Grand Targhee, Wyoming: Wyoming's Quiet Powder Powerhouse with Gary MacKenzie
Everyone has heard of Jackson Hole. Plenty of us have skied it. But fifteen miles away on the other side of the Tetons, sits a resort that gets more snow, draws smaller crowds, and feels a lot more like home. It's Grand Targhee, and on a recent episode of the Where to Ski podcast, I sat down with a man who has skied it since he was three years old to find out what makes it tick.
A Gem on the Wyoming-Idaho Border
Grand Targhee sits on the Wyoming-Idaho border, in Alta, Wyoming, and it delivers 2,600 acres of skiing, 2,400 feet of vertical and more than 500 inches of snow every year. It's generally seen as a mid-level resort, and I'll admit I made that mistake myself. I first heard about the place back in the 1970s and poo-poohed the idea of going for early-season turns. That was a big mistake. This is a big-mountain ski area with reliable terrain for every level, from first-timers to skiers who want serious, steep powder. It has only six lifts, but those six get you everywhere you need to go. And did I mention the crowds? Nonexistent. No lines. If you want a big town, hit the biggies. If you want skiing, hit Targhee.
My guest is Gary MacKenzie, Executive Director of the Grand Targhee Ski and Snowboard Foundation, a freeride head coach and competitor. This organization supports roughly 160 athletes and their families, independent of the resort, with affordable alpine, Nordic, freeride and snowboard programs. Gary was born in Driggs, Idaho, and both his parents taught skiing, so he knows this mountain as only a local can.
Getting There (and Getting Stuck)
Alta isn't really a town. It's three hotels at the base of the mountain. Driggs, Idaho, is the closest real town, about 10 to 12 miles away, and the Jackson and Idaho Falls airports are both roughly an hour and a half by road. Yes, the resort is only 12 or so miles from Jackson in a straight line across the Tetons, but you can't drive it that way. Gary says that on a clear day, if you climb the right peak, you can see the resort's backside from the Jackson side of the range, and even Big Sky from the top.
There are three ways in: from Idaho Falls, from Rexburg, and over Teton Pass. All three can drift over with wind, and the roads close often. Gary's advice is to be prepared to get stuck in the community once in a while. In his words, that one-way-in, one-way-out quality is part of what keeps this side of the Tetons quiet.
Where to stay? Gary points visitors to the Teton Tipi Lodge in Alta, and to the cabins, Airbnbs and lodges in Driggs. His tip: search for Teton Valley Realty, Teton Valley Lodging or Teton Homesteads, or just look up "Teton" and you'll find pretty much anything you need.
The valley itself is changing. Gary grew up among farm fields, creek bottoms and spud farming, with a single stop sign where Driggs and Victor now have stoplights. Subdivisions, Airbnbs and a growing community airport tell you the word is out. Anyone who hasn't visited in a few years will recognize the town, but not the way it was.
Two Mountains, One Big Day
Skiing at Targhee is spread over two mountains.
Fred's Mountain is the original operating area, opened in 1969. It's the big, bald, convex face you see from the base, and visitors often ask where the resort is when they're looking right at it. It's natural terrain at its best: jumps, bumps, moguls, cliffs and cornices, with some tree skiing mixed in, all under 500 inches of snow a year. The Dream Catcher lift, which you'll see as you walk out of the base area, takes about 12 minutes to reach the top of Fred's. There's a webcam on it, so you can check the lift line each morning and see whether it's even running.
Pequod Mountain, to the skier's left, is where most of the expansion has happened over the last 20 years or so. For a long time much of it was cat skiing. Then in 2022 the Coulter lift went in, a six-person high-speed detachable that, as Gary puts it, takes a lot to blow down. It delivers you to the top of Pequod, with beautiful views of the Grand Teton and a great place for a photo. Before the lift, getting up there meant a hike that took a couple of hours if you were coming from the flatlands, or 20 to 30 minutes if you were trained up.
