 "The only powder to get high on, falls from the sky." - Dave R |
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Powder Mountain is about 90 minutes from downtown SLC. If you were going to ride here a lot, then Ogden might be a better place to stay. That said, the mountain isn't as big as other places around SLC, so you might be put off by that.
I'd had a blast at this place though. For some reason I just hit it on a really quiet day, and although most of the powder was tracked out, the snowcat wasn't running, nor the shuttle bus, I still managed to spend virtually the whole day riding some sort of powder. I had to get away from it all though, and my route was circuitous, resulting in 4 "laps", but it was my second best day of the trip.
Weird thing though, if you've not been to Powder Mountain before: you drive up the hill, and come to a small car park on your left. Go past that and onto the next car park. Here you'll see the ticket office (although there may be one at the other car park). Buy your ticket, and get your stuff over to the snow. There are no chair lifts. You have to strap in and ride down around the corner to the Timberline lift. Strange. Of course, coming back, you invariably have to get a lift and then ride halfway down to the car park again. There is also a top car park, but the buildings were closed on the day that I visited.
The Paradise lift seems to go on forever, but there's little chance of avoiding it, especially if you're going to see the whole mountain. Plus it serves some of the best terrain on the hill.
This place for sure won't be for everyone. It's small, and doesn't have a lot of lifts. Of those lifts, none are fast, so if you like your high speed quads and more acreage, head down to Brighton, Snowbird et al.
