other suggestions...
Mongo wrote:
This is great!
Question for you - or anyone else who knows - for a trip on the week of April 14-18 from the DC area, would you recommend Snowbird/Alta?
I'm leaning towards Snowbird/Alta because we have Ikon, and it's pretty easy to get there (direct flight from DC) and to get from the SLC airport to the mountain.
Would you buy the airline tickets now, or wait until we get closer and pull the trigger based on the snow conditions? How much more expensive will tickets likely be inside the four-week window?
My other thought was Mammoth, because I know they usually have good snow in the spring. However, that involves a long drive from Reno or LAX after the cross-country flight, which is not so fun.
Open to other suggestions...
Can you fly midweek? The difference in plane fares Tue, Wed, Thu is noticeable. In general, plane fares to SLC are higher this season than in recent years. At least that's the case for Southwest. From RDU, I don't usually fly any other airline.
Plane fares within 2 weeks are usually very high.
I've been skiing Alta the first half of April for about 15 years. Have always had a powder day, or at least half a day before it warmed up too much. Of course, never know what will happen more than a few days beforehand. My last few ski days at Alta for my April trip will be April 14-16.
You might check the list of Ikon resorts that are offering spring skiing in April for people who buy a 2025-26 who don't have a 2024-25 Ikon. Presumably those are resorts that expect to have a decent amount of terrain and lifts open.
Winter Park and ABasin should still be good in April this season.
JimK wrote:
Both Utah and Mammoth are having slightly below avg snow years. Both should still be quite good for April skiing. Not that savvy about air fares, but I'd wait until closer dates for current conditions, then choose.
Yes it's a down year in Mammoth but we just left there today with 30" fresh pow from yesterday evening through the day today.
In mid-March I took a very entertaining road trip through Western MT and Northern ID. I've rarely been in this area, especially so far north and I skied a couple of mountains I had never skied before.
On 15 March 2025 I skied Lost Trail Ski Area in western Montana for the first time. It is set at the top of Lost Trail Pass (elev 7k feet) on US 93 in a remote part of western MT. Some of the trails are in Idaho and some in Montana, very cool. It's pretty big too for being in the middle of nowhere, 1800' vertical, 1800 skiable acres, 5 double chairs and 3 rope tows, with nary a safety bar in the place:-) Nearest city is Missoula, MT about 90 minutes to the north.
This is the view from ID 28 in the vicinity of Diamond Peak, ID (12k feet), about 2 hours south of Lost Trail ski area. Very little human habitation in this area.
Approaching Lost Trail pass and ski area.
More of Lost Trail.
Just a section of the base lodge.
A friend showed me around the mtn. We caught a mini-powder day with about 4-5" new snow by the time we left the mtn.
It was rather quiet for a Saturday with lots of elbow room on the slopes.
Other direction.
This is the Saddle Mtn Chair #4 leading to the highest lift served point on the mtn at about elevation 8200'. It had 1800' vertical and covered some really nice blue square and single black diamond terrain.
Debbie Armstrong Olympic Gold Medalist in giant slalom in 1984 was giving a clinic the day of my visit. She's left, in white helmet with dark blue jacket.
Very nice tree spacing in many places around the mountain.
The week of March 17, 2025 I skied five days at beautiful Schweitzer Mtn in northern Idaho. To be continued...
From the Lost Trail area my wife Kathy and I drove north in the direction of Schweitzer Mtn, ID via Spokane, WA. It was nearly 400 more miles of driving in a section of the beautiful Northern Rockies I'd never been to before. It was fun taking in various points of interest.
This leg of the trip included driving several hours on I90 and we saw, but did not ski, Lookout Pass ski area on the MT/ID border. Not only can you ski in two states at this ski area, but also in two time zones (Mtn and Pacific)!
We picked up our son Vince at the Spokane airport. He wanted to ski Schweitzer too. But on the way my wife and I stopped for a couple hours to stroll around the spectacular Riverfront Park in downtown Spokane, WA. It was the site of a World's Fair in 1974 and several structures featured at that event remain including bridges, a clock tower, old fashioned carousel , gondola ride, and a large covered pavilion.
Adjacent to the park was an impressive natural point of interest I didn't expect, Spokane Falls, a large multi-part falls/cascade/dam that dwarfs Great Falls VA.
On to Schweitzer...
I skied five out of six days during a week at Schweitzer Mtn, ID in mid-March 2025. It was my first ever visit to Schweitzer. It was as beautiful as advertised. The skiable acreage (2,900 acres, 2,400' vertical, top elevation 6,400') was more impressive than I expected. The front face of the mtn features quite a bit of above tree line or nearly treeless terrain. It's a huge half-bowl. The backside is a similar giant bowl, perhaps more of a horseshoe, but features more treed terrain.
I caught two mostly sunny ski days and three fairly snowy/lower viz ski days. It snowed about six overnight inches of somewhat heavy snow before each of my last three ski days. Skiing this increasingly deep-ish snow in the offpiste was very challenging for me. I was leg-weary by my last morning of skiing, Saturday, 22 March 2025. Schweitzer Mtn and PNW snow kicked my behind - the sign of a good mountain :-)
17 Mar 2025 Schweitzer approach road, impressive snowpack. At the base of the mtn, about 4000' below, there was virtually none.
View of base area with magnificent Lake Pend Oreille (Pond-der-ray) in the background. Surely, one of the most impressive lake views I've ever seen from the 100 ski areas I've visited.
Looking up at a small portion of the Frontside from the base.
Vince checking out the front face of the mtn.
The upper lookers left of the front face.
Looking up the Lakeview chair lift line on the front face. Good, wide open skiing here on clear days.
March 18th. Lake covered by low clouds in the early AM. Beautiful!
To be continued...