Here's how Gary would tour it:
Beginners: The Huckleberry conveyor belt and the Great Kids Club have lessons right at the base, and the Shoshone quad is down low. Anyone who has never skied can learn here.
Sacagawea: This lift covers the center of the mountain and is the way up in the morning. It's the lower, greener terrain.
Blackfoot: A slower fixed-grip quad that climbs most of the way up the left shoulder of Fred's, with bowls including Chief Joe and Williamson. Gary has spent a lot of days over here.
Teton Vista Traverse: A green trail that runs all the way back to the bottom, well marked, and a nice way to finish a day if you haven't been off the lower mountain.
Beaver Dick Bowl: The former cat skiing area, which leads down to the Coulter lift and back to the top of Pequod.
Insider Tip: If you drift off the cat track at the wrong spot, you'll end up in a gully the locals call Screaming Cheetah, because that's what your legs do by the bottom.
How long should you stay? Gary suggests budgeting three to five days, since weather might keep you on one side of the mountain or the other. Two or three solid days will cover most of it. And that may change soon, because an expansion into South Bowl is on deck.
The Backside: Respect the Rope
From the base, the mountain looks tame. The backside is a different story. Because of the tectonic activity here, the Driggs side of the range is going up while the Jackson side is going down, which creates a massive cliff line behind the resort. Jamie Pierre's 255-foot cliff drop, a world record, took place on the backside of Targhee. Mary's Nipple, a hike of about 30 minutes from the top of Fred's, is where much of the classic footage was filmed, including TGR films and the Egan brothers. Take the Teton Vista Traverse to get there, then hike up. Most of the big cliff terrain is now roped off, and that's a good thing. Gary knows stories of people stepping over the rope and taking quite a ride, and some who lost their lives. He says that for 99.99 percent of the population, that terrain is simply un-skiable.
If you do want to go beyond the gates, he recommends going with someone who knows the place, and who has the equipment and training. Yostmark Mountain Tours offers guided touring from the resort's gates, and Teton Backcountry Guides runs a yurt system. There's also an easily accessible yurt at the bottom of Teton Canyon, reachable on cross-country skis, which makes a great mid-week outing when the wind is blowing. With 500 inches of snow covering everything and changing every day, you want a beacon, a buddy and training, and Gary notes that the resort does a very good job with avalanche control.
How to Ski It: Wind, Visibility and Skis
I asked Gary how to plan a day at Targhee, and the answer starts with the wind. He checks the weather the night before. Wind from the north loads the south-facing terrain, and wind from the south loads the north-facing slopes, which are also a bit steeper. He says wind here is a good thing, because wind moves snow. Even if it hasn't snowed in a couple of days, it can change the character of the mountain quickly.
Gary's practical advice:
Arrive early. Parking gets tricky on a powder day, and when it snows it can be one in, one out.
Expect low visibility. Fog and clouds can sit on the mountain while it keeps snowing. Gary's rule of thumb is that if you can't see, it isn't going to be good. Stick to trees, snow fences or anything that gives you depth perception.
Watch the rime. Trees up high get ghostly and built up with rime that can last well into spring. A drift on one side of a tree often means good powder behind it.
Beware tree wells. With this much snow, a 12-foot tree can turn into a four-foot tree quickly, and tree wells are very hard to get out of. Keep your head on a swivel and ski with a group.
Bring a fat ski. In lightweight powder, Gary would pack a 110-millimeter-plus ski. The terrain is convex and rolling, not steep, so you want the float to get up and planing, like a boat coming out of the water. Skinnier skis get sucked to the bottom on deep days. Be ready for wind slab and crust, too.
Know where the call boxes are. There are call boxes around the mountain in case of emergency. And on a deep day, Gary heads to Coulter, where the trees and glades are good, and the wind is usually at the back of the lift.
And if you don't like the weather? As Gary says, wait five minutes. With 500 inches a year, if you're there for a week, you'll get two or three days of snow. It just happens.
