I've been delinquent in sharing ski reporting this winter with my DCSki friends. I actually did my migration to UT early this year and began skiing out here on Dec 5, 2025. But December was pretty grim with little snowfall and temps so mild places like Snowbird had trouble making snow even at night. In early Jan 2026 there was a saving streak of about 9 days of snow with totals approaching 60 inches. I missed part of that time returning to VA for about a week for family reasons.
The skiing was excellent when I got back on the slopes here about a week ago, 8 Jan 2026. But now (16 Jan) UT is in another long, high pressure system. Conditions are pretty good still, but firming-up.
5 Dec 2025, my first ski day of the winter was at Solitude, UT. They only had about 650' of vertical open and the lines were longish, but it was skiing:-)
Same deal on 7 Dec, but the sun came out. High pressure and dry, mild weather would be an all-to-familiar pattern in Dec in UT.
My first ski day at Snowbird was Dec 9 and to their credit they had top to bottom skiing off the tram, but only a few crowded routes down. You had to beware of meat missiles in the heavy trail traffic with firm conditions.
{Isn't an upside down flag a sign of distress at sea?}
Big Emma slope at Snowbird on the 9th:
11 Dec, these two photos were taken on Regulator Johnson trail at Snowbird.
18 Dec at Snowbird near the Little Cloud lift
I went to San Diego to visit family for Christmas for five days. We had a nice time checking out the sea lions at LaJolla beach.
On the return drive to UT we stopped for a meal at The Cliffside Restaurant in St. George, UT. This photo doesn't do justice to the views from our table.
28 Dec 2025 back on Regulator at Snowbird, if you have to ski a WROD at least it's 300 yards wide with 3000' vertical drop:
These two photos are from 31 Dec 2025, still pretty scratchy conditions at Snowbird.
Jan 2026: I returned from a brief visit to the east during the first week of Jan and everything had changed. Most of Snowbird's terrain was now open due to a total of about 60" of snow in the first 10 days of the month.
8 Jan 2026, Snowbird, my first true powder day of the season, about 8 new inches, but it came at the end of numerous prior snow days and skied even deeper in many spots. Conditions were excellent.
9 Jan back at Snowbird, UT:
More good skiing off Little Cloud chair.
But I also started getting runs off the Cirque Traverse to Middle and Lower Cirque areas.
11 Jan 2026 was perhaps my favorite day so far this season in UT, Snowbird had opened Mineral Basin and conditions were still powdery, but now with bright sunshine.
View of Mt Timpanogos from Mineral Basin
Ego boosting terrain off the Baldy chair in Mineral Basin
Challenging terrain beside the Mineral chair lift line. It all skied GOOD.
The Road to Provo was now open too, leading to more good skiing on the frontside of the mountain.
14 Jan 2026 I returned to Solitude for the first time in more than a month. Most everything was open except Honeycomb Canyon.
15 Jan 2026, very nice day at Snowbird. Snow still chalky in spots and even pockets of wind drift.
This is Near Bookends area in Mineral Basin, a friend and I lapped this area 4 or 5 times it was so good.
Silver Fox on the front/Peruvian side of the mtn skied quite well too.
What's next? In a moment of weakness, when conditions were poor a couple weeks ago, my son convinced me to spend the last 11 days of January in the Alps. Four of us are going over. Itinerary includes Geneva, Chamonix, Bern and Grindelwald and will include skiing and non-skiing activities. Not sure if I'll be able to document any of it real time here, but I'll share reports when I return.
Wow, have fun in Europe!
My daughter and I will be heading to Utah at the end of this week. Not the ideal conditions, but we will make the best of it. We are planning 2 days at Alta, and we are up in the air for the third ski day. With the small amount of snow they've had in the past two weeks, I'm leaning towards Deer Valley for some groomers. Is that crazy? We have Ikon so the other options are Snowbird, Solitude and Brighton.
eggraid wrote:
My daughter and I will be heading to Utah at the end of this week. Not the ideal conditions, but we will make the best of it. We are planning 2 days at Alta, and we are up in the air for the third ski day. With the small amount of snow they've had in the past two weeks, I'm leaning towards Deer Valley for some groomers. Is that crazy? We have Ikon so the other options are Snowbird, Solitude and Brighton.
