Sure, it's winter, but western Montana's ski season is off to a white-hot start, with most of the major areas open and busy.
"It's just been an excellent early season for us, really pretty amazing," said Wyn Edholm at Lookout Pass, on the Montana-Idaho border. "We've already set a record and we have snow falling right now."
Discovery Basin near Anaconda hadn't been able to open the past three Thanksgivings, but Beatriz Pitcher said this season's early snow and consistently cold temperatures put the area's slopes in much better shape.
"We haven't got the whole mountain open yet, but compared to the last couple of years, everything is going very, very well," said Pitcher.
Discovery has some new terrain served by the new Granite triple chair that opened only briefly at the end of last season, and Pitcher said mountain managers are eager to open up the new country.
"We just need to pile up a little more snow," Pitcher said.
Even so, Discovery already has 28 inches on top and 18 at the bottom. The area will be open this weekend, then open on weekends only until Dec. 12, a Friday, when the area opens full time.
"We had a great opening on Thursday and we're having a nice day today," Pitcher said.
Lookout Pass has more snow than the rest of the region, and it continued to fall on Friday. Lookout had over 5 feet at the summit Friday, and the area had more than 1,600 visitors one day last weekend.
"We're just in a slot where we're getting hammered," said Edholm. "And it's snowing heavily right now."
The Big Mountain in Whitefish has also been on the storm track.
"Well, last year we were downloading people to the bottom of the mountain and this year we have about 20 groomed runs open," said Big Mountain communication director Dan Virkstis.
Virkstis said the early season snow has been incredibly light, putting the resort in the position of needing skiers to "take a little of the air out."
"It hasn't really settled down yet, so we're urging caution when people are off the groomed runs," he said.
Big Mountain, which historically tries to get at least part of the mountain open at Thanksgiving, is offering $25 lift tickets through Dec. 19. The mountain has also opened up a new ski-in, ski-out lodge, the Morning Eagle Lodge, for this winter season.
Snowbowl, where visitors will be greeted by a larger parking lot, opened a small part of the area last weekend. The Missoula ski area will be open through the Thanksgiving weekend.
Snowbowl's Ronnie Morris said the area was "slammed" with people, although much of the mountain isn't quite ready to open. Where the mountain is open, however, Morris said snow conditions are "very good."
"We don't have much groomed yet," she said.
Blacktail Mountain, near Lakeside, opened Friday, but the Missoulian couldn't reach the area by telephone. The resort's Web site says the mountain will be open through the weekend, then operate on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays through Dec. 17, when it will open every day through Jan. 4.
Lost Trail Powder Mountain, south of Darby on the Montana-Idaho border, has yet to set an opening date.
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