Taylor Lyman on Mount Baker’s opening day. photo: Grant Gunderson
This season has started out terrible for some zones, amazing in others. We all want to know where the snow is and how close it is to where we are. This list will give you an exact picture of who is hoarding the snow and why you should go there. We’ve also got a mini list of who is hurting this year.
20 DEEPEST SKI RESORT SNOWPACKS IN NORTH AMERICA:
#1 – Eagle Crest, AK = 150″
#2 – Alyeska, AK = 104″
#3 – Mount Baker, WA = 95″
#4 – Alpenta, WA = 82″
#4 – Snoqualmie, WA = 82″
#5 – Mount Seymour, B.C. = 76″
#6 – Whistler Blackcomb = 75″
#7 – White Pass, WA = 72″
#8 – Steven’s Pass, WA = 71″
#9 – Schwitzer, ID = 69″
#9 – Cypress Mountain, B.C. = 69″
#10 – Crystal Mountain, WA = 68″
#11 – Whitewater, B.C. = 66″
#12 – Lookout Pass, ID = 64″
#13 – Ski Apache, NM = 63″
#13 – Revelstoke, B.C. = 63″
#13 – 49 Degrees North, WA = 63″
#13 – Fernie, B.C. = 63″
#14 – Taos, NM = 62″
#15 – Sunrise Park, AZ = 60″
#15 – Timberline Lodge, OR = 60″
#15 – Silverton, CO = 60″
(it’s actually 22 in total)
Squaw Valley today. Headwall face and chair.
Places we wish had more snow…
Jackson Hole, WY = 46” (the skiing is actually damn good right now…but more would be betterer)
Snowbird, UT = 32″
Telluride, CO = 30″
Stowe, VT = 26″
Squaw Valley, CA = 12″
Squaw Valley last season.
This sucks
This list needs to be corrected, Shames Mountain should be in the number 2 spot.
Yup! Shames Mountain in Terrace, British Columbia, has 129.5 inches at the base/lodge and 154.5 inches mid-mountain. Now that’s one of the top snowpacks in North America!
I lived in Terrace in the early 70′s and haven’t been back. One of these days I will drive up from Washington state and ride some real pacific north west powder, although my home mountain for 25 years isn’t bad either …… MOUNT BAKER
P.S. by the middle of Feb, MOUNT BAKER will be at the top of that list again
1140″ 1998-1999 WORLD RECORD MOUNT BAKER
10-20” a day at Shames! Come to Terrace, B.C CANADA to see it.
Shames now has a 4.7m base at mid (that’s about 15 feet or 180″)
no way silverton mountain has 60″….I have a cabin just across the street there at 11,820′ and there just is not 5′ on the deck on any aspect…
Currently Rain/Freezing-Rain at #4… the “equalizer” has lotsa holes and variable. Baker’s the best in the NW.
rain at baker too!
As soon as I read your comment, without even looking, I figured that number “4″ was a Washington stare resort….
its safe to say Squaw has the WORST snow pack at ANY resort in North America right now. At least we’re winning something….
This sucks ass.
Fuuuuuuck!!
My thoughts exactly
Bogus Basin. Boise, Idaho.- not open, not good. new quad.
Not much snow in CT… Ski Sundown has 100% open.
gunstock, which is most likely the worst ski area in the country, located in central NH, also has 12 inches of snow
and 25 open trails
FYI snoqualmie and Alpental are the same resort
they’re actually not. they’re across the highway from each other and snoq has a snowpack of 50″, not 82″
Both semi right in that they are two mountains at the same resort (Both under the Summit at Snoqualmie) i.e. a season pass will get you on the lift at both, same website, you can’t buy a ticket to just one mtn., there’s a resort shuttle that runs between them, etc. BUT they do have strikingly different snowpacks due to diff elevations, around the 82 vs 50 that Steph described. A lot of snowpack sites just report the top at Alpental for both because it’s the same resort.
What a nice way of saying steph is wrong Freg, you should run for president
When people say snoqualmie they mean summit central, or summit west. Alpental is a whole nother world man, way higher up.
Oh yeah Peter, forgot, Snoqualmie aka Snowcrummy. All kidding aside, it is great to have 3 other areas for people to go to just up I-90 instead of going to Alp.
