SeniorsSkiing Guide: Beaver Mountain—Utah’s Least Known Is A Delightful Surprise
The “Beav” Has All The Goods But No Crowds And No Fanfare.
Cozy lodge is friendly and down home. Look elsewhere for fancy.
Credit: Harriet Wallis
For most vacation-seekers, Beaver Mountain falls off the radar because it’s farther than the 10 resorts that are within an hour’s drive from the Salt Lake City International Airport. Beaver is about 100 miles—less than 2 hours from the airport.
Nobody knows about Beaver Mountain. Actually, lots of people know about Beaver Mountain, but they aren’t telling. They enjoy having the 8,600 foot high mountain with its 400 inches of average snowfall. Its skiers and snowboarders come mostly from nearby Logan and the Utah State University.
I’ve lived here for 25 years, and I’m embarrassed to admit I’d never skied Beaver until last week. A day there shattered all my stereotypes about it. Now I know it’s a gem of a mountain, and it’s very uncrowded. Repeat: Beaver is uncrowded.
And it’s an easy shot to get there: Take I-15 north, turn right to Logan, turn right up Logan Canyon, and you’re at Beaver Mountain.
What’s more, it has a friendly, down-home feel. For example: The sunny base lodge has a roaring fire stove and easy chairs for the ski-weary. That’s a touch that’s disappeared from most mega-resorts.
The cafeteria cooks up very good food at very reasonable prices. I loved the Reuben. But it was hard to resist the finger-likin’ ribs.
Corduroy courtesy of veteran grooming crew.
Credit: Beaver Mountain.
The mountain has a northeast exposure and gets the warming morning sun. Grooming is superb. I learned that the grooming crew is seasoned veterans who have groomed the mountain for years. It has plenty of challenging pitch. There’s an equal dose of mogul fields and off-piste tree skiing, a terrain park, and a magic carpet. The longest runs are 2 miles long. An adult day ticket is $50, seniors (70+) are $40. Seniors can also get a half-day ticket for $35.
I chatted with a couple that I presumed were locals. They weren’t. They live in Florida and travel and ski extensively. They’ve done the big name resorts and were thoroughly enjoying Beaver for the week.
I rode up the lift with Mountain Operations Manager Travis Seeholzer. He pointed to the ridgeline and said: “That’s the Idaho border.” Beaver is high in the northern-most corner of the Wasatch Mountain Range.
Because of its location, Beaver has a marketing problem. Lodging and big city amenities are 27 miles back to Logan or 13 miles ahead in Garden City, a popular summer destination on the shore of Bear Lake.
The flatlands surrounding the mountains are known as Cache Valley because mountain men and trappers cached their furs in secret places. Beaver Mountain is also a secret. Discover the secret mountain for yourself. Do what the locals do. Go “Ski the Beav.”
Other things you should know:
- There’s no cell phone service at Beaver. People actually talk with each other.
- Logan has tons of restaurants, car dealers, theaters, shopping, grocery stores, two hospitals, and more.
- Garden City is primarily a summer resort area and has very little open in winter. There are several time share facilities, and that’s where the couple I talked with was staying. They bought their groceries in Logan as they passed through, and that’s what they recommend.
To read more from Harriet click here for her stories on SkiUtah.
This is uncrowded. Nice.
Credit: Harriet Wallis
This Week In SeniorsSkiing.com (Feb. 2)
Mid-Winter Is Here, Re-Discover Snowshoes, New Mystery Glimpse, Steamboat Museum, SeniorsSkiing.com’s Own Poem, Tribute To Warren Miller.
By Ground Hog’s Day, winter is half over. As we have noted before, you’d better have at least half your woodpile left. At least that’s if the Ground Hog sees another six weeks of winter ahead. It could be another six weeks of blah which is what we are wondering when we saw the latest Climate Prediction Center’s projection for February, March, and April. Precipitation chart (left) shows above average of water falling in the upper midwest and west and a drier band along the southern border. Temperature chart (right) shows below average temps in the upper midwest and west and not so much along the southern border and New England. Bottom line: Canadian Rockies, Montana, parts of Idaho, Washington are looking good. As with most predictions, don’t bet your 401k on the outcome. [Click on maps for more detail.]