Deer Valley and Park City weren't able to make much snow in December at all because it was too warm. Still less than 60% open. Best to check and see which areas are open before making a decision. Even for groomers LCC/BCC are a better bet in the next week.
I completed my ski trip to Europe over the period of Jan 20-31, 2026. Now back in sunny, mild Utah where the high temps have been around 50 degs for an extended period. The trip to the Alps was great, but also quite demanding. We used trains and buses to get around and schlepped a lot of gear, there were four of us in the party, two skiers, two non-skiers. I skied six days and we devoted five days of the trip to travel/relocations and non-skiing activities. Our gateway airport was Geneva, Switzerland. From there we went to Chamonix, France for the first half of the trip, then trained over to Grindelwald/Jungfrau area of Switzerland for the second half.
Vince and I skied the Vallee Blanche one day while in Chamonix.
My fav photo from that day:
Here is a blow by blow account of our Vallee Blanche excursion with some photos: see here
Here are more photos from other days of lift served skiing during the trip.
Brevent/Flegere ski area in the Chamonix Valley, France:
Grands Montets, Chamonix Valley, this place had strong similarities to Jackson Hole with a fair amount of skilled skiers/boarders partaking in serious and extensive off-piste terrain.
Everything in this view was being skied:
Le Tour ski area in the Chamonix Valley:
Had two days skiing in the Grindelwald area, first one had bad flat light, not nearly as clear as this photo might imply. I skied in Mr. Magoo/snowplow mode while sharp eyed Euros blew by me?!? This is from the Mannlichen ski area. This gondi had 3100' vertical rise.
This is another gondola at same resort, even bigger with 4543' vertical rise and 26 heated seats inside. Had a ride in the Eiger Express all to myself:
Never skied a place before with trains tooling around various parts of the ski slopes, amazing infrastructure.
Next day I returned to Mannlichen in the morning, but also skied Grindelwald-First ski area in the afternoon, for a ski area two-fer. They are a few miles apart and connected by two different 20-30 minute train lines, and also by bus. My wife and daughter were able to buy a pedestrian ticket that allowed them to ride gondolas and trains to same terrain I was skiing. So we interacted quite a bit together during an extraordinary day. We started together on the Eiger Express 26 pass gondi:
Hotel Bellevue des Alpes at Mannlichen/Kleine Scheidegg train station, elevation 6762'. This hotel was featured quite a bit in the old Clint Eastwood movie The Eiger Sanction.
Meanwhile I went skiing with gondolas, trains and bubble chairs.
After a couple hours we all caught a 30 minute cogwheel train ride to Grindelwald. It was a highlight of the day.
After the cogwheel train we caught a bus for about a mile to the Grindelwald-First ski area. In the background of this view of the Grindelwald bus depot is the North Face of the Eiger, one of the greatest tests in the world of rock climbing. Here's what google says about it:
The Eiger North Face (Nordwand) in Switzerland rises roughly 1,800 meters (5,900 feet) above the Kleine Scheidegg area. It is the biggest north face in the Alps, stretching up to the summit of the Eiger mountain, which sits at an elevation of 3,967 meters (13,015 feet) above sea level.
Then the three of us rode the 30 minute First gondola to dine together at a lofty restaurant at the First ski area.
Next to the restaurant was The Cliff Walk, an extensive area of elevated walking platforms, however low vis conditions rolled in:
I found some good snow and light late in the day off the high elevation Oberjoch chair at Grindelwald-First while the ladies went for an indoor swim in the town of Grindelwald.
These last views of the Eiger/Jungfrau area made me emotional. Not sure if I'll ever get back to ski the Alps again. The scenery, the verticality, the infrastructure, the food, are all amazing.
Finally, some snow in Utah, about 1 foot has fallen at Snowbird in the last 48 hrs. I didn't get up yesterday, but today (12 Feb 2026) was very good. Probably the best snow I've skied this winter. So nice to be on powder/packed powder.