Make a New Friend
The best advice Gary gave me wasn't about gear or terrain. It was about people. When it's snowing sideways and the powder is deep, hire a mountain instructor for a tour of a couple of hours or a full day, or link up with a friendly local. The ski school has well-certified PSIA instructors, and there are guides in the valley as well. Squeeze onto a quad, say hello, and you can learn a lot from someone in about 12 minutes, which is just about the length of a Dream Catcher ride.
Every ski area has its own personality, and the only way to find it is to ski with people, have dinner with them, go to a bar or go for a hike. Gary's community is here for the skiing, and nothing else. The mountain is also a serious venue: even in a lightweight winter, Targhee had enough snow and terrain to host the Western Region FIS Championships and the U-16 Nationals.
The Bottom Line
Targhee is the opposite of a megaresort. It's quiet, it's snowy, it's a little windy and a lot of fun. Bring a wide ski, plan for three to five days, respect the ropes and the weather, and make a few friends on the chairlift. Plenty of people hear Wyoming and think Jackson. Hop over the Tetons, and you may find that Targhee is the one you remember.
Listen to the full conversation with Gary McKenzie on the Where to Ski podcast, and keep an eye on wheretoski.org for more of the world's best ski destinations.
Best Food - Trap Bar and Grill has good food and some music on weekends. Introduce yourself to Tater
Best Day for Gary - Up to Mary's Nipple an a few cliff jumps into powder with his brother
Episode Transcript
Welcome to Where to Ski. I'm John Morgan, your host. Today we're heading to Wyoming in the USA.
Grab your skis. Let's check out Grand Targhee. There are only a handful of ski areas in Wyoming.
Everyone's heard of Jackson. Many of us have skied it. Fifteen miles from Jackson is this place called Grand Targhee, and it's awesome.
Sits on the border of Wyoming and Idaho, especially it's in Alps, Wyoming, and it's a gem of a resort with 2,600 acres of skiing, early and ongoing snow, and basically no crowds. While it doesn't have a name run like Corbett's, Targhee's got reliable skiing for every level of skier. You can just start there, you can advance your skills there, and you can get into some really serious, steep powder there, and it's got enough snow for any kind of skiing.
It also has a close-knit base area that's like being at home. Driggs, Idaho is the closest real town. That's 12 miles away.
Jackson and Idaho Falls Airports are both about, oh, an hour and a half driving. First heard of this resort in the 1970s, and while I poo-pooed going there for some early season skiing, that was a mistake. Targhee's generally seen as a mid-level resort, but it has a big mountain ski, 2,400 vertical that gets over 500 inches of snow every year.
They steal the snow from places like Jackson and Big Sky. While they only got six lifts, those six get you everywhere you need to go. Oh, and did I mention the crowds, or lack of them? Yeah, there you go.
No lines. If you want a big town, hit the Biggies. If you want skiing, hit Targhee.
Today's guest is Gary MacKenzie, currently Executive Director for the Grand Targhee Ski and Snowboard Foundation. He's a former freeride head coach and a competitor. This organization that he runs currently supports about 150, 160 athletes and families, independent from the resort, by providing affordable Alpine, Nordic, freeride, and snowboarding programs.
Gary was born in Driggs, started skiing Targhee at three, and has seen changes in the mountain and the community. Both his mother and father taught skiing under Pepe Steigler at Jackson and under Gene Palmer at Targhee, so Gary really knows this mountain. It's his home.
After a quick break, we'll talk to Gary and find out how Targhee skis
Thanks for joining us today. John, thanks for having me. I'm super stoked to be here.
You know, I've been listening to your podcast over the last few weeks after kind of reaching out and touching base, and I'm really excited to be here. Thanks for including me. Well, you're going to bring some insight that others couldn't bring about your favorite area, Targhee.
I mean, it's a hidden gem. It's an awesome spot. What's it like growing up near that place? You know, it's been pretty interesting.
I grew up here. I was born in Driggs. Driggs is about 10 miles from Grand Targhee.
