Best places to ski in Utah/Colorado??

Question

We ski blue/black dimonds in Vermont...what places are best for us? (we are going as a family as well)

Answer 1

UTAH:

The Canyons is an AMAZING place. It's soooo big, you could ski it for several days, maybe a week and not ski every trail. If you ski blues/blacks in VT, you're looking at mostly blues/easy blacks out West. The Canyons has tons of really sweet blues and things they mark as "double blues" which are a little harder, usually very similar to an Eastern black diamond, which is cool because most places don't mark things as double blue. I've been to Alta, Snowbird, Deer Valley, Park City, Snowbasin, and The Canyons in Utah and The Canyons was BY FAR my favorite.

Park City is also a really good place for your skill level. It has a lot of blues and easy black diamonds to chose from and their terrain is really expansive, though not as big as The Canyons.

Deer Valley is another good one. I liked it because they didn't allow snowboarding and I really hate snowboarders. Almost everything at Deer Valley is groomed so if you like groomed trails you should definitely check it out.

Snowbird and Alta were both good resorts, but they are definitely much steeper and more difficult than the first three I mentioned. Snowbird is sometimes considered to be the steepest resort in the US. While I'd say that's arguable, definitely be prepared for challenging runs at Alta and Snowbird if you go there.

COLORADO:

Copper. Freaking. Mountain. Oh my gosh, I loved Copper Mountain SO MUCH. I've been to Beaver Creek, Keystone, Winter Park, and Copper Mountain and I LOOOOOVED Copper Mountain. Copper Mountain has something for everyone! It has all kinds of blues, blacks, insane double diamonds, easy cruising greens. My dad and I (I'm a 17 year old male expert skier) went with this couple to Copper Mountain and all four of us thought it was fantastic! I found a lot of double diamonds that were very challenging for me. The couple we went with liked easy blues and greens, and they also had tons of trails they liked because there is such an enormous variety at Copper. There's a bunch of blues and a bunch of top to bottom greens -- but there's also numerous crazy black diamonds and ridiculously steep and bumped doubles.

DO NOT go to Keystone. I thought the skiing at Keystone was mediocre -- there was variety but just not the expansiveness of the other choices in Colorado. In addition, the walk to the slopes at Keystone from the parking lot is simply horrendous, it must've been half to 3/4 of a mile, and it really puts a damper on the day.

Winter Park is a really huge really great resort, but like Alta and Snowbird in Utah, it is definitely a more challenging one. One of it's mountains, amusingly named after a prostitute, "Mary Jane" consists of nothing but long, bumped-out black diamonds. While I found them very enjoyable to my 17 year old self, my dad and the couple were rather disconcerted. =)

Beaver Creek is good choice. It's extremely uncrowded and rather plush. I think it is uncrowded because people would rather go to the nearby Vail. Beaver Creek has a loooot of terrain, and it has a lot of nice easy stuff to choose from but it also has difficult stuff, though definitely not variety like you find at Copper Mountain or Winter Park.

I have never been to Aspen or Snowmass, but know that if you go there you will pretty much be skiing those two places for your vacation because they are so remote from everything else.

So that's the word on the West from me.

Answer 2

Winter Park, CO

Steamboat Springs, CO

Snowbird, UT

Alta, UT

Answer 3

I've been to Breckenridge and Aspen. Breck is more laid back, Aspen is very nice and a little more trendy, but I recommend either!