This Week
We returned from the Outdoor Retailers and Ski Industries America combined trade show in Denver with lots of ideas for SeniorsSkiing.com. The vendors and retailers we met knew about our online magazine for senior snowssport enthusiasts and were very supportive of what we are trying to do for our readers. That felt very rewarding, indeed.
While at the show, we happened to meet a young poet selling poetry from a little hut on 14th in downtown Denver. Here’s the story and “Knees”, the poem he wrote for senior skiers.
We noticed that snowshoes and snowshoeing had a noticeably big presence at the show. So, the article about snowshoes from correspondent Jonathan Wiesel is timely. Snowshoes have indeed come a long way, and snowshoeing is a very spouse-friendly way to enjoy the winter.
Our Mystery Glimpse this week asks you to identify an event rather than a person. There were fewer guesses about the previous week’s tennis playing ski racer. Turns out, she was not only an Olympian, but a great humanitarian as well.
We love museums that celebrate snow sports. Correspondent Tamsin Venn stopped by a classic in Steamboat Springs on a recent trip. Here’s her report on the unusually named Thread Of Pioneers Museum with some interesting archival pictures.
Finally, we found a fitting tribute to Warren Miller, who left us last week. There isn’t a person we know of a certain age who hasn’t been affected by Warren Miller’s films.
Coming Up
Next week, we’ll be exploring why you should consider taking XC lessons, more about what to put in the box in the back of your car, and other news. Please note: We are working hard on our release of Ray Conrad’s The Cotton-Pickin’ Lift Tower. We should be making that available to you very soon.
Thanks for reading SeniorsSkiing.com. Tell your friends, and remember, there are more of us everyday and we aren’t going away.
Ski resort version of Ground Hog Day? Is the moose trying to tell us something?
Short Swings!
Unless you’re riding with people you know, ski lifts are public places, and conversational topics should reflect that.
Courtesy of Northstar
At least, that’s how I view the 8 – 12 minute ride with people who, if nothing else, have the sport in common. But experience shows that others may not share that sensitivity. How else to explain the ride on a triple where the night manager of a local hotel explained in detail how the owner was a drug dealer who used the property to launder money? Personal discretion must not have been a requirement for his job. That was a long time ago. More recently, on another triple, the man in the middle went on a racist rant for most of the ride. I told him he was using inappropriate language for a public place. He paused for a few breaths and resumed in a more obnoxious manner. I told him that based on what he said he was a racist. “No I’m not!” he yelled as we left the lift and he skied away. Regardless of age or status, lift conversation is our opportunity to bridge gaps and preserve the spirit of skiing. Please make the effort.
IKON Pass Introduced. M.A.X. and Rocky Mtn Super Pass to be Retired
Ikon is from Alterra Mountain Company and includes 23 resorts in the U.S. and Canada, many of which are part of the M.A.X. Pass, the Rocky Mountain Super Pass and the Mountain Collective. M.A.X. and Rocky Mountain passes will no longer be available and Mountain Collective will continue through 2018-19. The resorts include Mammoth, Squaw/Alpine, Deer Valley, Alta, Snowbird, Copper, Eldora, Aspen/Snowmass, Steamboat, Jackson Hole, Big Sky, Killington, Sunday River, Sugarloaf , Loon, Tremblant and CMH. Ikon will announce costs at a later date.
Epic Pass adds Telluride
Telluride Ski Resort will be available on Epic Pass starting next season.
Winter Olympics
Courtesy, IOC
The South Korean games run Feb 9-25 in Pyeongchang, the name of a county about 40 miles from the DMZ. Opening and closing ceremonies will be held in a roofless five-sided stadium seating 35,000. South Korea is the second Asian nation to host the games. Korea’s Yongpyong resort has been the site for World Cup ski races four times since 1998. It has 14 lifts servicing up to 2,500′ vertical.
Warren Miller
Ski Utah posted this five minute edit of the1984 Warren Miller’s Ski Country. Hearing his voice narrate the film brings me back to another time.
Patagonia Environmental and Social Responsibility Report
This three minute video presents what Patagonia has done to improve the environment, preserve outdoor recreational areas, and contribute to improved lives in 2017. It’s an eye-opener.
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