Big Sky Resort Blog

How about this snow!  We’ve had amazing days on the mountain, in fact I think I’ve been skiing so much that I haven’t had a chance to write it all down. 

I’ll have to tell about a few different days, they were all different, with different friends and visitors, but the one common theme is how great the snow has been.  I’ll have to start with a few days ago when I had the opportunity to show my secrets to  Corey and Karen visiting from New Jersey.  They visited the resort for the first time around 5 years ago and have now been back 20 times, they already have their March vacation booked; these are true fans.  After skiing all this time they thought hitching on to my ski day might show them a few spots they haven’t seen before and they were up for any adventure, which of course is great news for me.

We started nice and easy for an Elk Park Ridge, this was the day before the 20 inch dump, but even this day we found soft, snow on Elk Park Meadows, that angle is perfect for powder turns as we cruised through 4-6 inches of snow that had piled up with the previous two days small storms.
 
Karen and Corey were skiing great so the next stop was to get back to the base and head up Swift Current toward Lone Peak.  Naturally I want to make our journey fun so we got back down through trees on Congo, there were moguls, but the snow was edging well. 

We went to the triple chair and snuck into the Bowl for a run, I’ve really developed a favorite spot off this giant wide face, it’s about half way across the Turkey Traverse above a rock band, hardly anyone skis it, yet you don’t have to huck off the rocks as a gentle shift to the right gets you around the corner perfectly after getting untracked turns.

Corey was pleased so far so I took it up another notch with a Challenger lap.  We found soft snow on Upper Moonlight and then headed to the right for BRT North.  Karen was skiing great and never lost confidence getting into the run even though skiing above a couple of cliffs.  Once in we all picked our line.  I found the best turns on the left edge between the trees on this steep slope.

OK, I had a wonderful day skiing with Corey and Karen, but the next day we got hit with a new storm, gingerly laying another 15-20 inches on top of great terrain.  (By the way, this was a classic Big Sky powder day with 5 inches measured at Swifty at 5 a.m. but with knee deep, face shots on the upper mountain!)

I was skiing with a friend from Billings, Matt who was demoing new skis from the performance center.  He had been shopping and knew he wanted wider under foot, but just didn’t know with all the new technology.  Considering I’m not much of a gear guy I pointed him to the pros and he got to try all different styles through the powdery day.  We really only had the time for one big lap, but we made it worth it for the Tram.  After some face shots on the Lenin rollover, I skied him through the Dictator Chutes and he skied smoothly and confidently while taking in the amazing views, his favorite line ended up being toward the bottom of that run, if you ski Dictator’s, you can jump to the left into a short shot on Lenin proper, but keep an eye out to the right and you can get into the left side of Wave Wall with a short traverse, there are almost always untouched lines in that section. 

We spent the rest of the afternoon skiing the Bowl, we found a foot of fresh in the Exit Chute area, completely untouched powder turns accessible from a lift at 3:30 p.m., there's simply too much mountain to get gobbled up in only one day.

The last time I skied with Matt, it was a powder day at another Montana mountain.  He had commented that considering it was the day of his life at this mountain, he was curious why while I was having a great time, I didn’t seem overly as joyous as the crew.  He told me on the Triple Chair his theory is that I’m spoiled with so many powder days getting to live here, they must be too numerous to count, perhaps he’s right, definitely with the spoiled part. 

I had another epic Tram day with the Burke family that I may have to write about later, I think I’ve officially written too much and the time has come for me to boot up and explore more powder turns.

We’ll see you out there,

Dax

Skiing is fun, just in case you hadn’t heard.  Sometimes it just takes the right motivation to get you out on the hill and there are never any regrets.

My motivation this week was that one of Big Sky’s biggest fans has been emailing me for years regarding different snow related topics from his home in Georgia.   He was planning another trip back to Big Sky and thought it would be fun to be featured in this blog, so I set a time for Robert to meet at the Summit Clocktower and I was joined with his two sons Gabriel and Tripp. 

Like any tour of the mountain I first learned where they had been skiing, luckily they were very adventurous and wanted to use the opportunity to ski somewhere they hadn’t with a local’s guidance.

We got started with a ride up the Triple Chair, where Robert explained to me all the reasons he loves Big Sky, he has brought dozens of folks up before making them all believers, he really likes the snow, plus the altitude isn’t as high as other places he’s been in Colorado, but really, he loves the fact you can simply get so much skiing in during a short vacation, his theory is that for every extra hour he uses to fly to Montana, it pays for itself with 2 hours of extra skiing, he’s seen some resorts with hour long lift lines.