Nice early line in Middle Cirque. This storm was somewhat warm and heavy, but the upper mtn skied quite nicely with dryer snow.
I missed a rope drop on the Road to Provo/Little Cloud Bowl by a couple minutes, but the sloppy seconds were still quite tasty ;-)
The sun even came out at times, this is Little Cloud Bowl again.
I skied Great Scott today for the first time this season. It's been too bony previously. Watched these folks for a way to get through the entrance.
Vince led me down.
Then we cut over to skier's right and he skied a snowy line in Hanging Bowl. Is that a little smile I detect?
12 Feb 2026 might have been my favorite day this season out of 20 at Snowbird. Hopefully, more snow coming in the next 5-7 days.
I enjoy many "it's a small world" moments during ski season. We rode the tram today next to "Mose", Vince spotted his instructor pin on his jacket and randomly asked him where he instructs - Liberty Mtn! Vince instructed there early in his ski career and earned his PSIA-L3 while in the Ski School there back around 2015. Mose knows Otto Matheke, an old friend of ours and DCSki from the Liberty Ski School.
Mose:
I first skied Liberty back around 1968 when it was known as Charnita.
Mercifully, Ullr has brought a complete reset of ski conditions in the Wasatch. Snowbird has received 47" of snow in the last seven days with most of it coming on Feb 17 and 18. Conditions are excellent all over the mtn, but I've had to share the goods with a big influx of Prez Week visitors. That's ok, I'm not greedy, especially since things were so lean for over a month:-)
Friday the 13th of Feb, this guy got sort of cliffed-out in Death Chute at Snowbird. He was able to very carefully tiptoe over a rock band and get safely down, but it was a scary situation and even sketchier than this photo conveys.
Again from 13 Feb, This is a day after one foot fresh snow and prior to the 4 feet referenced above. Mineral Basin skiing very nicely.
Friendly Snowbird tram operator, Angel from Puerto Rico:
to be continued...
15 Feb 2026 I hiked Lower Baldy this day.
Leaping into Alta terrain.
17 Feb I went over to Solitude and skied in about 6-8" new snow during the day.
Trees are your friends in stormy, low-viz conditions.
19 Feb back to Snowbird and after a 3 foot dump in prior 36 hrs. Gad 2 chair liftline very fluffy.
Nearby tree skiing:
Snakepit gully now full of snow.
20 Feb 2026, cool, snowy day. Not too many photos. A friend in Barry Barry Steep on the Gad Valley side of the mtn.
Interior of new The Nest Restaurant at the old Mid-Gad location. It lacks a little bit of the old restaurant's wood beam character, but it features huge windows, updated furniture including some sofas and lounge chairs, outdoor firepits, and best of all the rest rooms are easily accessible and on the same ground floor level as the restaurant.
Glad Utah has gotten some good snow. Thanks for the Euro trip pics. Glad you got over there. Skiing in Europe is definitely something special. While the snow isn't always as nice as western North America, the food, culture, and higher vertical are amazing.
25 Feb 2026 skied in about 3-6" of Sierra Cement today at Snowbird. But in this below average season, any snow is good snow.
Black Forest off the Gad 2 Chair:
Mostly untracked in the vicinity of Regulator Johnson trail in Little Cloud Bowl:
Some good snow on Eddie Moe near Gadzoom chair. This heavy snow was good if untracked and ok if fully packed. In between it was sloppy slush.
You're like an elf that has sailed home to Valinor, but occasionally sends letters back to middle earth.
JimK wrote:
25 Feb 2026 skied in about 3-6" of Sierra Cement today at Snowbird. But in this below average season, any snow is good snow.
Black Forest off the Gad 2 Chair:
Mostly untracked in the vicinity of Regulator Johnson trail in Little Cloud Bowl:
Some good snow on Eddie Moe near Gadzoom chair. This heavy snow was good if untracked and ok if fully packed. In between it was sloppy slush.
Stephen wrote:
You're like an elf that has sailed home to Valinor, but occasionally sends letters back to middle earth.
The snow fall situation greatly improved in UT since mid-Feb turnaround.
