Powder Journal for Powder Mountain

Reports from Pam Mitchell,
Wolf Creek's Powder Hound Webmaster

January 14, 2005. Powder Mountain. What a powderific surprise! Three days since the last storm, bright sunshine and a sky so blue it almost hurt your eyes. My husband Howdy and I went with Powder Mountain Host, Paul DeLong to board the Sundown Lift at 9 a.m. For an extra $7 per run, a snow cat takes you from the top of this lift to Lightning Ridge, elevation 9,105 feet. This opens up more terrain than you can ski in a day. As luck would have it, the cat was waiting for us when we departed the chair. Up we went. The cat tow made me giggle as we used our poles to form a T-bar that gently pulled us up the ridge. We enjoyed spectacular mountain views in all directions, including James Peak within the resort. When James Peak is open, you can access it by helicopter or a healthy trek. As our Host Paul summed it up, “Twenty minutes on foot by those young kids, 35 minutes for me. I take my time.” But we didn’t need to hike for the good snow today. Even though everything looked wind-scoured from the parking lot, Paul found the stashes that the wind missed last night. And he knew how to garner the most vertical from each cat ride. Believe me, it is well worth the cost of a guide if you came to Utah to ski powder.

 

First to Lower Sugar Bowl – sweeeeet! Then to Lower Hair Raiser – it was so good in the trees that we went back again and found an even longer pitch of soft untracked tree skiing. This was reminiscent of Canadian heliskiing in the Selkirk Mountains.

Paul told us about a Californian that he recently guided to this same run under equally delicious conditions. At the bottom, the fellow literally had tears running down his face. He pulled out his cell phone to call several friends back home about the best run of his life. We knew just how he felt. This was heaven.