Only if you don’t know any better
. Alpental is Alpental, Summit West is The Flats, Summit Central is Ski Acres and Summit East is Hyak, or Milwaukee Bowl if you want to go way back. Yes, you can buy one ticket and ski all four, yes they are managed by the same company, yes there are a bunch of lifts, but to call Summit at Snoqualmie a “resort” is absurd at any rate.
Actually Jackson has 120” right now and yes we agree skiing quite nice.
please get back in the kitchen Nina and leave the important chit like math and anything to do with numbers to the men dear……….120″ is how much they have received all season, not the base on the ground….
hey graveler……get off the computer and pay attention to my leather cheerio
why do you two have to ruin every site?
WHY DONT YOU JUST STFU
Please! I have brought video chat….user experience points….and new servers through the avow network to bring unsurpassed speed to our site…..blowest is my vision for the future and you have all ruined it
The real question is who likes it deeper, Fordy or Graveler?
Why dont both of you come over to my snob garage and milk me like a mid depression cow owned by a 10 kid family
I have huge cans and live in Red Deer…….can I get some love please? I’m so insecure!
I have 12″ of love I could show you
Washington state is horrible for riding. DO NOT come to WA!
why would u not come to WA? baker is killer. it rained one day and the rest has been pretty damn solid
^ This f****n’ guy. Scotty, whoever you are, you’re the man. Alex, get with the program.
No alex you got it wrong, WA wink wink does wink wink suck wink wink. Oregon, Cali, Colorado, Utah, Wyoming are much much better, you must all go to those resorts
funny how sarcasm doesn’t always translate. if you aren’t 100% sure you “get” why someone said something, just as a rule of thumb, they may be being sarcastic. With that being said, why the hell would anyone want to ski in Washington St.? The mountains don’t ever get any snow, The lift tickets are way over priced (snicker, snicker), To top it off they don’t have enough lanes on the tubing slope. Go somewhere else, it rains too much.
The Cascades are, quite literally, easily the snowiest mountains in North America. The Cascades, and specifically Paradise @ Rainier and Mt. Baker, held the world record (Baker still does) in snowfall in a season. The Cascades get the most snow annually on Earth. No snow? Does not compute. It’s a wet snow, but when you can get 95 ft of snow in a recorded season, that’s more than any place on Earth.
Well I’ll be damned, Emmett Watson is still alive, and going by the moniker of scotty.
How is the hell does Snoqualmie have more snow than stevens?? I don’t believe this.
and more than crystal
Stevens and Snoq. are very close as the bird flies and average the same amount of snowfall (within 15 inches) because they are in the same convergence zone. Crystal averages 50-100 inches less annually but retains it the longest due to the higher elevation.
Snoqualmie has more snow machines.
oh you mean snocompton. park rats don’t like to much snow thats why central exisits.
It’s been an AWESOME season at Alyeska, with lots of outer areas open and freshness everyday!
stay away from schweitzer it is a terrible resort icy snow and too many trees and really foggy all the time
So true, I can’t believe that place even stays open with the amount of days they have wind holds and ZERO visibility… and learn how to glade a run will you???
Schweitzer is a terrible resort, can’t even believe they stay open with the wind delays and the ZERO visibility for much of the season. …and learn how to glade a run will you?!>
Go ahead and stay away. You’re obviously a poser if you think there’s too many trees. It only made it on Skiing magazine’s list of best resorts for tree skiing. It is occasionally foggy, but certainly not all the time.
It’s a shame you left out Shames…read it: 167 inches at treeline, 137 mid mountain.
Brundage Mountain, ID, has great snow! None of it manmade!
brundage needs snow like a fat kid wants cake. i can’t wait to head to valdez
Pathetic. Northeast is dismal at best. I’ve skied Crystal Mtn the day after they got more snow in 24 hrs than anyone on the list except Eagle Crest has gotten all year. (March ’94)
pac nw has rain in its near future, my getaway plans for glorious powder shots are dashed. Guess maybe i go to northstar and ski cruisers, not. Probably dont remember how to make turns anyway
If you listed all the resorts in BC with more snow, there wouldn’t be much more room in the top 20 for the US resorts.. Mount Washington, BC = 75″ at mid-mountain this morning and at least 12″ more fell over today!
did somebody make this list up?
