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10 Tips for Spring Backcountry Skiing – Tip 10, Where is the Snow?

Bookmark and Share            By Lou

Yep, prime ingredient = snow. Every region in the country may have below average snowpack at one time or another. If your region does, don’t be afraid to travel during the spring backcountry skiing season. The “eastern giants” of the California Sierra are almost always a good call if your local snow is meager. Ditto for Colorado’s high passes such as Red Mountain and Independence Pass. The Northwestern U.S. is light on snow this year, but during most spring seasons you’re sure to encounter plenty of white (as in 500 inches a year on Mount Hood, for example.) If you’re in the Northeastern U.S. you’ve got Tuckerman Ravine, where good spring backcountry skiing seems to be as reliable as anywhere.

In these days of Internet it’s easy to suss out good regional snowpacks — just read the posts on the major backcountry skiing forums such as that in our nav menu to the left, and leave your own query if you’re bold. How to get snowpack details? Many regions have amazing telemetry you can access from the web. For example, check this one.

It’s been fun sharing our series of 10 tips (even if we did forget how to count for a while (grin)). I know some were kinda basic, but quite a few newcomers are enjoying our sport so we hope our hints were useful to the tyros out there. As for you old timers, perhaps you got reminded of something — I know we did.

Posted by Lou on March 23, 2005 | Filed Under Technique 

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Welcome to Louis (Lou) Dawson's backcountry skiing information and opinion website. Lou's passion for the past forty years has been alpinism, climbing, mountaineering and skiing -- along with all manner of outdoor recreation. He has authored numerous books and articles about backcountry skiing and is well known as the first person to ski down all 54 of Colorado's 14,000-foot peaks, otherwise known as the Fourteeners! Books and free back country information here, and tons of Randonnee rando telemark info.

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