And when I grew up, it was all farm fields and creek bottoms and fishing and spud farming. And now we're just kind of farming little communities around here, and the place is really changing. A lot of those farm fields have turned into subdivisions and wholesale lots, and it's really starting to grow here.
The word is out. There's a private airport. It's actually a community airport, public airport.
Kind of takes up to those larger jets. And then, yeah, kind of just a one-way-in, one-way-out scenario once in a while in the winter. Oftentimes, the Teton Pass is closed to come over this side, so it kind of keeps it quiet over here.
That quiet's okay, yeah, and going from being rural and farming spuds to having transients come in and Airbnbs and people building whatever they build, that's a big change. Yeah, you know, it's been interesting. Like, when I was a kid, there was a stop sign for where there's currently a stoplight, both in Victor and in Driggs, and that's kind of, you know, really taken the locals a long time to still figure out, and people that haven't been here in a long time, you know, if you're coming in and it's been 20, 30 years, you're going to remember the town, but not like it was.
That's pretty cool. Is fishing still good? You know, I haven't been to the river lately, and I would imagine, judging by the snowpack, they're starting to get cleared out. You know, fishing's really good around here.
A lot of people hop on the South Fork and do that in the summer, the Teton River, tons of stuff, Henry's Fork. You know, we're pretty lucky to have the hub. That's cool.
That's cool. Now, Targhee itself is in Alto, Wyoming. It's not really a town there.
It's really just three hotels. So you can either stay there or you drive in. Driving in, you know, if you stay in Driggs, you can do that, or you could drive an hour and a half from, you know, the only way to get there, really, if you're coming in for the week is to either go to Idaho Falls or to Jackson, right, and then drive in? Yeah, for the most part, you know, the roads can get pretty windy around here, southeast Idaho.
There's jokes about wind that everybody can make, and there might not be enough scene for this podcast, so we'll kind of keep them on day, but it can get windy here, and so that creates a lot of drifting roads, either from Rexburg or from Idaho Falls, and then again from Teton Pass. Those are kind of the three ways in here. And yeah, the roads close often.
So be prepared to, you know, get in or lodged in our community once in a while. And if you are staying here, you know, there's some great options. Alta is a little town.
It's not very big. There's the Teton Tipi Lodge there, and then in Driggs, there's a number of, you know, cabin hosts and Airbnb-type situations, as well as some lodging, and there's some great opportunities to get hooked up in those lodges through places like Teton Valley Realty, Teton Valley Lodging, Teton Homesteads. Kind of look up Teton.
You'll find pretty much anything you need. So. Okay.
Yeah, and you're only, you know, it's funny. You're 15 miles from Jackson. I was reading some of the things that you sent me, and 15 miles from Jackson, but an hour and a half drive.
Yeah, you know, if you could shoot a straight line across the Tetons, it's, I think from edge to edge, it's actually closer to like 12 to the resort, 12 and a half, something like that. I was looking at it on Google Earth. But yeah, it's, you know, it's right there.
You can pretty much, if you get across Teton Canyon and you're hiking around on the other side of the, the south side of the canyon there in the mountains, you can see the resort from certain areas. You know, if you climb up certain peaks and you can see the backside of the resort, the top of the tram there from, from here. So another, another mention, we can see big sky from here.
So on a very clear day, if you look, just, you know, right where to look, you can see big sky. That's pretty cool. So you take all that good snow, right? Yeah.
I mean, it all blows here, you know, comes across there, comes across the, you know. Skiing there sort of spread over two mountains, right? Yeah, more or less. So Fred's Mountain is kind of the original operating area there.
It opened in like 1969 under a special use permit. And there was for a number of years, a rope tow and three doubles for the most part, three fixed doubles. And the portion that went up the main part of Fred's had a midway.
And I think that chairlift is now located at Lost Trail, Montana. Anyhow, so yeah, that's the Fred's portion. Fred's is kind of the face you can see behind me here.
