Utah: Still The Greatest Snow On Earth -
So you’ve heard the phrase "Greatest Snow On Earth" bantered around but you may have absolutely no idea what that really means. This is one time where “guess you had to be there” is the only legitimate response to any who scoff at Utah’s state slogan.
With an annual average snowfall of 500 inches a season, an average base depth of 100-plus inches, and a water density averaging seven percent while most resorts hover around 20 percent, Utah’s snow is unlike any other. It also is easy to reach. It’s no wonder the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association call Park City, Utah, home.
Thirteen resorts hover within an hour of Salt Lake City International Airport, and Utah’s southernmost Brian Head Ski Area is just 2.5 hours from Las Vegas. The goods are all so close.
You’ll first pass The Canyons Resort, Utah’s largest single ski and snowboard area, 30 minutes east on I-80. You’ll never be bored on the mountain with over 3,700 acres, 163 runs, 17 lifts, two cutting-edge terrain parks, and six natural halfpipes.
The road narrows toward the charming, historic Park City ‘proper’ as you ramble down multi-signal lighted Hwy 224. Once a booming silver mining town, Park City fell to shambles and was nearly declared a ghost town until United Park City Mines, and a federal loan earmarked for economically depressed rural towns, created Treasure Mountain Resort. The $1.2 million dollars bought a gondola, base and summit lodges, a chairlift, a J-bar, and a nine-hole golf course. Today, you still can see and ski by the ruins of that era.
Deer Valley Resort opened in 1981 to address the needs of the elite traveler. Formed more on a hotel service model than the traditional ski area model, DV is all about customer service first. Valets unload your skis, hosts escort you around the resort, every run is impeccably groomed, and the cafeteria food can be better than you’d find in a four-star restaurant. Snowboarding still is not allowed here because the clientele demands it.
About the only thing Alta and Deer Valley have in common is the ban on snowboarding. Alta has no cute mountain village complex of cobbled walkways, astronomically expensive chic cafes, and million-dollar log cabins and Victorian homes. Alta is about snow. Alta had less than 100 inches by New Year's in only two of 41 seasons. Alta makes up one of two resorts in Little Cottonwood Canyon. But there’s nothing “little” about these resorts. The world’s premier powder-skiing meccas present nearly 4,700 combined acres of incredibly challenging terrain. The mountains are tough, vertical, and serious, and the nightlife minimal and irrelevant.
A mining town in the 1800s, Alta was wiped out several times by avalanches. In the late 1930s, however, Alf Engen decided that a resort here was viable. Snowbird opened its doors in early January 1972. A temple to local and international hard-cores who relish Snowbird’s long, continuous runs and deep powder bowls, more than a few locals work double overtime construction jobs in the summer so they can worship the Bird every day of the ski season.
Big Cottonwood Canyon is home to Solitude and Brighton resorts. Though living in the shadow of their big brothers in LCC, they hold their own for locals. When avalanches close the road to LCC, it's smooth sailing to first tracks in BCC. Brighton beckons to borders and backcountry skiers. Solitude, with abundant housing, healthy doses of powder, and uncrowded slopes is an intermediate and expert skier’s haven.
It wasn’t until the 2002 Winter Olympic Games that anyone other than locals paid attention to Snowbasin and Powder Mountain. But with people skiing the slopes of Snowbasin since 1939, the resort is one of the oldest continuously run ski areas in the nation. Sure, the first lift didn’t go in until 1946 but that didn’t stop the eager from hiking and poaching that light Utah powder. With open access points throughout the ridgeline, skiers from extreme to tame will find excitement at this Ogden Valley resort.
Doc Cobabe had vision about Snowbasin’s neighbor Powder Mountain. His father saw sheep for the 5,500-acre ranch land but Ol’ Doc saw slopes. His friends bought a snowcat in ’71 and began investigating what would become one of the largest resorts in Utah if not the country. Nearby Wolf Mountain emerged in 2007 as a beginners' hill.
Heading south from the Cottonwoods, Robert Redford and several partners spotted Timp Haven in the shadow of Mt. Timpanogos near Provo. They purchased and renamed the ski area Sundance Resort (allegedly named after his character in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid). Though an ideal mountain retreat with first-class log cabins, art ‘shack’, day spa, and two delicious restaurants framed in by floor to ceiling windows, Sundance sees little traffic beyond the locals from Utah County.
The word is out about Utah’s goods. But you really do need to ski it for yourself.
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