Powder skiing has always been an escape. Floating silently through crystalline flakes, it’s just you and the mountain. It’s immersive, and now more than ever, a necessary departure from the anxieties of the real world. Powder Mountain—as candidly connoted by its name—is already renowned for the copious snow blanketing its slopes, and thanks to its location, layout and the sheer magnitude of its terrain, there’s no resort better positioned to safely provide an escapist powder experience in the uncertain times of COVID-19.
Mountain resorts across the country are going to great lengths to alter their operations in the service of health and safety for their guests. These efforts, at every scale are about creating space to move and breathe. We’re in the age of social distancing after all. With 8,464 acres of terrain on tap, Powder Mountain already has the most skiable acres and room to roam of any resort in North America at their disposal. Add the fact Powder Mountain has just six open-air chairlifts instead of the sprawling networks of lifts, gondolas and trams at resorts with nearly comparable acreage, and you wind up with a resort that is naturally socially distant.
Long before a pandemic gripped the ski world, Powder Mountain exemplified a “no lines, no wait times” mantra. The daily caps on lift ticket sales and season passes now becoming commonplace in the industry have long been part and parcel of the package at Powder Mountain, which has always been committed to providing a better skiing and snowboarding experience above all else. Even when tickets are sold out and the mountain is at maximum capacity, Pow Mow delivers more vertical feet and untracked turns per capita than anywhere else. Whether you’re dropping in for endless face shots off Paradise or mining the glades below Timberline lift, you’ll be treated to a private powder experience you can’t typically find at any other a ski resort.
With such a bounty of terrain and snow, Powder Mountain makes skiing and snowboarding the centerpiece of its operation. In an increasingly commoditized ski world, many resorts rely on guests to spend money on food, beverages and souvenirs. Not at Powder Mountain, where the on-mountain lodges have always been designed around a singular goal: to keep you fueled up and out on the slopes. In a time where indoor spaces and crowds are to be avoided in the name of public health, Powder Mountain invites you to skip the lodges and keep shredding outside in their natural playground. Even if we weren't reeling from a pandemic, that’d be a refreshing sentiment.
The available snowcat skiing and riding on Lightning Ridge and Raintree are well-known as the most accessible you can find with single rides costing just $25—$20 with a season pass. Because of the flexibility and low price, Powder Mountain’s cat skiing and riding will also be COVID-friendly. The cats will have open-air decks and trailers fitted on snowcats to provide a safe ride up. Take your family or round up a few members of your quaranteam and fill up an entire cat with people you’re already spending time with indoors. That’s not an option you’ll find anywhere else for anywhere close to the cost.
What about the other aspects of your ski vacation like the shuttle buses, the restaurants filled with diners and busy lobbies? You can avoid all that with Powder Mountain's wealth of on-mountain lodging. A growing inventory of comfortable ski-in/ski-out lodging options provides convenient access to the slopes along with your own private area to dine, relax and après when you aren't making turns.
It’s a new and uncertain world we’re all adapting to. Because of the very aspects that give Powder Mountain its character, it’s prepared to safely keep serving up powder turns during a pandemic just like it always has with fewer people, more open air and more room to make powder turns for everyone.
This post is sponsored by Powder Mountain.