A few photos since last batch.
Feb 27, 2026 started at Solitude, UT, avi debris below summit chair:
Then took Sol-Bright trail and spent time at Brighton, this under Snake Creek chair. Some deadly avalanches near Brighton in recent weeks :-(
28 Feb, Snowbird, avi debris on Mark Malu trail, distant center:
Close up:
3 Mar 2026 interesting day. Terrible viz lower half of mtn, partly sunny and very nice conditions top half of mtn.
Got a rope drop on 9" new snow off Road to Provo, Little Cloud Bowl.
Good light, good snow and few people, Mineral Basin shines in such circumstances!
Thick cloud bank over lower LCC.
At 3:45PM I had to ski through it. Ugg, should have downloaded on the tram.
4 Mar 2026 unexpectedly excellent day. Heavy snow from day before dried out and got better, sun came out in spades. Crowds still moderate.
About 945 AM I caught a rope drop in the Bookends area of Mineral Basin. Snow settled to about 6" deep and reasonably light. It was so good I did a five-peat.
Front of mtn skiing good too in certain areas. A buddy in Silver Fox beside upper tram line.
As snappy would say YEW!
Forecast for LCC is about 10-15" new snow starting tonight into Friday.
A storm on March 5 and 6, 2026 over-produced (love that term) and the Cottonwood Canyons received about 2 feet of good quality snow.
Rode the UTA bus up and back to ski Brighton on Friday, 6 March. This was just after the two feet of snow fell and both BCC and LCC were super busy. In fact LCC was closed for several hours in mid-day for avalanche mitigation. The bus worked, but one-way trip took about 70 minutes vs normal of 20 minutes due to traffic. At least I had a seat and someone else was doing the driving.
6 Mar Brighton and the Great Western lift line, real good skiing/riding this day:
Same area, nice spacing in these aspens:
Boarders love Brighton:
Excellent skiing among evergreens by the Crest sixpack, Brighton is a fine place to ski on a storm day because of the tree skiing and tree-lined runs.
Saturday 7 March, beautiful day at Snowbird with big crowds. We went off piste to get some elbow room. My son and a friend were my ski companions this day. This is upper Mach Schnell.
Eye of the Needle in Peruvian Gulch:
From below (center):
Not sure about the rest of Utah, but the Big and Little Cottonwood Canyon resorts are firing on all cylinders right now. The lower Cirque at Snowbird:
Caught up with fellow Virginian @wgo and his son today 9 Mar 2026 at Snowbird. Gorgeous day!
Us guys:
WGO's son found an interesting perch in the Rasta Chutes:
Looking at that picture, I think Wgo and I rode the lift one time together at Massanutten the other week. Wgo, did you ask me if I was going to post something to Youtube, and I said, no. If not then it was someone else.
JimK wrote:
Caught up with fellow Virginian @wgo and his son today 9 Mar 2026 at Snowbird. Gorgeous day!
Us guys:
WGO's son found an interesting perch in the Rasta Chutes:
13 March 2026, spent more time today with @wgo and son at Snowbird. It was another sunny day with only light winds. Crowds were up a bit because Friday is the new Saturday, but we only got stuck in one longish line about 11 am in Mineral Basin.
I rode the tram three times today, two of the times were quick waits because everyone was back in Mineral :-)
Heading out to the Bookends, snowpack is the best it's been all year, but we're in a freeze-thaw cycle, so you have to follow the sun to get the friendliest surfaces:
We left Mineral after it got quite busy. After one week son of WGO knows Snowbird better than me, here leading me into Rats Nest and upper Great Scott.
Looking good in Great Scott:
Father and son photo:
On the Road to Provo cat track with mighty Pipeline Chute (hike-to only and rarely open) in upper right.
WGO got his mojo working!
Happy St. Patrick's Day from Snowbird, UT:
This is a photo of the summit restaurant. Panorama's signature off-piste terrain (Taynton Bowl) is behind it and beyond the blue sign. Unfortunately, it was hard as a rock and closed during my visit.