It's not really, when people come here often, they were like, where's the resort? Well, you're looking right at it. You just don't know it. It's pretty big, bald open, convex slope.
We've got some, you know, tree skiing within that, but not really many cutout runs per se. It's pretty much like a natural as is terrain parky type mountain in its own accord. Jumps and bouncy things everywhere and then moguls and cliffs and cornices and everything you want to jump off of right there.
All covered by 500 inches of snow a year. 500 inches, yep. And then so on top of, kind of to the skier's left-hand side of Fred's Mountain is the Pequod Mountain.
And Pequod's where they've done most of the expansion here in the last 20 years or so. I believe they put Sacagawea in sometime in like the 2000s, early 2000, I believe. And then that was mostly cat skiing for a long time, right up until a couple of years ago, 2022, they put in the Coulter Lift, which is a six-person high-speed detachable that pretty much runs any day, windy or not.
It takes a lot to blow that lift down. And so that goes right to the top of Pequod now, formerly kind of go from the Fred's zone and go up a little hike called Mary's Nipple and hike up to the top of Pequod and it'd take you, depending on who you were, if you're coming from the flatland, it might take you a couple hours or if you're trained up, it might take you 20, 30 minutes on deep, regular day. But yeah, now you just get right up there and it puts you right on top and top of Coulter Mountain is pretty incredible.
Beautiful views of the Grand Teton, just the surrounding area. Great opportunity to take a photo there if you're up there. That's pretty cool.
Now, so it's about a 30-minute hike up to Mary's Nipple, then there's supposed to be some good skiing up there. Yeah. You know, a lot of the shots, you know, even probably some of the stuff that people remember back in the day, the Egan Brothers skiing around, like that's up on Mary's Nipple.
You know, a lot of the stuff in TGR films, that's filmed just on the backside of Mary's Nipple there. And that's a great little hike. Most of that big stuff is kind of roped off at this point.
And so you're not really allowed to ski off the big cliffy zone there. That's probably a good thing. A lot of people couldn't quite handle that and just ended up on the wrong part of the wrong cliff.
You know, there's actually a number of stories from around here of people stepping on the wrong side of the rope and going for quite the ride or, you know, unfortunately, like losing their life because they just didn't know what was happening and kind of ending up in a really bad spot. Like when you look at it on Google Earth, if you look at the backside of Targhee, it's massive, humongous cliff drops. In fact, the Jamie Pierre cliff drop, 255 feet, I believe, world record is right on the backside of Targhee right there.
And yeah, it's a real deal thing. So you know, it looks a little tame on the front side and the backside is a severe drop off. And that's due to the tectonic plates here.
You know, the side that Driggs is on is going up and the side that Jackson is on is going down. So it's kind of doing this, which creates, you know, a very large cliff on the backside. Okay.
You know, Sacagawea, it covers really the whole center of the mountain. That's really the way up in the morning. If you can either go on the left side, and I can't think of what the name of the lift is over on the left, looking up the hill.
Blackfoot. And that's where beginner, that's more beginners and well, there's Shoshone, Shoshone's kind of down on the bottom. So there's a, there's a Huckleberry conveyor belt for the beginners on Great Kids Club.
They've got, you know, lessons right there. Anybody that has never skied can definitely, you know, step on skis and learn how to ski at Targhee. And then there's a little quad called Shoshone.
And most of these names are named off like the local Indian, Native American, and Trapper, Coulter, some of that kind of stuff playing off the names there. So anyhow, so Sacagawea is kind of the lower green mountain. And then that kind of puts you up to, you can drop into Blackfoot lift, which has some bowls, Chief Joe Bowl, Williamson Bowl, some great skiing over there.
It's a slower fixed grip quad, and it goes up most of the way up the mountain to the kind of left-hand shoulder, Looker's left-hand shoulder, Fred's Mountain. And from there, you can kind of come back down to the base area, kind of once you get over in that zone, you know, you're kind of over in that zone and, you know, kind of find yourself having a good time over there and don't really want to go back to the base. I've spent a lot of my days over there.
