From Jimmy, "It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end."
I came to MT on this years western ski road trip in search of places with great powder and small national profiles and hence low crowds. I found it.
. Western MT is full of little places that few outside their immediate vicinity have ever heard of. I skied Bridger Bowl, Lost Trail, Montana Snowbowl, discovery, and Whitefish. The first and last are known to most regular skiers. The middle 3 - I don't know. It might be interesting to take a poll. Be honest, have you heard of them? They are not in fact little. The smallest, Lost Trail has 1800 vertical feet, and the biggest, Snowbowl, has 2600. At all five You ski onto a chair every time. At Lost Trail, the gem of them all, you might have 10 empty chairs in front of you and 10 more behind. I finished my trip there on Thursday and Friday. At 70+ my lift ticket cost $14. For all practical purposes it is lift served heli skiing, 1800 vertical feet of powder where you never have to ski in or across another track unless you want to. OK, there is a groomed track across the top where you choose your drop in point and maybe the last 300 vert to get back to the chair. The first third of the drop is a big almost treeless face pitched at 30 degrees where you can rip 20 GS powder turns. Below that the pitch backs off as you enter the trees. The management have trimmed the glades in recent years so that in most of it you can just aim and go, letting the powder depth control your speed.
Coming full circle again, "It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end."