View of the Canadian Rockies off the backside of Panorama's summit. The previous rain had destabilized the snowpack and a huge avalanche slide path can be seen in that Aspen Highlands-like bowl in center.
I skied this nearby bump run called, IIRC, Roy's Run. It was a bit too firm for this old guy's knees. And those chunks were like little blocks of granite.
I stumbled onto a Canadian junior national mogul competition at Panorama...
...and got a lucky photo with my old cell phone camera.
A view of the Panorama base area.
The next day my wife and I continued our drive up to Banff, Alberta for a one week stay to ski several days at Lake Louise and Banff Sunshine ski areas (both on Ikon). We traveled two hours on beautiful Highway 93 in Kootenay National Park. It was breathtaking and just a preview of additional scenic drives we'd take in Western Canada during our sojourn.
This view was about halfway between Panorama ski area and Banff, Alberta on Highway 93. It was almost like twin Matterhorns going on here.
On my second ski day of the trip, 22 March 2026, I joined a large contingent of SkiTalk.com friends at beautiful Banff Sunshine ski area. It straddles the boundary between the Canadian provinces of Alberta and British Columbia, with trails in each.
This is a friend from the Baltimore area named Mark, with a nice Banff Sunshine backdrop.
There is some incredibly wide open intermediate terrain at Sunshine, but it was windy in exposed areas this day.
Here's another friend at Banff Sunshine. It was a cold and breezy day so I didn't take too many action shots.
We had a group dinner on the evening of the 22nd in Banff. The US dollar is strong in Canada. It's like lodging, restaurants, and shops are all discounted 25-30%.
My third ski day of the trip was on 23 March 2026 at Lake Louise ski area. It was one of my favorite ski days of the entire winter. We got a few inches of new snow on top of an existing snowpack at the ski area of mostly packed powder, It was sunnier and a little warmer, perhaps 25 degrees F? And I really enjoyed the terrain on the backside of the mountain with a trifecta of great tree-lined runs, open bowls, and steep chutes. I seemed to find better and better snow conditions as I explored the mountain throughout the day.
This is a very cool trail at Lake Louise called Rock Garden off the Larch chair. It is littered with several clusters of giant boulders along a lengthy stretch of trail. They were safely covered with snow this season.
This was the first day I was joined by my son Vince. He flew into Calgary and drove up to Banff the night before. He would travel with us for the next two weeks. Vince led us into the Alphabet Chutes where there was great snow providing the confidence to tackle some very steep terrain seen directly behind Vince in center.
Got this nice shot of a young friend in one of the Alphabet Chutes.
A friend named Tony took this photo of me in G Gully, one of the Alphabet Chutes.
Another view from the steep Alphabet Chutes area. The snow was superb, loose powder over soft chalk. Slough followed you down after each turn.
A Canadian friend skiing soft, friendly, powder bumps under the Paradise Chair at Lake Louise. These are the conditions we came for! And with plenty of elbow room. Crowds were very manageable throughout my Canadian travels.
Louise's backside was picturesque from every angle.
The view down the frontside was not too shabby either. The actual Lake Louise is in distant center.
24 Mar 2026, I took a day off from skiing and went to the Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise with my wife Kathy and two friends. We had a leisurely and elegant lunch while it dumped snow outside. You should have seen the desserts, a warm peach cobbler type thing with ice cream on top that cracked open like an Easter egg, and a blueberry cheesecake. We ate them before I thought to take a photo.
I was too tired to have FOMO about skiing the fresh snow, plus there was a long way to go and many more ski days on this trip. The Chateau is a huge upscale hotel with a gift shop area the size of a small indoor mall. We spent 3-4 hours there dining and shopping among the one percenters.
This is the hotel exterior, the world famous mtn/lake view is in the opposite direction. Wouldn't see it this snowy day, but I saw if from afar while skiing Lake Louise and my wife and other friends saw it close up the day before on a bus tour to this hotel and other sights.
25 March 2026 I returned to ski Lake Louise. This visit was my second time skiing in the Banff region. I skied six days here in March 2018, two at Louise, three at Sunshine, and one at Mt. Norquay. On that trip the highlight was staying mid-mtn at Sunshine and skiing three consecutive days with great conditions including about one foot new snow in small crowds.