We all worked our way across the Turkey Traverse and my theory was that the north facing South Wall could hold some soft snow.  I invited Gabriel to go first and he handled it well, Tripp went second and made easy work of the run, Robert took off and got himself down using a wide line technique, one that is useful and easily done with Big Sky’s big runs.  He was having a blast and they all decided they wanted to try a different run from the Tram (they had previously mastered Liberty Bowl).

Since they had the confidence, we spun back around and met a Tram station that had no wait, amazing considering the conditions are good, the sun was shining and it was 2 in the afternoon.  I took a picture to prove it, I was blown away.  Folks, if you like skiing the Tram, this week is a good one to be here.

We got to the top and with the sun shining, there was an interesting mix of clouds in the sky, most of them lower than our 11,000 foot perch, it was one of those breathtaking moments that the photo doesn’t do justice for, but I tried anyway.

I had received word before I took off that Lenin was skiing well with the new snow and I figured that would be a great run to progress from Liberty Bowl.  This run had it all with the steeps at the top, smaller bumps through the middle and then soft turns out the bottom.  We may have all taken a while getting down it, but I just suspect Robert wanted to savor the run.

To ski back to the base I figured I’d keep showing them runs they wouldn’t normally have seen or done, so I asked at the top of Jay Walk if they wanted to ski Rice Bowl, it’s great because you can see it from the first gate so they knew what they were getting in to.  I skied Great White and found really nice powder toward the final turns to the road.  Rice Bowl paid off with about 4-6 inches of fluff working through the trees.  I did notice Gabriel chose to really enjoy the powder by immersing his whole body in it with a little bit of a check slide.

We rode Crazy Horse from there and I got to hit the little kickers on the right side and found really nice turny snow in the middle.  At the bottom I had to bid farewell, and the family from Georgia was really thankful for the tour, but in reality, it is me thanking them, they love Big Sky and tell everyone about it, they find a way to make it up here often, and finally and most importantly, they gave me the reason to jump out and make some turns, something we should all be doing more often, after all, skiing is fun, look at those smiles.

We’ll see you out there,

Dax

In reality the similarities between a trip to Big Sky and the movie "Vacation" are few and far between. At least for this family.
 
There's not a big moose out front telling you, "Sorry folks, ski hill's closed."  And you don't have to take a lift operator hostage and force him to fire up the quads.
 
Quite the opposite this week.
 
All the lifts were running and a little bit of snow fell almost every night. Then a whole bunch of snow -- fell on three consecutive days. No one's (not even John Candy) going to get sick jetting around the mountains on that.
 
No need to plunk a few quarters into a vibrating bed and popping open a bottle of champagne. The mood was set by watching illuminated snow flakes flutter down through the lights from the night sky, then blasting over and through them the next day.
 
The booming explosions each morning to set off avalanches are far enough away that they won't cause deafness.  The mother-in-law didn't bring her rabid dog along to mistakenly be left attached to the car bumper when we drove off.  If you take a wrong turn you don't end up in a rough neighborhood.
 
The buses, of course, get you were you need to be on time. Being late, however, isn't a problem since lift lines are non-existant and you can't not get enough runs in.
 
No one even asked me to loan them some money and offered some tacky, white shoes in exchange. Dangle some stylin' white-framed sunglasses on the other hand and I might float someone a few bucks.
 
In the end it's hard to go wrong on a vacation to Big Sky or any ski hill for that matter.  Afterall, if there's not snow, there's apres skiing. If it's too cold, there's apres skiing.  If you're pooped out, there's apres skiing. You can even apres ski before it's apres.
 
Yes, all good things must come to an end and so I leave you with this:
Clark Griswold: I just want you to ask yourself one thing. If you were... if you were me, wouldn't you do the same thing for your children?
Roy Walley (amusement park owner): No.
 
Tom Stuber worked for 18 years at the Helena Independent Record and is on a permanent vacation from that job.

Oh deepness this week, if you hadn’t already heard from all your friends Facebooking and Tweeting of the epic conditions we’ve had.  With snow that just won’t stop, every day just keeps refilling from the day before. 

From time to time I get requests from folks to not just focus on the over the shoulder blower snow I find on Lone Peak from the Tram, they want to know about some of the lower mountain terrain they like to ski.  As it turned out my last tour will get to tell that story, after all, my words pale in comparison to the amazing video we’re now putting on the home page (check out late January BSPN).