And then, yeah, the main lift is Dream Catcher. Dream Catcher is right what you'd see when you walk right out of the base area. There's a webcam that you can look at it every morning, see what the lift line looks like, see if they're even running the lift, if there's too much snow and anybody's there yet.
You know, great webcam service. But that lift goes to the top of Fred's Mountain. And that looks like a long one.
That looks like a good solid shot to get up there. Yep. And I think it's like a 12-minute ride to the top.
And then, you know, just depending on how deep it is and where you choose your own adventure book, you know, and end up, can take you some time to get back. And there are some gullies that, you know, kind of can pull you over into areas you're not really anticipating on getting to. So linking up with the locals, you know, pretty good.
Locals are pretty friendly here. And then, yeah, that kind of takes you around. If you get off to the skier's right-hand side at the top, you can go walk over to Mary's Nipple and head up that way.
You want to take the Teton Vista Traverse to head that way. And then you'd hike up Mary's. And that kind of brings you down.
That Teton Vista Traverse is a green trail. And so, you know, if you're really looking to end your adventure on like a high note and you haven't been off the lower mountain, that's a great run. Can take you all the way back down to the bottom.
Pretty well marked. And then, yeah, if you kind of suck yourself down into the gully, if you get off the cat track too far, you end up in what we call Screaming Cheetah. And that's because you get down to the bottom of there and you're just screaming like a cheetah for your legs to quit shaking because it's just quite the adventurous little bumpity bump trail.
A lot of kids ski down in there and it's just a little whoop-dee-doo route. And that will take you over to the bottom of Sacagawea if you end up there. And then from Sacagawea, you can end up going back to the top of Sacagawea and looping back to the base by the marked trail.
Don't get off the cat track again. And then if you get off to the top of Sacagawea and go right, that's going to put you over into Beaver Dick. And Beaver Dick was a trapper here.
And Beaver Dick Bowl, which is the former cat skiing area, and that will take you on down. You can go down to the Coulter Lift and then take the Coulter Lift right back to the top of Pequod. And you've kind of done the all around the world at that point.
That's the mountain, but there's, you know, you've talked a lot of terrain when you went through all that. You were pretty light because there's so much there on each one of those spots that you could ski, you know, an entire day on any one of those lifts. Yeah, I would say, I would say if you're going to come here and spend some time, you know, you want to give yourself a good, you know, probably budget five days, three to five days in anticipation that there might be some weather and you might get stuck kind of on one side or the other anyways, of where to ski in the mountain.
But yeah, if you give yourself, you know, two or three solid days, you can get most of the mountain covered. You know, that's going to start to change because there's some, some expansion going to happen at the target some point. But regardless, you know, yeah, I would, I would give yourself a couple days and there's a lot of great things to do around the community as well when you're here.
So yeah, pretty, pretty fun. When you ski in the mountain, how does it ski like during the day? Some places you ski it with the sun so that you're not skiing in the shade or depending on like if it's January or March, whether the, you know, the snow, the sun changes the snow conditions and also obviously lighting conditions. Is there a way to be able to ski Targhee so that, to your advantage doing that? You know, a lot of it has to do with like what the wind, wind does overnight, right? So if the wind's coming out of the north, you know, the south facing, if it's cloudy is going to be, you know, kind of more loaded up and if it's coming out of the south and the, you know, more north stuff's going to be loaded up a little bit better.
The north facing stuff is a little bit steeper for those that are looking to get into some steeper terrain. But yeah, I, I kind of base my day, you know, I, I do a lot of, you know, looking at the weather the night before, seeing which way the wind's going to come. And then if I want to get up there early, you know, parking gets a little bit tricky.
So get up there, get up there quick, it does fill up, there's one in, one out often when it snows. But, you know, if I know it's going to be a good powder day, I'll just try and set myself up to, you know, think about which way the wind blew. If it didn't blow at all, you know, and if it's going to be, if it's going to be cloudy when I'm up there, the wind and then the clouds.