Bogus list, Shames Mountain should be right at the top and you somehow left it off entirely??
Hey Guys,
Shames slipped through my research on this. Thanks for the heads up.
#2 – Shames Mountain = 134″
Wolf Creek isn’t listed! C’mon guys. Give us some props here. We were the first to open, in the country and with 42 inches of ‘pow’, and now after a two-week melt-off session, we are still at 52 inch base and over 200 inches for the year in snowfall. Lift tix are cheap too. $52 anytime and $30 on ‘locals’ day without showing an ID of any kind.
Lets get that corrected then. Shames Mtn should be very high on this list.
Washington is fucking horrible. Those numbers are made up. What a load of shit, im getting rained on as we speak.
You must be at the Summit?
Whoa! I like the site. Keep it going. I was giving a little bit of ‘shyte’ to the makers of this to keep including the Wolf Creek experience. Keep up the good work and don’t listen to the naysayer…. ever. Keep going!
Alpental Rocks!
Squaw doesn’t suck! It is the best resort in America, you must come see for yourself!
Squaw is killer right now, you just need to see it for yourself!!!! We have a bunch of Asian’s who are RIPPPING IT UP RIGHT NOW
Ullr’s obviously a fake and a fraud, or he’s lost: please send the Ski Patrol and FBI out for him!!! Pleeeze.
I have to ask as I contemplate cancelling up to 6 weeks of holiday, what are the alternative things to do in lake tahoe preferably on a budget, different, unusual? Are they hosting bike rides, bands, bushwalks, snow god hunting trips, anything?
Take your Mt. Bike I’d say and some cold weather riding gear.
Go to Japan – they’re having the best season in 50 years!!
Snoqualmie only has a base of like 50 inches, so inaccurate.
revy has had fresh every couple days and no rain yet…. knock on wood. get here
Swell is up in Maui ! This season blows so far in JH ready to give it up for a surf board.
touched it just yesterday
Powder King is also missing from this list.
Powder King need not be on the list, unless you like rain/ice on a weekly basis and flat terrane with an overpriced lift pass for one lift and one painful T bar.
I do not think flat rain/ice infested “ski hills” with one lift and an old painful T bar can be ranked. Even if they get a lot of snow half the mountain (top only) is good as bottom (best terrane) is frozen or raining.
number 4 on that list should be Mount Washington, Vancouver island
Currently sittin on 84 inches and rippin waist deep bottomless wet cement.
good old Pacific fronts just keep stackin it up!
You are incorrect for saying Washington has bad skiing… Alpental gets amazing snow, you just have to know where to look… Crystal has also had a lot of good days, personally had a 13in powder day. And baker gets some of the most snow in the country on good years!
*Facepalm*
You just dont get it do you Jacob?
At least some of this information is out of date; Stevens Pass reports they have received 156″ so far, as of 1/3/12, with a 59″ base, 69″ on top..
I knew this list was too good to be true. I just checked Ski Apache’s website. They have received 63″ for the season with a base of 31″. Scratch them from the list.
Skiied Stevens Sunday and it was awesome. i almost qualify for s super senior pass so i pretty much have to stick to the groomers now. Still got in 19 runs and over 20K vertical in under four hours.
Leaving for Truckee/Tahoe tomorrow. No skiing going on there right now but don’t despair. El Nino will dump huge amounts but it may not even start until February. Happened last year and we were sking there in April.
Perhaps a little Jay Peak , VT shout out at 18 inches.. just saying.
how’s the indoor waterpark?
The waterpark has been a great outlet with the year off to a sluggish start. Never thought I’d be learning to surf in December in the Northeast. But it’s been snowing everyday for the last week hoping it never stops!
There are 144 inches at the top of Mt Eyak in Cordova, AK. There is only one chairlift but there is enough powder to go around!
http://www.cityofcordova.net/avalanche-conditions/
just changes trip in two weeks from snowbird to whistler, right decision?
definitely the right decision. SLC has no snow.Skied it over xmas. And even if they get some out of this storm cycle it is on a base of dirt and rocks. I live in Seattle and the whole northwest is great…Whistler is killing it this year.
Mt Washington on Vancouver Island (Canada) has 601 cm (over 200 cm). Why is it not on this list? Oh well, keeps people who make lists like this away–more skiing for me