Closing weekend in whitefish. Camped up at the hill with 6 other friends / families, and got a decent amount of hot pow to cap things off.

Camper party:...

Same deal in whitefish (which isn't ikonic). It was a bad snow year, but some of the pandemic years weren't great either. This year was much, much less busy than the madness 2 years ago.

Kimberly area has some fun biking in the summer too. A little bit of everything.

It seems to me that the "big money in skiing" thing is less about there being more rich people skiing, and more about the death of the middle class.

Skiing always attracted plenty of rich people,...

Ahem. The Big is whitefish. You're welcome to use The Sky though.

Same. We used to get down and ski big sky for a few days every year, but haven't in recent years. The day ticket pricing has gotten fairly ridiculous, and the tram charge is just the icing on the...

Oh man, that gives me flashbacks to our bike trip this summer. Which still wasn't nearly as bad as your debacle. But congrats on getting there, eventually.

Whitefish was severely variable...

Singlesline: in case you're checking this from Switzerland, you are very much not missing anything in whitefish. 2" on top of bullet proof refrozen shit.

Once whitefish gets cold again, the snow is gonna be fairly terrible. It'll take at least a foot of high density to bury the current mank. Switzerland sounds like a much better call, even with...

That'd be nice. Definitely one of the downsides of Whitefish - once winter hits, it stays pretty snowy until April. My bikes usually don't get touched from December through March.

Singlesline -...

That seems likely. It'll be a crappy winter right up to the point where I say "fuck it," and mentally switch into bike mode. At that exact moment, snow will start flying, skiing will get good...

I'll definitely keep you posted if I get word on any more of these sort of events at Turner. And yeah - let me know if you're heading this way. I can set you up with a place to stay and discounted...

Ah, bummer! I'll let you know if they end up doing another vet's day. The guy who organizes it does a lot with vets, so I wouldn't be surprised if it happens again.

I should also mention: there's another private Turner day next Wednesday for veterans. Free to any vet. PM if interested.

It was pretty damn lucky. The organizer booked the private day a year ago. As it turns out, it was the first day that turner was able to open for the season, and it came right after a big storm. ...

It's gotten a lot more expensive. I think it's around $5500 now. Used to be $2300 or so. Still worth it though. Definitely a fun little hill.

Killer day at Turner today. Got to meet Yeahman too!

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20240119/508153ac05868b421a634bb0faef1f96.jpg

(Edit: yeahman took better pics than me. I think that's a...

Good that the snow was halfway decent in there. I skinned up to the summit this afternoon. Temps were fine, but the snow in Ptarmigan was terrible. Super variable wind fuck. Sounds like the...

Oh man. Nice work. Not sure it was worth it for chair 10, but I can sympathize with the cabin fever setting in. Hoping for more hospitable temps tomorrow.

Whitefish is shut down for the day, and the cold front's just getting started. Currently -55° at the summit with wind chill. Forecast is for almost -70° tomorrow. I bet they'll be closed at least...

^^^ Agreed. Yesterday was awesome skiing. My biggest problem right now is that the lackluster December didn't get my soft, shitty body into proper ski conditioning!

I'm hoping the cold just...

Sent you a pm

That skate/ski/kite is pretty awesome. Looks fun as hell.

In other news, Whitefish is in the midst of one of the best cycles we've had in a couple years. Deep and right side up. Only...

Thanks for that - good article. That was before my time in the valley, but I still bump into a lot of the people mentioned in that article fairly regularly.

Looks like a slow daily trickle for the next week or so, with some potential for a more potent hit next weekend-ish.

5 day total:
...

I've been wondering the same thing as I watch Whitefish struggle to even maintain a ski-able route back down to the base area (since most of the early season skiing is on the backside). Although...

https://www.cnet.com/a/img/resize/82d8af1058d58aa09d9ca431c06c7c65b448f0f0/hub/2022/09/08/d70a36a5-b599-4d70-af32-00e9ee746781/out-of-touch.jpg?auto=webp&width=768

I maintain that the children...

Definitely. That whole "influencers in the wild" Instagram account is just videos of people doing weird shit in public that they should be far more embarrassed about. It's amusing in a "society is...

Conditions at Big Sky looking pretty good.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/C1kBOMIrvXu/?igsh=NTNucDFpbDBhaWJ5

That's depressing, but at least we're all depressed together. Maybe we should put together a bulk buy on plane tickets to Europe or Japan.

That's rad.

My annual Turner ski day is coming up in 3 weeks. Hoping things turn around for them soon!

Of the things I'd like to see snowbowl maintain / upgrade, paint on the deck is pretty low on the list.

^^^ Sweet! That's the Christmas spirit!

Oof.

Not sure what's worse - the snow totals or the comments on that post.

Yeah, the next week looks... non-optimal.

That's good to hear. I skied bighorn yesterday and it was fucking atrocious. Chunky re-freeze with rocks. Amazing what a difference a couple inches can make.

^^^ well done.

It's the kind of season where it's actually kind of nice that whitefish doesn't really have any rocks.

Does this soup have alcohol in it?

Shit's starting to get grim in whitefish. Warm temps all week did a number on the already meager snowpack. Dirt patches all over the place, including on north facing terrain at the summit. And...

So you're saying there's a chance!

^^^ thats awesome.

Except for the snow levels. That's pretty damn thin.

Sounds good!

I get 4 $62 friends/family tickets with my season pass. I don't expect to use them otherwise, so more than happy to hook that deal up. Could probably get 4 more via Mrs. Toast.

Nice views into GNP over the inversion today.

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20231213/cf1b1a3c79e021a0244b3f1f9f41ad45.jpg

Yeah, it's tough over there.

Although Turner summit is only ~500 feet below the top of schweitzer, and ~800 below whitefish. A lot of areas are gonna be pretty borderline in 15-20 years.

In...

Oof. Hopefully some cold air + moisture shows up.

That certainly makes it look like nelson / rossland would be prime. Wonder how much rain they got. I think whitewater opens this weekend.

Careful what you wish for. The Whitefish summit snow-cam is currently a picture of a puddle. 34° and raining hard at the summit right now.

I saw something saying that the Libby area was supposed...

Whitefish picked up about a foot. Opening day is Thursday. Which would be exciting, except the rain line is supposed to shoot up 2000' above the summit on Tuesday and Wednesday, with close to a...

Maybe she was playing paintball.