Big Sky Resort

The track of my skiing at the Big Sky Resort is shown here.

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Part of Voyage to Revelstoke in 2023

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After over 40 years, I returned to ski Big Sky Resort in Montana. I read negative temperatures driving to the mountain from West Yellowstone, but gearing up at the back of the car it didn't feel bad. I parked in one of the free lots with a shuttle service not far from the Village. So many people arrived when I did for the 9AM opening, that the open air trailer shuttles were always full. I didn't linger and just walked the 300 meters to the Village.

The Village is a collection of buildings at the base of the mountain. I use the term base loosely because the ski area is massive. The ticket office, shops, food court, and a hotel are located in the Village. The building called the 'Exchange' houses the food court. It took me a bit of walking about outside to figure that out. The queue for the ticket office wasn't so long but was slow. I ended up asking at the ski school desk if my IKON pass would work at the lifts - answer was yes.

There are two high speed chairs departing from the Village. The Swift 6 seater is the choke point for the mountain. You have to ride this chair to access most of the remainder of the mountain. The queue was the longest I've seen since leaving Colorado. I decided to start on the 8 seater chair because there was no line there. My legs were not happy with me as I got off. Making big sweeping alpine turns on the groomed green-blue run consideration emerged that this might be the best I could do today. By run three they were delivering me down the mountain through the bumps that had 1-3 inches of fresh snow.

Snow conditions varied on the mountain generally favorable at soft to medium or light powder. It snowed lightly for a couple of hours with the sun even breaking out.

I'd examined the trail map the night before and baulked at 3 black diamond designations. I had to retract that when I saw the actual runs: narrow chutes and some with cliff faces. I learned from someone I shared a chair with that some areas are restricted to having a beacon and being accompanied by a guide. I was also told that the Lone tram to the top of Lone Mountain where many of these 'runs' are accessed costs an additional $70 over the normal day ticket. The Big Sky Resort website reports that the tram is being replaced with a bigger and fancier tram in the near future. I did see the base for the new tram.

On the south side of Lone Mountain there are a couple of slow chairs that serve a mixture of diamond and blue runs. The runs were fun with tree skiing opportunities and there were no lines. This was the side of the mountain with the Liberty bowl - one way down from the top of the tram that was only a single diamond pitch. This side of the mountain does get the sun and all the positives and negatives of that. Conditions were great today. And the lift operator on the Dakota chair had Star Trek futuristic sunglasses!

I tried to sample most of the mountain, but didn't make it to the Madison Base area. That's probably the area I skied so many moons ago.

As a footnote, there is a large ski area to the south called Yellowstone Club. I rode up a chair with a chef that works there. He shared that it's a private ski area. Membership requires owning a house in the area and paying $400k per year as dues. (Yes, there are five zeros in that number.)