Sometimes we say, if you, if you, if you can't see, it ain't the gi. So, yeah, really, you know, I've heard there's some fog up there. I've heard that you can get just fogged in for a while.
And yeah, it happens, you know, days on end where it's just cloudy, you know, just as the free refills keeps on snowing, you can only see one chair in front of you on the lift, which is not that far. You know, and then the other thing that happens up there, we get a lot of rhyme. So the trees that do live up high on the mountain get really ghosty and built up with a rhyme on them.
And that, you know, that can stay all winter, well into the spring. And so really, yeah, trying to just, you know, have your head on a swivel, understanding that like there's a lot of drifts, depending on which way the wind blows, there's probably going to be a drift on the other side of the tree and then some really good powder behind that. You know, so I'm kind of on those days trying to ski where I know that I can find some trees or kind of find a little bit of like visibility feature, some snow fence, any of that kind of stuff.
Anything to get that depth perception. Yep. Linking up with the local, following somebody that's kind of at your same, you know, pace.
Skiing in a group is always good, having a good, confident skier in your group always helps. You know, we do get the tree well scenario here, you know, be advised that, you know, that is a feature that happens here because of the 500 inches, you know, we get a lot of snow and that 12 foot tree can turn into a four foot tree or less pretty quick. Yeah.
But that's a big tree well to try and get out of. I mean, that's not easy stuff. Yeah.
You know, so just, you know, head on a swivel, find, you know, look at the map, see where you go and try and plan it out, have one in your pocket. There are a bunch of call boxes around the mountain to, you know, if there are an emergency, but yeah, really, you know, I just try and think about the wind and the visibility and like on that, you know, what kind of ski would I ski on? Is it going to be a little bit more packed powder or is it going to be lightweight powder? We get both, you know, lightweight powder, you know, I'd probably be bringing a 110 plus ski. Really? Okay.
Why? Well, probably just a lot because it's the convex rollover, right? So we don't have like a ton of steep stuff to get going. So to get up out of the snow to even get your, you know, think about like a boat coming up out of the water, trying to plane, you know, you kind of want a little bit of that sometimes to get going. And then once you're going, you know, you can kind of surf it.
If you're on those skinnier skis on those deep days, you kind of get sucked down to the bottom. You can kind of feel that coral reef underneath occasionally or where the wind slab happens. Carton for those that ski carton, we get a little bit of that sometimes.
So yeah, just kind of, it's a, it's an ever-changing mountain, you know, if you don't like the weather, wait five minutes and something might change and something might open. That sounds like where I grew up in New England. Don't like the weather, wait five minutes.
Yeah. And you guys had a big one this winter. Oh yeah.
Oh yeah. So with 500 inches, you are going to get, you know, if you're there a week, you're going to get two or three days of snow. That's just going to happen.
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Use code where to ski at globalrescue.com or hit the link on our website for a discount and travel with confidence. You know, last winter was kind of an anomaly, I think for everybody, you know, and the thing is, is, you know, here we just experienced consecutive snow for whatever reason. It tends to happen, you know, even though it was pretty lightweight last winter, we still, we still did pretty good.
We had enough, we had enough, we had enough snow to hold a fist race here last year. We held the Western Region FIS Championships and the U-16 Nationals here for USSA. So I mean, yeah, we've got snow conditions that build up and allow us to, you know, create great things.
So if somebody were to show up there and it's just snowing to beat the band and there's tons of powder, does it make sense to get a guide or an instructor to take you around the first couple of days? Yeah, absolutely. You know, there are mountain instructors up there that would take you all around the mountain kind of as a tour for a couple hours if you want, all day if you want. You know, a lot of locals are super friendly.
If you're, you know, skiing, seeing that they're your kind of match type people, you guys look like you're getting along. You know, a lot of people hop on lifts, you know, it's a quad, so, you know, like the faster loading, the more skiing, obviously. So I'll squeeze up often onto like a two-person chair, make it three, you know, try and you don't really have a whole lot of lift lines after, you know, 10.