This time my days at Lake Louise ski area were the highlight. I skied the backside of the mountain 90% of the time. Snowed 3-5 inches several nights during the week and the sun came out for much of the time. The crowds were a bit larger than 2018, but it was spring break for Calgary schools. Also, I think some of the additional traffic was due to Banff having a banner year while many other western ski destinations were not.
On the 25th we revisited many of our favorite runs from the 23rd and hit a few new spots.
Skiing Rock Garden trail again.
This is a friend in one of the Alphabet Chutes, see what I mean about the slough following you down the slope!?!
Same person seconds later, these shots more accurately capture the steepness of this terrain. Notice few moguls, just a nice loose layer of snow over a soft chalky surface.
Again
Vince dropping from a big cornice to the skier's right of the Paradise chair on the backside of Lake Louise ski area. IIRC this area is called Swede's. That's the Larch lift line behind him.
Photo by a friend named Al, from another angle and slightly different part of the same cornice. Vince lapped this area a few times, it required a short hike/skate.
Vince skiing powdery bumps under the Larch chair lift line.
Spectacular vistas from every chairlift ride at Lake Louise.
Panoramic photo from the summit of Lake Louise looking towards the backside of the mountain. The grandeur is very inadequately captured.
Scenes from the town of Banff. It is about 25 minutes from Sunshine and 45 from Lake Louise ski areas. It's far more busy in summer, so in winter there is an over-supply of great hotels/lodging and many fine restaurants and shops. It's surely one of my favorite ski destinations ever!
26 March 2026, I went back to Banff Sunshine ski area this day. It was a mix of sun, snow, and clouds. A few inches of fresh snow had fallen overnight.
This is a friend in the Goat's Eye area of the mtn on a slope called Cleavage after two big rocks.
The great snow spoiled us, this is another friend from Dawson Creek, Canada in same area.
Me and a long time Ski Talk friend named Mark in the Goat's Eye area.
Goat's Eye view, lots of acreage per skier.
A friend in Bye Bye Bowl off Lookout Mtn, elev 8954', the highest lift served point at Sunshine.
Greetings from Bye Bye Bowl at Sunshine.
27 March 2026, this was my last ski day in the Banff area and I returned to Lake Louise to ski with a large group of Ski Talk.com friends. For an area without slopeside lodging, the base lodge complex at Louise is huge. It's like a huge day-lodge.
I didn't ski the frontside of the mtn very much, but it had great views too. The Chateau Lake Louise and famous lakeview can be seen in the distance of this photo.
The summit lift at Lake Louise tops out at elevation 8,650'. It was the gateway to some terrific chutes and bowls on the backside of the mountain. It's relatively new and replaced a notorious platter lift a few years ago.
Groomer to right is called Boomerang and is an example of the stupendous terrain and scenery served by the summit lift.
Apres ski time with friends.
On Saturday, 28 March 2026, I dropped Vince off for a morning ski session at Banff Sunshine. He took his avalanche safety gear with him in the hopes of getting to ski Delerium. Meanwhile, my wife and I packed up and cleared out of our room at the excellent Banff Aspen Lodge after staying there for six nights. We picked up Vince a little after noon time and he had just successfully made a lap in Delerium Dive. Photo here:
Then we headed straight up to Jasper, Alberta, which took about four hours.
Passing Castle Mountain a few miles outside Banff on the drive north.
Eventually we used the magnificent Highway 93, the Icefields Parkway, where the snowpack was super deep.
The Columbia Icefield (glacier) was impressive in ominous light.
Jasper was small compared to Banff, but had several good motels/hotels and a number of restaurants.
Jasper owes its origins to the Canadian railway system.
On 29 March Vince and I logged our first ski day ever at Marmot Basin ski area. It is legit, with 1720 inbound acres, and 3000' vertical. The base elevation is 5570', the highest in all of Canada. The summit is 8570', which is quite high considering a latitude.
It was spring break for the Edmonton school district and the base lodge was hopping.