Plus, for this story, I get to share how diverse our terrain can be, even on the same run!  You’ll see.

I met with Grace who is visiting from NYC, she has been to most every major Rocky Mountain Resort and absolutely loves the snow and terrain that the mountains in the west get.  I wanted to give her a full exploration of the different terrain we have, I picked up a grooming report and we started up the Ramcharger Chair.  For the first run we hit El Dorado off the back side of Andesite.  This run is absolutely huge, width that is.  I liken it to a guilty pleasure and with the fresh, soft corduroy; Grace exclaimed this is hero snow!  She was right.

From there we spun up Southern Comfort for a lap on Deep South, at this time it might have been about 11 a.m., yet I rarely crossed another ski track with the perfectly manicured grooves holding my edges with confidence.  We tilted the pitch for the next couple of runs for some blue squares, we hit Elk Park Ridge with the bottom of Thunderwolf in sight, I could shoot right and grab the soft, powder snow while Grace could stay up on the ridge and keep skiing the groomed.  We met at the bottom about the same time and we went up for a Big Horn.  Here again the groomers courteously left the left edge natural, so I could ski powder and Grace could ski machine groomed, all while skiing the same run.
 
We hit Ambush to work our way down to lunch, this time I opted to stick on the steep groomed slope myself to get the legs moving on the several headwalls that run offers.  We filled up at Whiskey Jacks, the Gringo Gut Buster can’t be beat when it comes to sustenance through a ski day. 

Big Sky continues to impress me, sure we have some of the biggest, orneriest black diamond terrain you can reach with a lift, but it’s the variety for everyone that makes the place unique. 

Don’t worry powderhounds, I’ll get my face shots in due time, there’s plenty of season left and like I said, the snow keeps coming!

We’ll see you out there,

Dax

A lot has been written about powder skiing, extreme skiing, mogul skiing, and competitive skiing, but what about family skiing?

I may make a pretty lame Clark Griswald for the first 24 hours of our annual vacation to Big Sky, but Chevy Chase has got nothing on me after that. Loading up the '94 Toyota pickup (a pretty fine ride compared to the Vacation's Family Truckster) and ditching the wife and kids (very unlike Clark) for the drive down from Helena is a snap.  In the upper lot by 2, it's more slip-into-a-phone-booth-for-a-quick-change-into-ski-clothes, than picking up Aunt Edna at Cousin Eddy's.

On the hill by 2:25 for eight quick laps on Andesite, then quickly into Whiskey Jack's for a few beers and watching the game (everyone enjoyed that Charger fan Sunday) before it's back to the pickup and the start of being Griswald.

Of course my, er Clark's, condo has 17 steps down, then 32 steps up.  There's three coolers of food, three ski bags, four totes of dry foods and clothes, four suitcases...you get the idea. Down, up. Down, up. Down, up. Down, up. Down, up.  And one more down, up.

Lock the keys in the truck and water is boiling over on the stove. Phone rings and it's the wife, "Where have you been?" Well, not exactly at the pool with Christy Brinkley.

The next morning it's time for a day on the slopes to burn up the next eight hours before the wife and kids arrive.  Yeah, it's off to The Tram. The sun is shining off the peak in typical Lone Mountain-fashion as I load for that always awesome ride to the top. Everything's cool, but then a thick cloud - now I'm thinking was that Eugene Levy loading me in the tramcar? - decides to hang onto the side of the mountain for the next 20 minutes.  I pick my way over to The Gullies and down, look back up and the cloud moves along. Figures.

All's good after that little episode as a couple inches of fresh snow blankets the rest of Big Sky and no more incidents for the day.  Turns out that it's the calm before the storm.

Dork that I am, I decide to wait outside at the turnoff for the family to pull in. Just thinking about how excited they'll be to see me standing anxiously awaiting their arrival. I'm singing the Wally World theme song "Morty Moose" only changing the words to Tommy Big Sky. "T-o-m-m-y!  B-i-g-S-k-y! Tommy Big Sky, Tommy Big Sky, Tommy Big Sky, guh-yuk, that's me!"

Here they come. I'm bouncing up-and-down, really giving it my all. The wife's car pulls closer. Something's wrong.  Where are the kids? Another car is right behind. They're in there with my MOTHER-IN-LAW! OK, she's not exactly Aunt Edna, but you get the picture.

