STORY AND PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK
It’s time to get serious about skiing.
Sun Valley Resort opens the crème de la crème today as it opens Warm Springs top to bottom.
You heard it—top to bottom.
Thirty-four hundred vertical feet of skiing linked by a nine-minute chair ride. Think of the number of vertical feet you can ski in just a couple hours!
Sun Valley Resort had planned to open Flying Squirrel, Lower Picabo Street and Lower Warm Springs today. But ideal snow making temperatures, plunging just below zero overnight, allowed snow makers to create a blizzard of snow on the Warm Springs side of the mountain all week.
Upper Warm Springs and Warm Springs Face will open, along with Lower Warm Springs, said Mike Fitzpatrick, vice president of communications. And all will be serviced by the Challenger Chairlift.
The Warm Springs Lodge, which was damaged in a fire last April, will reopen on Dec. 15. Until then Sun Valley will have temporary facilities in place at the base for people to purchase lift tickets and what-not. A grand opening and ribbon cutting for the lodge will be held Dec. 22.
With Warm Springs taken care of, Chief Snow maker Dennis Harper and his crew have turned their attention to Christmas Ridge and the Seattle Ridge area. Snow pyramids several feet high line Gretchen’s Gold and Muffy’s Medals waiting for the snow cats to spread them over the runs.
Cut-off is lined with little mountains of snow waiting to be mashed down, as well.
The methodical way with which Sun Valley Resort has approached its snow making and grooming this year has paid dividends—you’ll be hard pressed to find a pebble on the runs. Of course, it didn’t hurt that the resort didn’t get a repeat of last year’s Thanksgiving weekend rain, which wiped out much of the snow that had been amassed for last year’s Thanksgiving opener.
Skiers and boarders have been elated with the snow conditions, with chairlift after chairlift filled with big smiles.
Dollar Mountain reopens for the season today, as well, with good coverage.
Meanwhile, more and more skers are showing up at the Sun Valley Nordic Center as skiers hear of the good conditions there. Three runs are open—all in the sun—and they’ve been groomed every day but one since opening on Tuesday.
Once you hang up the skis:
The Pisten Bullies will perform free après ski music from 2:30 to 5:30 p.m. today in the River Run Lodge.
And Sun Valley Resort will kick off its Winter Wonderland from 1 to 4 p.m. today in Sun Valley Village. There’ll be a gingerbread man decorating party in the Boiler Room, a scavenger hunt, face painting, live Christmas music and the children’s train toodling around the village. And, of course, Santa will be there to field children’s innermost wishes.
More stoke will take place in the Sun Valley Opera House as Warren Miller’s newest ski flick, “Face of Winter,” rolls across the screen, taking snow enthusiasts from Switzerland to Chamonix, British Columbia to Alaska and Chile to Iceland. Movie tickets are $5.50.