Lots of recent fresh snow in Marmot, including a few squalls during our ski day.
The advanced terrain on the upper mountain was not seeing much traffic and we quickly stumbled into a snowy and nearly empty mountainside off the skier's left of Paradise chair. It was called Tres Hombres. It was steep, huge, and nearly empty, and it had excellent soft, fresh snow.
Vince's first run down Tres Hombres.
Marmot has a nice mix of trees and open terrain. This is the Eagle Ridge Chair.
It served a steep, treed area called Eagle East.
But after lunch we couldn't resist going back to the Tres Hombres area for more great snow, these two shots are from a section there called El Diablo.
Coming...
Going...
Monday, 30 March 2026 was a cold (high of 5 degs F), but beautiful ski day at Marmot Basin with terrific snow conditions. It was another of my favorite ski days of the trip and season. It was sunny for much of the day and perfect for exploiting 6+ inches of "cold smoke" snow in the last 24 hrs (and 21 inches in the last six days) at Marmot Basin.
I haven't mentioned that there was a shocking amount of damage from a huge forest fire in the summer of 2024. It went on for 25 or more miles in the vicinity of Jasper. I'm told even a portion of the town was destroyed. Fortunately, it did not reach all the way up to the ski area, but it came close.
On our second day at Marmot Basin Vince and I concentrated our skiing on the summit area served by The Knob quad chair. It features a huge cirque which on Monday the 30th was filled with high quality, accumulated snow. We had avoided this magnificent, mostly treeless area in the low viz conditions of the previous day.
I took this photo beneath the Eagle Ridge Chair. The Knob/summit chair is to the far right. Everything in between comprises The Cirque, much of it lift served via traverses. The highest parts of the Cirque are inbounds, but hike-to only.
Looking the other direction from the Eagle Ridge lift the town of Jasper is in the distant center.
We stored our brown bag lunch in the mid-mtn Paradise Lodge and later ate there. It's center in this photo. Most Canadian ski areas seem to be quite accommodating to brown baggers. The Canadian Express and Paradise chairs can be seen to the right. We barely scratched the surface of the tree skiing at Marmot.
A highlight of the day was heading out from the Knob chair to make fresh tracks in the Cirque.
Further out, traversing to the saddle of the Cirque. The next day Vince would twice make the hike up to Marmot-2 Peak on the right.
Fresh tracks and cold smoke on March 30. It was 5 degrees, windless, nice sunshine and little competition for the powder!
Again, we drove 1000 miles due north of Salt Lake City for this and it was worth it :-)
Cool patrol shack buried in snow at the top of Knob chair. Hikers can be seen above it. We climbed this bootpack on our way to the Crest of the Cirque.
Marmot is the kind of place where the fresh snow on the mtn, particularly on the expert parts of the mtn, doesn't get skied out in one day. This photo of the Marmot-2 chute was taken from The Knob chair at 3:35 PM.
Later in the evening my wife Kathy recruited me to drive her to dinner at the Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge's Orso Trattoria.
Exterior.
31 Mar 2026, Vince made some early runs at Marmot Basin while my wife and I packed up and checked out of our hotel in Jasper. We started driving the Icefields Parkway in the southerly direction at about noon. Both the road and the visibility was much better/clearer than last Saturday when we drove up this route (HWY 93).
Heading south from Jasper the Canadian Rockies were blanketed in deep, white snow.
We made a quick stop at Athabasca Falls. It's about 70 feet tall including several plunges and is located about 20 miles south of Jasper.
This Icefields Parkway scenery went on for 2+ hours.
The plow drivers were our friends.
Approaching the Columbia Icefields where there are multiple glaciers nearby.
I donned my snowshoes for the glacier.
Vince broke out his touring skis. This area had a violent micro-climate. It was super windy and 20 degrees.
A few miles down the road we made a pit stop at the most scenic outhouses in Canada :-)
We found WINTER. It was really cool to see such an incredibly deep snowpack after such a mild winter in the western USA.
We saw some monster avalanche slide paths and debris, this was 20-30 feet deep.
