The Resorts

Here's something I think you'll really like. For all you Google Earth users, I present a tour of some of the resorts you have skied. A quick visit to Wyoming and Colorado is followed by a tour around Lake Tahoe. Then on to British Columbia, for trip up the Pacific coastline, including a stop in Squamish!

Go here to get Google Earth, then right click on this link and save the file on your local disk. Then start Google Earth, select Open from the File menu.  It appears this tour only works in version 4 of Google Earth.  Version 3 users are out of luck until I get a chance to look at it.

Jackson Hole is as big as it's logo. There are some huge bowls that you can ski over and over again, and continue to ski something different each time. The bowls are wide open so you don't notice the crowds. There are a lot of rocks at Jackson Hole, so be careful if there is not much snow. Laramie Bowl has a variety of terrain ranging from blue to black. But the grand daddy of all bowls is Rendezvous Bowl. Pay the extra money and take the Tram up to the top of Rendezvous Mountain. We have never seen so many bumps!. You can ski and ski and ski until your thighs are screaming. When you stop, take a look back up, then take a look down. You haven't hardly made a dent in it. There isn't as much tree skiing at Jackson Hole, or maybe we are so content with the bowls that we haven't felt the need to seek it out. If you want to ski in the trees, check out the Moran Face. You have to do some hiking, but it is well worth it.

Make sure you take a trip into the town of Jackson Hole. It is a tourist trap, but there are some neat things to see and do. There is a bar with a western motif and the bar stools are horse saddles. And if your lucky (or unlucky) you can get the bartender to pick his nose! There is also a small diner that serves burgers and fries. There is a lunch counter all around the grill, so you can watch them flip burgers.

Grand Targhee is a bit of a drive, but worth spending a day. The road to Targhee is the first to close when there is heavy snow, so you need plan accordingly. You actually travel into Idaho and then back to Wyoming to get there. The drive is absolutely beautiful. Grand Targhee is fairly small and is all top to bottom skiing. You can ski between some large, widely spaced pines that are right next to the marked runs.

Site of the Add A Man trip in:  1991 1996 2000

The only thing bigger than Jackson Hole is Vail. People have talked about the back bowls of Vail for so long, the trail map now titles them, "The Legendary Back Bowls". They even trademarked the name. They are truely one of the biggest views in skiing. Wide open expanses of skiing, few trees, even fewer rock outcrops. Not really above the treeline, just not that many trees. Bad snow on one face? Try another, it will be different. Nothing extreme, but some bump runs that go on forever.  Plenty of blue and black runs to choose from. There is a conceptual flow to the back bowls. The relevance of the High Noon lift servicing Sun Up Bowl and Sun Down Bowl, should be intuitively obvious to the most casual observer. We travel east to China Bowl, (not to be confused with China Grove by the Doobie Bros.) It is serviced by the Tea Cup Express lift and shares Orient Express with Siberia Bowl. The relevance of the asian theme is unknown, other than when you get all the way out to Outer Mongolia, you are a long way from home.

Since the first Add A Man trip to Vail (1988), Blue Sky Basin has opened. It offers more in the trees skiing than China Bowl. Skyline Express follows a high ridge to a peak called Belle's Camp. Lover's Leap offers what looks to be some pretty good, drop in from the cornice skiing, with the right conditions. With a good view from Skyline Express, it's sure to attract a crowd. Pete's Express and Earl's Express get you around the rest of Blue Sky Basin. Very good skiing but we have no idea who Pete and Earl are.

You can't get around Vail (or Beaver Creek) without a catwalk or two. Plan on spending some time traversing around one bowl to get to another. The most observant reader will notice that there has been no mention of the front side of Vail. There probably are some pretty good runs to ski, there's just way too many people.

