Resort Ski Touring Across the USA

Get a workout and enjoy the scenery in some of America's finest ski areas.

FATMAP

Images

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Huckleberry Canyon Sierra-at-Tahoe

by Arjun B.

Licence Free

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Description

With much of the USA's mountains having a continental climate, it can be tricky to find safe ski touring options in the depths of winter. Constantly cold weather combined with violent snowstorms creates a pretty touchy snowpack, so venturing into the backcountry is a dangerous pastime until things settle down in spring.

This list of resort ski tours should provide you some ideas of where to get some uphill exercise anytime there's snow on the ground, regardless of avalanche hazard. That's not to say that every tour in here is safe and suitable for every winter day, but these trips should be possible on most snowy days. Expect cold temperatures, big views and perfect winter ambience and you won't be disappointed!

One final thing - resort touring takes place, by definition, in a ski resort. Before doing any of these tours, make sure that you’re allowed to do so at that time. With grooming machines driving around, and resorts entitled to stop tourers using their runs if the rules are ignored, please stick to the restrictions of each resort. We want to be able to keep ski touring next season and all the ones after that - as on every ski day, the goal should always be to “ski tomorrow”!

Adventures

Tiger Run

Legendary Secret Glade Run at Keystone (MTB trail)

Alta Summer Road

The typical uphill access at Alta, used for inbounds and backcountry terrain.

Brighton Uphill Access

Inbounds uphill route at Brighton Resort, with option to exit through a backcountry gate.

Minecrotch

Set of extremely tight trees between Devil's Crotch and Mine Shaft also known as "The Devil's Shaft"

Hully Gully

One of the steep, challenging black runs in Mott Canyon

River Run Uphill

Morning and evening uphill access to the top of Keystone resort.

Route A Uphill

Uphill access at Loveland, for skinning in the morning and evening.

Lower Snow Valley

Separate from the main bowl, this run and two others have the valley to them selves.

Skip's Trees

Unmarked black diamond tree run skiers' right of Skip's plunge

Skip's Break

Unmarked black diamond tree run directly in between Skip's Plunge and Firebreak

Village Way Uphill

Easy uphill route at Winter Park, taking green and blue trails to the top of Prospector lift.

Hughes Uphill

A go-to uphill route with variations for difficulty, and good options for the downhill as well.

Sleeper Uphill

The skinning route for black diamond runs in Winter Park's Mary Jane Territory.

Mary Jane Uphill

Skin up from Mary Jane base to unlock lots of terrain for resort ski touring.

Spruce Cliffs

A steep, wooded pitch off the side of Spruce Mountain

The Ramp

Nice back country zone right off Bridger bowl

Igloo Chute

Steep chute between rocks off of the south face of Sound of Music.

Rip's Face

Mellow, powdery face on lower Rip's Ridge.

Homerun

Open, powdery face in the Saddleback area.

Moon Rocks

Steep, open glade between The Divide and Clifford's Wish

The Divide

Fun, rocky spine next to the Driveway chute.

Comstock Corridor

Run that begins with Corridor and continues directly under Comstock's liftline

Reuter Bowl

A remote bowl of Kirkwood that hugs the resort's boundary line and takes quite a lengthy traverse to get to

Hollywood

A cliff and a cornice located right under Sunrise (Chair 4) where everyone can see you

Janek Cliffs

Cliff Zone to skiers' left of Look out Janek; leads into Olympic