Later on the 31st we passed through Banff one last time and had a meal at The Boss Kitchen and Bar. It's named after a famous alpha-grizzly bear that still roams the area. Banff was one of my favorite locations ever for a large gathering of ski friends. The town is highly walkable and loaded with good hotels, restaurants, and shops. It was fairly busy, but winter is actually low season compared to summer in Banff, so we were able to have numerous group dinners and outings with little advance reservations or planning. And the vibe is much less pretentious than some of the upscale ski resorts in the USA, not to mention the highly favorable exchange rate, USD vs. CAD.
After leaving Canada we drove to Big Sky, MT for a three day visit. We passed through a very rural farming and ranching area in southern Alberta with some Hutterite "colony" farms. They apparently are similar to the Amish and Mennonite communities I am more familiar with near Lancaster, PA.
A colony farm in southern Alberta near the US border, 1 Apr 2026.
We arrived on Wednesday evening 1 Apr 2026 in a light rain. Later that night it turned into a very heavy 5" of snow. Vince and I were somehow slightly uninspired after a long drive and the terrific conditions in Canada, but we hit the hill from 11 AM to about 1:30 PM. It was a slush-fest. The best we could tell the mild winter left only about 30% of Big Sky's terrain open, mostly in the center of the mountain. Still, a third of Big Sky is bigger than a great many American ski areas.
Slush-fest at Big Sky.
Fortunately, the snow kept coming and on Friday morning 3 Apr 2026 I cleaned another 8 or 9" of snow off my car. It was colder and better quality and continued a bit during the day. We put in a full day of storm skiing, frequently among the advanced terrain off the Challenger chair.
There was enough new snow that avalanche mitigation work limited operations to only three lower lifts (two bubble chairs and the gondola) early in the day and lift lines were massive. Bozeman is a boom town and the locals were out in force to enjoy a relatively rare powder day in this subpar western winter.
Once we got out of the base area things went better and the new snow totaled about 14" over the previous 36 hours.
It was not Alberta cold smoke, but it was pretty nice!
The next day, 4 Apr 2026, was another of my favorites from the trip. We had partial sun, the new snow set up well. The storm wrapped up and it was very fine "day after" skiing. Being Ikon base pass holders, Vince and I decided to pay the up-charge to take a single ride on the Lone Peak summit tram. The dynamic pricing was set at $25 per ride this day. It opened at 9:30 AM and we got in line ten minutes before then. We caught the second tram up to the summit.
The top 15% of the summit was clouded in, but still we enjoyed hanging out for a bit at the glass floored summit observation room.
I got a very nice view of the uber-exclusive Yellowstone Club private ski area as I skied down Liberty Bowl from the summit.
As we explored the mountain the scenery really started to pop.
Vince pointing to a chute he skied (without me) pretty far out in the expert Headwaters section of the mountain.
What a fun day and much better lift lines than the day before even though it was a Saturday!
Beside the Challenger chair again.
This view captures the upper mo
4 Apr 2026 at Big Sky continued.
This view captures the upper mountain Powder Seeker bubble chair, to the left is the tram line and summit complex.
Vince was interested in skiing the Big Couloir. It's Big Sky's signature steep chute from the summit, but it was closed this visit due to icy/bony conditions. It is just to the left of center in this photo.
This giant igloo (they call it Iglu) contained a bar inside. Outside a DJ was playing tunes.
Wildcat man checking his social feed.
One last look at Lone Peak (elevation 11,167') at Big Sky as we headed south to Salt Lake City and complete a really fine 18 day road trip.
5 APR 2026, Finally back in SLC area. 18 day road trip. Straight line SLC to Jasper is over 1000 miles due north. We probably logged close to 3000 miles with our wanderings, SLC-PANORAMA-BANFF-JASPER-BIG SKY-SLC.
When was the last time you skied in single digit temps and multiple snowstorms, yet upon return home had to wash millions of bugs off your car, ski rack and skis? When we left SLC on March 19 it was 80+ degrees. When we returned on April 5 it was 70+. It was full-on spring down here, bugs included, while it was full-on winter up there!
Thanks for reading.
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