"Are you ready to haul more stuff down and up those stairs?" she asks as only a mother-in-law can.  Yes, ma'am.  Our ninth annual trip to Big Sky is officially off and running.  Stay tuned for more . . . .

Tom Stuber spent 18 years as a sports writer for the Helena Independent Record and is hoping his new Family Truckster gives him an angle as ski writer.

Just one of the great things about living in Big Sky is that we get the chance to show off this giant mountain to people who haven’t been here before.  These were big mountain skiers who are in the industry and have skied most every place else but Big Sky had elusively missed their list, until now.  It was Mike and Dan, Dan who spends his winters in an unnamed Wyoming resort had heard plenty about Big Sky, but today was the day I’d get to show him exactly what the Biggest Skiing in America looks like.

Mike and Dan had explored the lower mountain earlier in the day while Brandon and I were going to catch up and show off the big stuff for the afternoon.  It was a perfect, blue-bird day and the temps were comfortable so we started our big ski tour by lounging on the plaza at the picnic tables eating delicious burgers from the Burger Bar outside, the servings were plentiful and we were fueled up to get to the top.

We rolled four wide up Swifty, then made our way to the Triple Chair.  When the mountains popping white and the sky is deep blue, skating around the corner of the Jay Walk unleashes the immensity of the Lone Mountain with a wide Bowl to the left, steep Gullies straight ahead and the ornery A-Z chutes finishing the cirque to the right.

We got to the top and even though we hadn’t seen Dan or Mike make a turn before, we knew they were adventurous and strong so we skied Otter Slide to the Dictator Chutes.  We positioned above the chutes, but before we pushed off, we took a moment to take in how big this terrain really is, not only are you standing 800 feet above a rollover cliff section, but looking straight out toward the Madison range with Cedar and Sphinx, and countless unnamed snowy peaks and faces, we all knew correctly that even though a lift got us to this point, this was real mountain skiing. 

The snow was that really nice consistency of chalky, maybe 2 inches of grippable snow that had been nicely wind buffed smooth for steep, but easy turns.  We honked a left (by the way, as a guide they told me I say “honk left” and “honk right” a lot, so now I have a complex) and we worked our way to Lenin proper, only long enough to find the entry point back to the right underneath the cliffs we had just skied above.  From there our turns got deeper with barely touched lines that still kept us high enough to get above the unloading bullwheel of the Shedhorn lift.  We scooted quickly across the Duck Walk, glancing at the steep mountain side on our left and the steep drop off to the right to position ourselves for a second lap up the Tram. 

Now that we had showed them the technical steeps, now it was time for the big wide steeps that Marx provides with almost impossibly long vertical drop.  Our friends were loving it and even though the Tram was closing for the day, we still had a full hour of Challenger laps to explore.

By now with the short January sun, it was starting to dip and we would relish with the rays at the top of the legendary fixed grip double.  The snow was great and we hit our favorites like 17th Green, Moonlight and BRT North.  For Dan and Mike, who knew the next day we’d stretch out the Biggest Skiing even further with Moonlight Basin, I think they were beginning to think this area had no end, which in a lot of ways, it doesn’t while it continues to wrap around Lone Peak.

Just a few more satisfied Big Sky first-timers who pledged to come back.  I’ve determined there are two types of skiers out there, those who haven’t skied Big Sky, but talk about the plans to make the plans to someday make the trip, and those who have experienced the place and count the days to when they’ll be back. 

How many days do you have left?

We’ll see you out there,

Dax

Say Hey Snowriders; there's no better way to greet the New Year than with a half dozen tram laps on some fresh powder! Welcoming 2010 over the weekend proved spectacular for my flatlander friends visiting from South Dakota!  Roger and Ross were sure that the first run of the first day of the new decade needed to be from the top of Lone Peak @ 11,166'.  I knew that the snow was extremely soft and carvey on the south side of the peak, so I guided them down an exceptional Liberty Bowl run into the deep tree powder of the Bavarian Forest. We followed that up with a quick jaunt down Marx to get their legs warmed up for what ended up being a New Year's Day of fun over on the Challenger lift, Roger's favorite Big Sky Terrain.

