GUIDED TO THE GOODS

Making The Most From Your Jackson Hole Adventure

It’s 6pm, mid-February and I’m sitting in a café bar in Chamonix, poring over weather charts and snow forecasts desperate to see a glimmer of hope and the slightest sign of some storm activity for the Alps. Aside from a big snow fall in early January there hasn’t been a snowflake since.

I refresh my forecasts for the umpteenth time that day hoping for a change in the storm update. There is nothing on the horizon for the Alps, but on the other side of the globe a stack of storms and the jet-stream are lining up, stretching all the way across the Pacific from Japan with a torrent of moisture and cold air that’s set to slam into the entire stretch of western mountains of the USA. I can’t help myself. I make a split decision to pack, catch a shuttle down to Geneva and 12 hours later I check in on a flight back to Jackson Hole.

It wasn’t days of powder skiing that unfolded – it was weeks. 10cm, 20cm, 30cm, sometimes 40cm of snow fell on a daily basis. When the last lift rolled at Easter marking the close of the season Jackson Hole confirmed the most in-season snow ever reported at 594” in Rendevous Bowl.

This place is so big and has so many nooks and crannies that depending on the direction of the storm you really need to know your stuff to hone in on the sweet spots. It’s easy to get overwhelmed, and when there’s surreal top-shelf storm skiing on offer this vast playground can be too much to take in.

If you go it alone, for sure, you’ll stumble across plenty of decent stashes, but you can also easily get lured to follow the herd along the main runs and waste precious time at the bottom of Thunder when you could have been wallowing in untracked powder in one of the many special lesser known zones. There’s 2,500 acres to play in at Jackson – and that’s just inbounds. So, the maths isn’t hard to work out. There are plenty of ‘choose your own adventure’ options to explore. Once you add in the side and back country on the edges of this monster mountain your skiing is only limited by how much your legs and courage can handle.

This is where a mountain guide is a super smart idea and pays off in spades. You’ve invested your hard-earned money and time flying to the US. You’re frothing on getting up to the mountain and skiing its legendary cowboy powder. You’ve heard the stories and you’re ready to add a notch to your ski belt.

It’s an easy mistake to make – thinking it’s a matter of simply turning up and jumping on the infamous “Big Red” tram and then assuming the best runs of your life will unfold before you.

The tram will indeed deliver you to the top of the legendary Rendevous mountain and you’ll be shoulder to shoulder with locals, legends and pro athletes as you listen to the ‘don’t know, don’t go’ safety speech as you pull in up top next to Corbett’s Cabin.

If you click in and point it down you’re going to get a helluva run. You could do tram laps and follow the trail map all day and you’d be grinning and tired at the end. But I invite you to take your experience to a whole other level and discover parts of this place it would otherwise take you a lifetime to work out.

Left: I bet you wouldn’t find this place without a guide. Shroder Baker in his backyard.

IT WASN’T DAYS OF POWDER SKIING THAT UNFOLDED – IT WAS WEEKS. 10CM, 20CM, 30CM, SOMETIMES 40CM OF SNOW FELL ON A DAILY BASIS.

Ski with a local guide. It’s hands down the best investment you can make to unlock this imposing place, to get home in one piece and to connect with some special insiders who will help you get a glimpse of their extraordinary backyard. The guides of Jackson Hole are some of the most legendary, accomplished and unassuming skiers you’ll find anywhere. The line up here includes Dave Miller, Dave “The Wave” Muccino, Jeff Zell and Chris Leveroni among others, some of the founding members of the legendary Jackson Hole Air Force and pioneers of Alaskan big mountain guiding fraternity.

Or you might have a legendary athlete like Lynsey Dyer sharing their favourite spots and taking you through terrain you’ll recognise from famous ski film segments. Occasionally you come around a corner to find Kai Jones throwing cab 900s off a cliff filming with local production house Teton Gravity Research or Jeff Leger and Schroder Baker being photographed by Chris Figenshau (who gets his fair share of face shots in between banging off frames for the Jackson Hole marketing crew).

You’d be forgiven for thinking locals might be tempted to hide their ‘secret’ spots away from blow-ins like you and I, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. Guides here love skiing the best conditions as much as you do and take real pride in showing off their mountain in the best light and blowing you away. If they can drop you into one of the best ski days of your life, they’ll do it. I can’t recommend strongly enough the difference that getting a guide (or joining one of Jackson’s Backcountry or Steep and Deep camps) will make to unlocking terrain and experiences you’d never manage rolling solo.

A final note – and an important one. Like all hospitality and service industries in the US it’s customary to tip your guide. They are giving you a high-end service so make sure you have cash ready and tip generously. Don’t be one of those losers that gives Aussie skiers a bad reputation by not doing so. The guides are sharing so much more than a paid service on the day, they are generously sharing the wealth of experience they’ve amassed over decades of skiing so you can slipstream into a superior ski day.

Left page top: Jeff Ledger with a bit of frozen mo action going on. Left page bottom: High mountains, dry snow, cold smoke. This page top: As photographers we like to get our fair share in between shots. Here’s local legend photog Chris Figenshau scoring his fix. Middle left to right: Dave Miller, one of the vast array of legendary guides, Being guided in small groups is almost as good as heli skiing, and a lot more affordable, Shroder neck deep whilst every where else was being tracked out. Next page top: How many nooks and crannies can you count on this mountain? You’d be lucky to find a quarter of them without a guide. Next page sequence: Jeff Ledger dolphining in the goodness away from the masses. Last page: Max Bardas frolicking in-bounds. It pays to be shown where to go.

TAKE YOUR EXPERIENCE TO A WHOLE OTHER LEVEL AND DISCOVER PARTS OF THIS PLACE IT WOULD OTHERWISE TAKE YOU A LIFETIME TO WORK OUT. SKI WITH A LOCAL GUIDE.