Beaver Creek is an extention of Vail, a Vail, Jr. if you will, sorta like Vail only different. The Ritz-Carlton hotel at Bachelor Gulch Village shows you what happens when you build a 5-story, 5-star hotel out of lincoln logs. Really cool lincoln logs. The best skiing is directly out in front of Beaver Creek Village and upwards. From the Centennial Express lift out of the village you can get to the Birds of Prey Express lift or ski down to Red Tail Camp and spend some time on the Grouse Mountain Express. There is some steep skiing from this lift. One word of caution: The only thing slower than the Larkspur lift is the Westfall lift. You will need to take one of them to get out of that area, but they should be used for that purpose only.

Site of the Add A Man trip in: 1988 2003

Alta is one of the most extreme places we have skied. There is some very steep terrain, and there is usually enough good snow that it is accessible. Their attitude is, this is a great mountain, ski wherever you want. In Colorado the attitude is, this is a great mountain, ski on the designated trails. Also, Alta is geared more for the locals. Lift tickets are low priced. The best areas we have found are off the Supreme and Germania lifts.

Solitude is a smaller area, but there is still a lot of skiing to be had. This is also the place where we got turned on to videos. We rented a guy to shoot video that we could take home as a keepsake. The guy, whose name we don't remember, was a European, who was here for the season. He took us to some out of the way places that we probably could not have found ourselves. He enjoyed it a lot more than taking pictures of mom, dad and the kids on a blue run. A few years later, we were hiking around looking for some good places to ski, and we stumbled on the same little bowl that we had skied with our European friend.

The Summit lift takes you to the best skiing at Solitude. Off the back side of Summit (and Powderhorn as well), there is a lot of tree skiing to be had. Towards the bottom, there is a stand of Aspen that are great to ski through if there is fresh snow.

Site of the Add A Man trip in: 1989 1990 1993 2005

SummitNet has information on the resorts of Summit county, and Copper Mountain has their own site. Copper also has a Web Cam.

Site of the Add A Man trip in: 1994

The Whistler and Blackcomb have a combined site and there is also a Whistler Community site.

Site of the Add A Man trip in: 1992

Here's a collectors item
from the 2001 war on terrorism

Lake Tahoe is a collection of some very impressive ski resorts. All are within driving distance, if you plan a bit. On the north end you have Squaw Valley USA and Alpine Meadows. Both large enough to ski more than one day. Practically next door to one another. And of course you have Mt. Rose, conveniently located close to the airport, on the way to all the other skiing. On the south end you have Heavenly, a place so big it covers two states, California and Nevada. There is a huge buildup around Heavenly, and gambling is close by at the border. Kirkwood is a bit further south, over Carson Pass.

The road around the east side of the lake is pretty build up, particularly the southern half. The west side is not nearly as built up and it is not nearly as accessable. It will be one of the first roads to close in bad weather. A narrow windy road up and down and around the lake. But it sure is a pretty drive. That is, if you can see. One year, the lake remained in a fog bank most of the time we were here. We would get above it in the mountains and could see the fogged in lake below. At the end of the day we'd drive back into the fog.

General Purpose

Snoweb for Tahoe All the resorts listed, mountain info, Ski conditions,ticket prices

Here's a nice History,Geology and Ecology of the Lake Tahoe Basin

Here's the best area map of the ski resorts I could find.

The Super 8 Motel is a good place to scam a hot tub.

Site of the Add A Man trip in: 1995 1999 2004

The best thing about our trip to Steamboat was that we stayed in a nice condo. Wasn't bad skiing, but nothing to write home about. Anyway the official Steamboat Springs site has some much better things to say about it.

Site of the Add A Man trip in: 1997

There's plenty of extreme skiing in Banff. The Ski Banff, Lake Louise, Sunshine site is a good place to start. They have a very scenic map showing the area. Lake Louise also has a site. The new comer is Kicking Horse, about 2 hours west of Banff in Golden, British Columbia. Lake Louise and Sunshine have there own Web Cams.

Site of the Add A Man trip in:  2002

Site of the Add A Man trip in: 2001