Once powder kind of gets skis up, everybody's kind of heading back to wherever they go. But yeah, you know, finding a guide, finding a local, there are some actual guides around here if you're looking to do that kind of stuff, but on the mountain, for sure, linking up with the local, linking up with the ski school up there is great. They've got all sorts of greatly trained, well-certified PSA instructors.
So yeah, super awesome. Yeah. So we're basically saying make a new friend.
Yeah. Make a new friend. You know, this community is changing so much.
You know, it's important to, you know, get, you know, get a link on what's going on outside in the world and, you know, meet these people and understand, you know, is this, you know, is this the type of person that is going to be in this community for a long time? Or is this person visiting going to be a repeat? Like, how does this work? You know, we're always trying to encourage more cool people to move here when they're cool. You know, and if that's not your jam, it's hard to make a living here for sure. You know what? Every ski area has got its own personality and the only way you find that personality is to go out and hang out with people and ski with them or go have dinner with them or go to a bar with them or whatever.
Go hiking with them. Yeah. That makes all the difference.
Yeah. You know, and my job as executive director for Grand Antarctic Ski and Snowboard Foundation, that's kind of like something I really, you know, pride my community in is, you know, just linking up with people and, you know, we're here for the skiing. Nothing else really.
You know, it's all about the skiing, enjoying the mountain, you know, passing on the education, learning new things from new people on the ski lift, just having a good conversation, you know. You can learn a lot from someone in about 12 minutes. And that's about the right amount of time.
That's perfect. And if you don't learn anything, you can get away from it too. Yeah.
So on a deep day or a winter day or a snowy day, that's where I'm going. Colter's a good place to go and because you've got some trees, you've got some glades. Yeah.
Colter's a great place to go. You know, the thing that's awesome about Colter is it kind of lines up when the wind comes from the south. The wind is at the back of the lift, so that thing will run most days.
For a lot of people that hear me say wind, yeah, it gets windy here, but wind brings snow here. Wind moves snow. So even if it's windy and it hasn't actually snowed, per se, in a couple days, that can change the dynamic of the mountain pretty quick and make it go from being pretty firm to like really just rough surface.
Now there is some backcountry up there too. There's gates that go off the back, if I remember right. And that's a whole different set of skills.
Yeah. That's some real stuff. There's some big stuff, like I was saying, big cliffs back there that are just un-skiable for, I would say, 99.99% of the population.
And then there are some tours you can do off the mountain. The South Bowl is slated for expansion in the coming years. So that area has a couple gates down lower.
You can kind of go out and then you're going to want to tour back. And there's a great company here in town, Yoastmark Mountain Tours. They actually provided some services to do such a thing with those that are looking to get just a little bit more out of their experience.
And then also Teton Backcountry Guides here, they've got a yurt system, if you're looking to actually do that a little bit more too. Really? Okay. Yurts are cool.
Yurts are cool. There's actually a yurt kind of down in the bottom of Teton Canyon there that's pretty easy to access through cross-country skis, if you're not looking to ... Maybe the wind's blowing down and you're looking for a mid-week something or another to do and go ski up there. So you're saying that basically if you go through the gates, you really need to know your shit.
Yeah. It's better to have a guide or someone who knows the place really, really well, who's got all the equipment to go with it and the training. Yeah.
We don't get the opportunity that people at Jackson Hole get, for instance, where you ride the tram. And as you get to the top of the tram, the tram announcer is saying all his things, what's closed, what's open. And then he's got his spiel right at the end about if you're going to leave the resort, have a beacon buddy in the training.
And if you don't know, everybody yells, don't go. That really is important, especially when you get into snow like what you've got, because it covers up a lot of stuff and it changes every day. And with 500 inches, you get avi problems, I'm sure, too.
The place has got to be blown apart to open sometimes. Yeah, totally. I mean, they do a really good job at the mountain controlling
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