We shot down the cat-track and dropped into the Magic Trees where the glade in the middle section yielded some of the best turns.  He really likes to put together a top to bottom Midnight / Moonlight nearly Outer Limits run that took us from the upper skiers-left shoulder of the run where the fluffy stuff was untracked, down into the Midnight glade and trees where there was more virgin snowfall awaiting our arrival.  It was so good ... we did it again.  By that time I had picked out a line down Bert's that was calling to me as we rode the lift. Finding the entrance incredibly smooth, I shot across to the right for some deep snow while my skier buddies took the left side for more vertical pitch. We were all well-pleased.  But on the next lap, it was Roger that was being called by the snow to take the top of the highway over to the edge of the trees right below the left. Spectacular! ... We knew our time investment needed to stay worthy before leaving for re-fuling at the base ... so we repeated the best run and headed for some soup.

We capped the day with a couple speed-runs over on Andisite, with Elk Park Ridge nearly bringing me to my knees in the powdery moguls on the left side while my buddies stayed up on the groomed flatlander-friendly highway of this 1700' vertical rush.  Something about that dog-leg that makes this run seem like the longest on the mountain... even though it pales against the bigger lift-accessed terrain!  We topped the day with a quick blitz through the Silver Knife tree-glade that apparently is a forgotten powder-field right in the middle of some of the most popular runs off the Andesite side. The guys were pleased and headed to Whiskey Jacks for some brews and nachos.  They wanted to meet up with some friends from the Black Hills that were experiencing their first trip to Big Sky.  Montana's best has apparently cured them of their Colorado addiction.  Nothing like no-lift lines and the biggest skiing in America to get your head screwed on straight!

By the next day the tram seemed to really want all our attention.  Marx and Lenin were skiing really good ... but the best shot of the day was definitely the Third Dictator chute, and by Sunday you could still take the hard right off Lenin just below the transition fence and get into the "Beard".  The run-out apron of snow was knee-deep, fresh and unscarred ... just pick your line of fun! We threw in a visit to the new Shedhorn Grill for a soup, sandwich and re-hydration break.  How awesome to have a yurt in the woods for the folks that want a break from their hard work without returning to the base!  Better get more seating, the food is great! Even though we got back on the hill to do a series of pick-up laps for missed terrain ... from Bad Dog to Erica's Glade we ran out of day before we ran out of mountain ...  Thanks to some blissfully warm mid-twenty temps and fairly continuous snowfall mixed with occasional shots of blue skies, my friends had an exceptional visit to Big Sky.  We've already got the dates in February for another visit and another 4 days to try to conquer this mountain!

Let's Ride The Sky!

-Anonymous Knuckle-dragger

It started to snow around 11 a.m. and the flakes were getting bigger and bigger as the storm settled in, by 1 p.m. a few inches had fallen and I was set to meet with Friso and Meg visiting from NYC.  They were checking out Big Sky for the first time and have traveled to many other ski resorts the past few years.

Their first observation of skiing our area was both the size of the resort along with the relative lack of crowds, they always ski the Holiday week and even though Big Sky too had more people than average, the lift system kept people moving smoothly and with a few quick choices, you could find you’d have a run all to yourself with ease.

The stories I picked up from Meg and her husband told me they should be able to handle plenty of terrain, but for a starter for me to get warmed up I opted for a nice, long, rolling cruiser of Elk Park Ridge, one of our quintessential intermediate slopes that is lengthy and full of options.  The new snow was really nice as we worked our way on the run, I was pleasantly happy to glance over my shoulder and see them both right on my trail, they were both strong skiers and I knew our tour would be fun.  We stuck to the right side that was a mixture of the new snow, the groomed track along with some of the packed powder right off the ridge. 

We got to the bottom of Thunderwolf and skied right to the chair for our next lap, which I figured with their adventurous spirit could involve some trees.  I lead them toward Hangman’s where we caught the left road to find Congo.  By now the snow was really picking up (see the photo) and we stopped a few times to savor the perfect pitch and soft snow.

From the base we went up Swift Current, this time I figured to up the pitch a bit and we went toward Rice Bowl.  After getting about three quarters around the cirque, we jumped in to find really soft and creamy turns toward the bottom.  After popping out the trees we headed back to the hidden entrance to Buffalo Jump.  Friso was eyeing the rock outcroppings but I skied around the right side and we played in the playground of kickers and whoops through the sides and belly of Buffalo Jump.

We finished our afternoon tour with a run down Lobo that was the perfect finish for the afternoon.  They had been skiing all day and were starting to prepare for the après/dinner plans.  I was happy to explore the mountain and show off a few secrets that truly show the depth of how much variety we have in ski terrain.

We’ll see you out there,

Dax